The Beach for my birthday!

We went to the beach at Dauphin Island for my birthday. It was a beautiful day, and we had a great time! Briley LOVED it! This was her first real time at the beach.
The first thing she wanted to do was climb all over the beach chairs. She is such a monkey! When we tried to eat lunch, she ended up eating more sand than sandwich! She was absolutely wild, which made it not so relaxing for us!

She had a hard time walking on the sand. She would take 2 or 3 steps, then plop down on her bottom. I bet she did that 100 times!
Maddox was easy. He was content to dig in the sand. He could do that for hours!
We took a stroll down to a little tide pool to cool off.
Well, when Miss Briley saw the big water, she made a run for it!

She belly-laughed every time the waves would crash on her feet. She loves water!

After an hour or so, she finally chilled out in her daddy's lap for a few minutes!

This is how they looked before we even got out of the parking-lot!

11 Months Old!

The birthday party invitations are in the mail, and I can hardly believe it! This year has been a blur! I really wish it hadn't gone by so fast, but then again, those first few months were hard! Briley is really getting to be a fun age. Her little personality is really coming out. She has already started pitching little fits when she doesn't get her way. Not fun!
She still isn't saying a word, but she can meow, moo, and quack. She also yells really loud sometimes, so I taught her to say "shhh". She also likes to try to imitate her brother. Today, Maddox was pretending that one of his toys was a water hose. He gave the toy to Briley and she did the exact same thing. She idolizes him!!
After my excitement at Kindermusik a couple of weeks ago, Briley is still crawling about 85% of the time! She does like to walk if she's holding someone's hand. She was whining tonight for her daddy to hold her hand and walk her around the house. He was trying to encourage her to walk on her own. Well, guess who won!!
Briley now has 7 teeth with at least one more coming any day now. She has been a very fussy teether! I'll be glad when she has all her teeth!!
She is still taking 2 good naps every day and is still drinking 5 bottles a day, some 6 oz., but mostly 4 oz. I don't think she'll be too hard to wean from the bottle. She LOVES finger foods! She would sit in her highchair for an hour eating, if I would let her!

This girl is a daredevil! She loves to climb!

She was loving this corn-on-the-cob!


Climbing again!



She loves her pink Woo-Woo. Britt says he wouldn't have it any other way.
What a ham!

Easter fun!

Maddox was invited to an egg hunt at his friend Joseph's house.

We also went to an egg hunt at Matthew's house on Fowl River.

The sweetest little easter bunny!
This butterfly net was Maddox's favorite gift from the Easter bunny! He didn't care that much about his chocolate bunny this year (thankfully!)



We had a wonderful church service and got some great pictures afterwards!



Maddox had ANOTHER egg hunt after lunch (Briley was napping). He had a blast! Briley will be right there with him next year, I'm sure!

First Steps

On Friday, March 26, Briley took her first steps! We were in Kindermusik playing maracas while listening to a song called "Hop Up, My Baby". On the word "up" we were holding our maracas up over our heads. I was impressed that Briley was holding her maracas up at just the right time in the song!
Then, she decided to crawl to the middle of the circle, stand up, and start walking. She took about 3 steps, fell, got back up, took 3 more, fell again, got back up and took 3 or 4 more steps! I started yelling over the music "she's walking, she's never done that before"! Mrs. G stopped the music and we all started clapping and cheering for her. I was trying my best not to cry!
She has been standing alone for several weeks now, so I was just waiting for those steps to come! She hasn't walked too much since then. She did walk from the coffee table to the back windows when Bae was keeping her on Sunday.
But, she's also had an ear infection and a high fever this weekend, so I think that slowed the walking process. She will be all over the place before we know it!
The picture at the top and the one below were from later Friday afternoon. We have not been able to catch her walking on video yet. I will post that as soon as we can catch it!


Here are a few pictures from the Egg Hunt at church Sunday.

10 months old!

It's hard to believe we will be celebrating Briley's first birthday soon! The past year has flown by! Briley is such a sweet baby. She is a mommy's girl right now. She squeezes me so tight when someone else tries to hold her!
Although she still hasn't said her first word, she has learned a few new "tricks" in the past month. She does the sign for "more" and even signs it when daddy says "mas". Britt is doing a great job teaching these kids Spanish! She also copies some sounds that we make, like "meow". She makes her voice really high!
She is also standing alone for several seconds. I'm really surprised that she's not walking yet. I'm hoping she will be by Easter, but we'll see.
Briley has already given up baby food. She won't let me feed her with a spoon at all! It's all finger foods for her. She thinks she's so big!
The girl loves to climb on things and crawl under things (like the bed!). She's very adventurous!
She really is a good baby, as long as she stays on her nap and bedtime schedule!