Happy Birthday, Elena!

Our sweet girl turned one on the 17th! She is such a happy and lovable kid and we are so blessed to be her parents. It is funny how she has really started to seem older and more independent since her birthday. She has always been talkative, but now she knows so many real words. She says: book, banana, hi, bye-bye, ball, mom, dad, baby, etc. She can also tell you what sounds a monkey and a dog make as well as where her tummy, ears, hair, eyes, etc are. She is getting more adventurous too. Although she takes steps each day (2-4 before she falls), she isn't walking yet. She sure doesn't let that slow her down though. Sometimes she crawls so fast that she trips herself up, and she loves to cruise around furniture/people and crawl over and around things. She is so much fun to have around. :)

My mom came to visit on Wednesday and we have had a great time (my Dad had work and a conference in Maryland). She was so excited to be here for the big day. On her birthday Elena opened some presents in the morning and we went to the Children's Museum between her two naps. Her favorite parts of the museum were the hollowed-out treehouse with baby dolls and the Krispy Kreme make-believe factory.

Amazingly enough we woke up to snow on the 17th. The last time that it snowed here was on January 18th last year (I woke up to see snow the morning after Elena was born). This past weeks snowfall was our biggest storm in a couple of years. Seriously, they canceled school the night before in preparation. The house looked like this:

Saturday the 19th was the day of Elena's little party. We invited her friends that she knows well from play dates. I was so happy that everyone was able to come. We had a great time and it was nice to let her enjoy spending time with so many of her favorite people all at once. Here are a couple of pictures from the party. These first two pictures were taken at the end of the party when we tried to get all of the kids onto the carpet so that I could have one picture with all of the children in it. It almost worked. :)
(Notice: Cute 11 week old Michael propped up on the couch behind all the kids.)

Pizza/hot dogs for lunch...
...and chocolate cake for dessert.
It was a blast! We love our Elenita!