Happy First Birthday, Libby!

In between all of the gift-exchanging, wine-and-cheese consuming and back-and-forth driving, who could forget that someone special was turning ONE over our holiday break?!

It is amazing to think that it has been a full year since we welcomed little Libby into our lives. When you're expecting a baby (or have a newborn), anyone and everyone will tell you, "Enjoy it--it goes by so fast." I seriously must have heard this from at least 743 people in the first month of Libby's life. Not one of those 743 people were lying. It really doesn't seem like all that long ago that it was just me, Tom and the dogs, yet our "pre-Libby" lives feel so far away. What in the world did we DO with all of our time before her?! Now I just smile when I hear people without kids say they are "so busy." Libby has changed everything in our lives--I drink coffee now, I shop at the budget-friendly Aldi, I could pour a perfect 8 ounce bottle in my sleep--what a different world from the one I lived in just 12 months ago.

But enough about ME in the past 12 months. For as far as I've come as a mom, Libby's got me beat by leaps and bounds. Remember this little peanut we brought home a year ago?


Sure she was cute and wonderful and we loved her from the moment we met her, but let's be honest--she didn't do a whole heck of a lot. She slept and ate and all that, but that was about it. And for a little person who didn't really do much, she sure kept us busy. Feedings on 2 hour intervals at all hours of the day and night, shushing and walking around the house to calm her during those fussy evenings, cleaning up spit up puddles every time we turned around. Whew, it was exhausting. But she was cuddly and she smelled like new baby and she would nap on the couch with you when you were exhausted from being up with her all night.

Then, just as we were settling into life with a newborn, we suddenly had a baby on our hands. In an instant, she could roll off the bed if we weren't looking (and, yes, if you must know, she did--I never said I was perfect). She actually smiled at us and started making sounds other than just those dreaded 2 a.m. wails. "It surely can't get any better than this," we thought.

And then it did. She was like a little person all of the sudden! She could crawl and eat the same foods that we ate and she made sounds that sounded like real words! She laughed at us and slept like an angel and had her very own fabulous personality. "Okay, it really can't get any better than this," we thought.


But as the experienced, been-there-done-that mom of a one-year-old that I am, let me assure you, it does. My baby is a toddler. And she is funny--she plays peek-a-boo and she mimics her Daddy's laugh. She is feisty and independent--just try to help her find the spout on her milk cup or break a cracker in half and watch the drama ensue. She is over-the-top friendly--she will wave and smile at anyone, any time. She is smart (and I bet I would think so even if I wasn't her mom)--she says "mama," "dada," "bye bye," "hi," "Bauer," "night-night," "cracker," "cookie," "hot" AND can tell you what a dog or a bobcat says. If that's not impressive, I don't know what is. It can't possibly get any better than this...can it?


I can only hope so. Happy 1st Birthday, Libby.