We ended up having a pretty busy Halloween this year.  To start, we did Henlie's one year photos in the day.  We were going to do them around 11am, but my sewing machine started having issues, and I really wanted to finish the skirt I wanted her to wear in them.  Fortunately, Mom's house was open, even though she was off playing with Charlie and Camile, so I could borrow her machine.  It was pretty quick with a sewing machine that actually works! haha  I asked Sarah if we could bump the shoot, and she had me bump it even more because her husband had taken the car to work that had some of her equipment in it lol.  We did eventually make it out to West Mountain to do Henlie's pictures.

My little girl would NOT sit still. She wanted to run all around.  She'd run over to Sarah, and Sarah would let her see herself on the camera.  Henlie didn't get the concept of how she got there, though lol.  I did a lot of running around and a lot of treat giving.  I'm pretty sure her lunch consisted of rice puffs and then her birthday cake :)  I've only seen one teaser photo from the shoot so far, but hopefully Sarah has them edited by today (that was the last estimate I'd heard from her :)).

During the smash cake portion, I took video and some (okay, a lot) of shots myself.  I'm glad I videoed it.  It was entertaining, especially when she lost a couple of the pearl candy sprinkles under her skirt and she went hunting for them! haha!

After we got home and gave the baby girl a bath (she was SO covered in frosting.  Yes, that was the point, but at the same time . . . baby wipes kind of sucked at getting it off and de-stickifying her), we had to decide what to do next.  I was exhausted after chasing her around, and we still didn't have any candy for the trick or treaters!  I eventually decided to dress her and the dog up and visit the grandparents.  Matt had school, so he wasn't home.  I also didn't dress myself up.  First stop, Hadfields. (We always stay longer than we intend, poor girl went to bed late, but she did fine with that fact, thank goodness.)




When we got there, Grandma and Grandpa were in the shop with some friends.  We then migrated to the house, but first we got a cute little witches hat (probably for a doll, in actuality :))  Grandma and her cousin/friend/I'm still not sure who she is just LOVED Mocha.  She does make a pretty cute butterfly.  Because of Henlie's spots on her costume, Grandma was reminded of a quilt she had in her shop.  It's green with jungle animals, and bordered in some giraffe-looking fabric.  That was Henlie's trick-or-treat :)  (It's a great blanket. The back is all fuzzy.  We may or may not use it in the living room when we get chilly :))

After Hadfield's (and almost forgetting my sunglasses and actually forgetting Henlie's coat - don't worry, we realized before we left Lehi and were able to go back to get it), we went down to Provo to Grandma and Grandpa Covalt's.  Grandma was either not home or was laying down because she didn't feel well (I'm not really sure which it was), but we chatted with Grandpa Covalt for a minute.  He gave us a sucker.  No picture as we didn't actually go in and sit down.

Then it was off to Springville and Mapleton.  Fortunately, Christiansens, Erdmanns, and Wilsons all live near each other in a (relatively) straight shot.  This was good as it was already late.


We went to Grandma and Grandpa Christiansen's first, but they weren't home and the porch light was off.  We tried the door, and it was open, but no one was home.  Apparently Grandma was off trick-or-treating with Randy and Janel and kids, but they arrived shortly after we broke in ;)  Henlie loved following Owen around, probably because he had a sucker haha.  Grandma gave us a tootsie-pop for our pumpkin, and then gave her another tootsie-pop so she would have a sucker of her own.  Later, she also had a strawberry tootsie roll.  I'm pretty sure Holland helped with that one ;)




Next stop was Erdmann's.  We visited for awhile and got a couple little fun-size candybars for Mom and Dad.  Henlie was rather interested in Grandma's teddy bears.  She even let Grandpa pick her up.  It was cute - she was laying across his tummy getting tickles and giggling :)



Last on our trip was Wilson's.  We got some more goodies and visited for a few minutes before heading home.  After all, Daddy had already made it home from class, so we were in trouble! :)

It was fun visiting all of her great-grandparents and showing off Halloween costumes.  Another plus? We didn't need to buy candy for any trick-or-treaters because we weren't home haha. Although, Matt did ask me to pick up candy for 1/2 price since I was going to the store on Friday anyway :)

The Hadfield Halloween party was on Saturday, Oct. 26th.  This also happened to be the day we did family pictures :)  After pictures up the canyon, we sped back down with a brief stop by Denise's house to drop off final copies of the Primary program for the next day - just in case I failed to make it to sacrament meeting, as often happens.  We got home and hurried to change into our costumes and head to Mom's house.  Most of my pictures were blurry :(, but fortunately, Mom put hers in our Dropbox folder, so I can have some less than blurry ones :)

To be honest, I was much more excited for Henlie and Matt's costumes than my own.  In fact, I pretty much just threw mine together.

Matt was Dr. Robert Chase from House.  We've been watching House for awhile (the last disc should come in the mail from Netflix today - so sad!) Anyway, he and Chase are a lot alike and even kind of look like each other, so I decided that was who he was going to be for Halloween haha.  We bought the labcoat, borrowed the stethoscope, and I edited a replicated name tag off of DeviantArt (thank you thank you thank you person with mad artistic skills! haha) and used a clip from his old missionary tag to attach it to his coat.



I had already planned Henlie's costume when I was pregnant based off of the onesie I bought on Zulily.  And then I found the shoes on Zulily while still pregnant haha.  I made her ears and her tail.  There is a wire hanger in them to give them shape, unfortunately, that made her tail pretty heavy, so I had to pin it to her shirt if I wanted it to stay up :)  I glued the ears onto clips so we could put them right in her hair or on a headband.  We went with a headband this year.  I then drew on her face with eyeliner.  She rubbed her nose right off and I had to reapply when we got in the house.  Isn't she an adorable little cheetah/leopard/something cat?


I was Little Red Riding Hood.  I've had this red cape for ages (and yes, it does have a hood, I'm just not wearing it :))  I was going to wear my broomstick skirt, but it turns out I'd already given it to the DI :) So, I was a little more modern in my under-cape attire.  I bought the basket at DI for $1 on the same shopping trip I picked up Matt's lab coat (at *not* the DI - that's a full price actual lab coat, friends.  The store was just really close to the DI :))  I put a jar of honey in it and wrapped a Powerade or Gatorade bottle in a linen dishcloth to make it look like a loaf of bread.  The basket was also a handy place for my phone and the aforementioned eyeliner. Oh, and Mocha's headband. Yeah, we had the dog, too :)


So, Mocha! I'd almost forgotten her :) (Neither picture is from the party... apparently we didn't love her enough to take any of her that night haha)  Zulily had dog costumes on one day for actually decent prices, and there was the cutest butterfly costume.  At the time, I had money, so I ordered it for her.  Now our puppy has two to choose from :)



Mostly we hung out and had some dinner.  There was also an activity going on downstairs for the kids, and then there was the chicken dance performed upstairs haha  We love getting to spend time with our family!  And now, some random pictures from the evening. Enjoy!

Okay, now that I have Henlie's birthday posts up, we need to backtrack a little bit.  Recall our busy day on Tuesday, Oct. 22nd?  Well, we had another fun-filled day on Thursday, Oct. 24th too.

We had tried to take Charlie and Henlie swimming earlier, but the pool was closed for cleaning.  Since we had another warm spell (yay!), we tried again.  Fortunately, the pool was open.  They previously had issues with the pool cover, and I hadn't been since it had been fixed.  It took me a minute to find where to open it now.  Camile had the girls in the bathroom with her while I opened the pool.

We had lots of fun playing with Charlie and Camile in the pool.  It was great because no one else was there :)  Henlie loved it, for the most part ;)  We practiced floating, and there were even a couple of times I could remove one hand for a second.  We tried going underwater, and she did okay with it.  Good thing too because on one trip to sit on the top step, we didn't quite reach, and she fell under.  She didn't seem too traumatized by it.  We had fun playing with Charlie's squirt toys and kicking our frog beach ball.  She loved it when I'd bounce up and down (I was so sore for a couple of days after this...)  She thought it was funny when I'd blow bubbles under the water.  Now we have a whole lot of swim diapers to use before she gains another 6 pounds :)  Too bad I hate walking to the pool in the cold!

I started planning Henlie's birthday party between 9 and 10 months.  Granted, initially it took me awhile to decide on a theme lol.  Once that was decided, I could get into full planning mode.  The last month to month and a half has been actually putting things together for her party.  Yay for Pinterest! hahaha

Initially the theme was "vintage" but it turned a bit into "shabby chic." The final theme was Purple and Pearls.

Once I was finished eating, we got down to the presents!






After presents, we stripped her down and let her have her cake.  After her birthday photoshoot on Halloween, she had a better idea of what this was for and how to do it :)







Thanks to everyone who came to our little party! We had a great time and Henlie got some wonderful gifts that she truly enjoys!

It's pretty crazy to think it has been a year since we welcomed a tiny little baby into our lives.  She has been the most exhausting, trying, fun, and rewarding little person.  I love watching her grow and learn, explore and test her limits.  It has been fun to watch her personality emerge as she becomes her own person.  She's a charmer.  She's observant.  She's also sneaky.

This month, we were really affected by separation anxiety, but only with sleeping and directly after napping.  During the day, she is fine going off and playing on her own, or hanging out with Grandma or the ladies in the primary presidency.  At night (or nap time, sometimes), it could be a lot harder to get out of her room.  Usually she's okay at the beginning of the night, but if she wakes up, it can be a challenge to get her back to sleep.  We would lay her back down, and she would lay there (which she has been preferring her tummy with her legs tucked under her), then sit up and look for us.  Once she saw us, she would lay back down for a minute.  This would happen for quite awhile, and then sometimes she would get too awake and start grinning at us and wanting to play.  It made for some long nights.  We had even started bringing her to our bed when she woke up in the early morning, just to get a little bit more sleep.  (It seemed to get everyone a bit more sleep, at least :)) With napping, if she woke up crying, she would be awfully clingy for a good while before she would be okay go-go-going again.  Like, I couldn't even set her on the floor next to me to do something that required two hands (like put on a jacket to take the dog out).  Her life is rough.


In order to help her get to sleep (which she got better later in the month with sleeping again.  It is probably just a teething thing.  Oh those teeth.....) I have started singing to her.  Primary songs.  We start with I Am a Child of God, and sometimes I pull them up on my phone and we just keep singing songs.  I still prefer nights she falls asleep after nursing and I can just lay her down without incident, though :)

As for eating, I have still been buying jarred baby food.  Mostly because it's easier and I'm sure it's a more healthy option than what I may find for her otherwise.  Most of the time, I don't even know what to do for myself for lunch.... At the beginning of the month, we were still nursing between 4 and 6 times in a 24 hour period (4 if she didn't wake at night, and another 1 or 2 times if she needed it to calm down to go back to sleep in the middle of the night).  She doesn't nurse for super long, so pumping at work is a little discouraging.  I rarely get more than 1.5 ounces per session.  Oh well :)  For that reason, I think weaning would be kind of nice (that, and it takes a serious chunk out of my shift to go pump twice in a shift).  




She wasn't so cooperative for pictures this month.  I just let her hair air dry after her bath, so it's kind of shaggy, too :)


At the end of the month, nursing was down to four times total.  Then right around her birthday, we dropped to three.  That same week, I dropped to one pumping session at work.  Weaning is around the corner!
 
About a week after turning 11 months, we introduced whole milk.  I know it is supposed to be at the one year mark, but surely some babies are developed enough to handle it before then.  Mostly, we were getting low on formula, and I didn't necessarily want to buy more.  I only put the milk in her oatmeal in the morning.  This also helps cut down on dishes since I don't have to fix a bottle to make her cereal with.  She has had no problems with the milk at all.  We ran out of formula just over a week before her birthday, so she now even gets to drink it from a cup or bottle when Mommy is at work.

Her tooth count at one year is four.  It seems once the first one broke through, all of the others that were making their way down wanted to join the party.  We thought the fourth tooth on top had broken through, but now, I don't think it did.  However, right around her birthday, she got her first bottom tooth! Center right.  However, going most of the month with only top teeth has made biting things a little difficult.  She has tried biting her Gerber's Lil' Curnchies (like cheetohs, but in multiple flavors).  It's fun to hear them crunch, but having no bottom teeth makes it hard to get all the way through them, so she ends up popping the whole thing in her mouth. :)

She loves books.  I know I mentioned last month her love of Moo, Baa, La La La! but now she loves turning pages and carting them around the house too.  It's super cute.  She'll even flip through the pages of a couple of small notebooks we have laying around.  She also will bring us a book.  She loves to sit back while we read to her.  She's pretty adorable.


As for speaking, she has a few "words" that sometimes even mean what they are supposed to.  "Ball" is the one that really means small round object.  She also says "mama" and "dada" (okay, like "dadadadadada").  I'm not sure she always means us when she says them though :)  We've also been practicing "duck" a little bit.  

She loves to play with the dog.  She will take Mocha's toys and run off with them.  Even if the dog isn't actually chasing after her, she thinks it's funny to run from the puppy.  She will bring us Mocha's squeaky gecko or spider for us to throw to the puppy.  The dog sometimes brings them back to Henlie.  Other times, Henlie goes to retrieve them herself from Mocha, only to give them to us to throw for the dog again.  I guess if our dog can't learn the concept of the game of fetch, between the two of them, we can play :)

She has become quite independent and has her own opinions about things.  Too bad she doesn't speak, so we have to resort to crying and tantrums.  (Whenever she's upset, she always throws her head and body backwards.  She usually hits her head, which results in more crying. I can't wait until she outgrows that reflex.)  She is getting better with walking and has ventured into some running.  It's cute.  Since she is so independent, it is super nice when she'll take us by the hand while we're walking somewhere.  It's also nice when she comes up and gives you a hug.  Sometimes she'll grab my legs from behind, and I'll peek down and play peek-a-boo between my legs.  She thinks that's funny.  I think it's adorable ;) 

We visited the doctor again for her 12 month check the morning of her birthday.  They are participating in a vaccine study to get another provider registered in the U.S. for the MMR vaccine.  We enrolled Henlie, so we were there for two hours.... that didn't help my party preparations :)  Poor girl got the standard 4 vaccines, plus a flu shot.  Then, for the vaccine study, they drew blood to get a baseline.  Since they were drawing blood and the iron indicator from her finger prick indicated her iron level might be a little low, we okayed them to take more blood to send to the lab to verify.  Poor girl didn't bleed quite enough for both tests on the first arm, so they had to draw blood from the second arm.  That was a total of 8 bandaids.  She wasn't a happy camper, even though they gave her a sucker during the blood draws.





She had fallen asleep on the way to the doctor's office.  After her ordeal at the doctor's she fell asleep again on the way home.  I let her nap in her car seat when we got home, and she felt better after that.  


Her measurements this month: weight=20 lbs 2 oz (56%), height=29.9 in (77%), and head circumference=17.7 in (52%).  We also got the lab results on her iron later that evening, and her levels were great.  She's a healthy little girl growing like a weed :)