Anyone who knows me knows that I am totally a Christmas fan. I wait all year for the holiday season and then I decorate to the max while watching Christmas movies and drinking hot chocolate. So other holidays pale in comparison for me. Now that I have a baby, though, it is important to me to make all holidays special in some way. Easter was no exception. I put up some Easter decorations and even found an Easter special on DVD at Target. But as with most things, I had a bad mom moment along with some good mom moments.

My brother Mason is leaving on Friday to be a professional water skier in Germany for 8 months. I know that sounds like I am making stuff up, but it is true. It is going to be such an awesome experience for him, but we are going to miss him an awful lot. So my dad decided to put together a little family party for him.

Of course, my family never plans anything in advance, so on Saturday afternoon, I received this as a picture message.

Because my family is awesome, we all automatically RSVP’d without even thinking it was weird in any way. We also clarified that this could include snow sculptures and that my dad was the judge. Andrew and I put on our thinking caps and came up with a plan for our sculpture.

Today we celebrated Mac’s first birthday with a small, family party. She was first apprehensive, then loved being the center of attention, and then was too tired to function. So it was a great party.

For Christmas, Andrew got a green screen stand that we have since used a few times as a party background. It worked great to hang a “Happy Birthday” banner on. We also served sandwiches, veggies and dip, buffalo chicken dip with tortilla chips, and Ikea veggie balls (for us vegetarians and vegans.)

I cannot believe that Mac is a year old now! She is such a ray of light in our lives. Her favorite things include Ralph, Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, and books. She will eat anything we put in front of her which includes kale, quinoa, sweet potatoes, broccoli. The girl loves to eat!

Mac is always on the go! I took this picture about a month ago (so please excuse the Christmas tree.) We bought her a pair of big girl shoes. She looks a bit apprehensive, but she asks to wear them now. Not only does she run after Ralph, she also is practicing jumping off of her little couch and also does down dog to view the world from a different point of view.

In less than a week, Mac will have her birthday. It feels like just yesterday she was born. My fragile infant is now a big girl who walks, almost talks, and doesn’t need many cuddles anymore.

She has been walking for almost three months now and even runs, but only if she has something she isn’t supposed to or if Ralph is chasing her.

We have had Mac in our lives for just over 6 weeks now and we have finally fallen into sort of a rhythm. Mac does like to mix things up, so things still aren’t consistent day-to-day. But overall, she is a great baby who eats and sleeps like a champ. I figured it was time for another photo dump.

Here is our baby burrito all wrapped after a good night of sleep.

I haven’t blogged in 3 weeks now, which is weird. I was on such a good schedule. It’s almost like I don’t have any free time anymore. But I have had a little time to pick out some cute pictures to show off.

Overall, life is good. Mac is a great baby the majority of the time. She sleeps through most of the night, is a champion eater, and isn’t too fussy. Plus she is cute, so I can’t even be that mad when she is fussy.

We even had our first non-doctor outing yesterday. Mac and I went to visit the toddlers at my school and Andrew’s coworkers at his office. She slept the entire time, which meant everything went great. I’m looking forward to her getting even older so we can start doing fun things, but of course I’ll also miss how small and cuddly she is right now.

She cracks us up with her faces. She is incredibly expressive.