Happy Happy 1st Birthday and A Monkey

Well, after a year this girl is 1!! I wonder if when she first saw us a year ago, she thought "What these two?" But we have all come so far since that very exciting day. Mike got over the fear of holding her very quickly and now he prefers to hold her over putting her in a shopping cart.

Our day started with some breakfast with Daddy, just like any other day. Chloe had no clue about the significance of today. But that is to be expected. With that said I was so stressed about making it such a memorable birthday until after listening to the advice of Mike and my mom. She isn't going to remember any of it. I then admitted I was worried about the pictures to have proof that we did something for the momentous occasion.

Mike came home early from work today and we went birthday shopping. What fun, for us. First we went to the big box store and raided the toy aisles for the toys from Mom and Dad. I chose the red barn with animals and Mike choose the big bag of over sided Lego's (Lego's were his favorite toy from childhood). Then down the road to the mall. Chloe received a gift from her cousins to go to Build-A-Bear. This turned out to be more fun that we had expected (still cheesy but fun). Chloe and I had scoped it out earlier today so we had an idea of what we were looking for. Mike and I choose 3 animals, soft bear, soft dog and a monkey. We put them on the floor, as Jori suggested, and let her crawl to them. As you can see in the pictures below, she choose the monkey both times. She even displayed one of her new tricks by giving the monkey a big "squeeze."

First time

Second time

So we got the monkey stuffed, which scared Chloe to tears, gave it a bath, some cool sunglasses...

and we were done. As you see below Monkey went to bed with Chloe tonight. After all this I think Chloe was done for the night. She ate some dinner, got cranky, tore her birthday cupcake a part (she didn't like it), had a bath, and enjoyed her playtime with Daddy and the blocks. Mike would try and build a tower and Chloe would tear it apart faster than he could build. She is starting the take things apart stage. The silver lining is she is into putting small things inside other things, so clean up is also a fun game for her.

Our bedtime routine tonight was a little crowded with Lovey and Monkey. Hopefully this is only temporary. But we will do anything for a teething one year old right now.

We hope this gave all those far a way a chance to take part in Chloe's birthday. (sorry I can't upload any more of the pictures due to Blogger errors. I will try later.)