Bribing, Funny Faces, and Pigtails.

If someone were to ask us to describe Lenora in one word, we wouldn’t be able to answer. We would however say she is psychotic, lunatic, crazy, goofy, silly, sneaky, smart, and a big helper. Sometimes I wish I knew what Lenora was thinking when she tries to feed her snacks to the people on TV and her Elmo which I’m constantly removing day old snacks from his mouth, or when she comes up and licks your leg for no reason, or why she likes to yell at you until you “pretend” cry so she can hug you and say “I love you”, and why she thinks it’s okay to hide in the pantry until mommy almost dies from panic because she is missing, I could go on forever. Oh and just as a side note-she could finish a whole jar of baby dill pickles in one day (I have never let her though).

Today I tried real pigtails, we usually just do silly ones on top, but I decided now that she is older she deserves a big girl hairstyle! 

Then I of course had to take a photo, and after trying 27 times I cut her off a small piece of an otter pop (To bribe her) it kind of worked.  As I’m prompting her to make all kinds of faces, she does exactly the opposite. These are the results….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ROASTING PUMPKIN'S

Last night we cut up and roasted 2 giant pumpkins (also toasting the seeds, yummy). I made extra pie crusts to freeze and have on hand, and also plan on making something called “Pumpkin Butter” with all the puree. We now have 32 cups of pumpkin puree! It took me a couple hours, and it managed to burn up one blender- but I had a second base on backup (long story). So this Fall I’ll hopefully be making lots of pies, breads, muffins, and oooh pumpkin scones!

Back to carving- Lenora was absolutely disgusted by the innards of a pumpkin! She ran away, hid, and kept saying “eww, dirty, icky”, yet she had no problem whacking them with wooden spoons, and kicking them and when Lenora has a wooden spoon or other long object she is not one to be messed with (flash back to my ankle getting hit with her plastic broom, and swelling to the size of a lime almost instantly)  

Enjoy the pictures.

 

This is her go to look now for photos.

 

 



Assaulting the pumpkin.

 

Hiding from us and the pumpkins.

 



Must of got some on her arm.







 

 

32 cups of pureed pumpkin.

PUMPKIN PATCH

Today we took Lenora to the pumpkin patch. It’s so crazy to think that she will almost be 2 years old, and last year when we took her to the pumpkin patch she was only 9 months old and couldn’t even crawl yet (back when we could actually take her places without dramatics) Today she was such a good girl, but strangely did not want to pose for any photo’s like usual.

We took her to a farm today where you could not only pick pumpkins but also pick Asian pears, Fuji apples, Squash (acorn & butternut), and we even got some onions. It was also a very quiet farm, not a lot of people and it was free to get in. All together I think we got 3 pumpkins, 2 butternut squash, 1 acorn, a bunch of apples and pears, and some onions for only $16! Asian pears were 0.50 cents a pound!! Amazing! I think I’ll try and make a pear tart.

 

PUMPKIN PATCH 2011 (LENORA 9 MONTHS OLD)

Outside

Playing outside with Lenora today! It was 82 degrees and the perfect weather for sprinkler/pool. She loves it outside and the poor little girl is just beside herself when it rains, she’ll sit and cry by the sliding door.

She did some swimming, picked some flowers, screamed at the kids in the neighbor’s yard, and barked back at the dogs. It was a good day!  

My Little Helper

Lenora has always been such a great little helper, as you can see from the photos. She recently started helping unroll all the toilet paper but I have yet to catch that on camera. She likes to throw everything in the bathtub because when we are getting ready for a bath I let her throw in her ducky’s, her wash cloth, and her soap, but if I’m not paying attention she’ll also throw in the clothes she just took off, her diaper, the toilet paper and whatever else is in arms reach. Today she was supposed to be helping me with folding the laundry (bottom two pictures) but instead she was doing barrel rolls all over the piles and wiping her snotty nose on all the clothes, which was my fault because she watched me smell one of the towels so naturally she had to as well.  I love her lots, even though she makes a bigger mess for mommy to clean up. I know I could stop her before the mess gets to out of control, but she's generally having fun and I don't like to disturb her. How can you resist that sweet face staring at you while doing a hand stand!

  

Lenora's First Birthday

So FINALLY after almost a month I am sitting down to write about Lenora's first birthday. I've literally had no time to just sit here at the computer. Her party turned out better than I could have imagined. The chicken that I had been simmering all day in the crock pot for tacos was the best thing I've ever eaten, and the cake was too good to be true (especially her adorable little smash cake), the cake lady really out did herself.  It was a wonderful evening of good food, great company, and Lenora got to play with her friends! 

Here are some photos and a video from her party. Our camera was acting awful and it wouldn’t let us use the flash so all the pictures turned out grainy or blurry (very bad lighting). We did managed to get some good ones though, but it's so sad.

  

Sharing with Grandpa

Trying to wash the cake out of her hair.

Happy Birthday from Red Robin

Today Lenora turned 1! Since Mart had today off we took her to Red Robin for lunch. She had so much fun saying “HI” to anyone who would listen, and eating her Chicken on a stick.  When we were all finished the staff brought Lenora an ice cream sundae and sang her a Happy Birthday song. She stuck her fingers in the whip cream, and I gave her 2 small bites of the ice cream, then out of nowhere she projectile puked onto the table! Luckily it was a quick puke that didn’t get onto her face or clothes (just the table, it went far, kind of funny, I've never seen anything like it. ) so we threw some napkins over it and no one saw.  The puking didn’t even faze her, and she went about like nothing happened. She had too full of a tummy and too much excitement.

Walking

Lenora finally started walking on January 29th, 2012. To my surprise she just got up one day and took a step, although she still prefers to walk on her knees. She gets so excited when she walks that she ends up falling. She doesn’t do much crawling anymore. No matter, I am still proud of her. She made it before the 1 year mark which is tomorrow!!

SNOW!

Lenora’s first experience in the snow!

She loved it.

Planning Lenora's 1st Birthday

I can’t believe it’s that time already…FIRST BIRTHDAY! Well since party planning is one of my favorite things to do, planning small party for Lenora just wouldn’t be possible; so we decided to not throw her one at all and to just do a dinner with family and a few friends. Works for me. Especially since Lenora won’t remember it. We’ll save the theatrics and streamers for her 2^nd or 3^rd birthday; I’m thinking Mad Hatter Tea Party!  Anyway, so I decided to do some DIY invites. I went with a BRIGHT colored theme since Lenora is a silly goofball! 

To top it all off I found this perfect shirt for her at Fred Meyer today, and it was 50% off, SCORE! I also made her a hair pretty to match.