For art's sake

It's never too soon to introduce arts and crafts, or is it? Mama and Charlotte had some fun with double-sided tape and some pieces of tissue paper. In between eating our art supplies, we made this:

Then I made some paste from flour and water and let Charlotte have at it. Of course, her first impulse was to dip her entire hand in the paste and put it on her face. But she eventually got the idea and made this:

 Lots of fun. Hopefully she will inherit her father's artistic abilities instead of mine :)

Charlotte turns one!

Charlotte celebrated her first birthday on November 9th. It's so hard to believe she is already a year old, and at the same time, we can hardly remember life without our sweet girl.

We had a birthday party for her with Grandma, Pops, Aunt Liz, Uncle E, Michelle (our nanny), the Maloneys (our nanny share family) and our friends across the street Heather & Paul and their son Zander. Matt and I had a lot of fun with the farm theme!

Matt's artistic abilities apparently extend to icing cakes, sculpting marzipan, and crafting animal hats. 

No surprise, Charlotte loved cake. The video is priceless. Faceplant @ 1:20!

Charlotte had a lot of fun ripping open the wrapping paper and especially loved her new shoes from Aunt Liz & Uncle E and her xylophone from Grandma & Pops.

First Halloween

Charlotte's official due date was October 28th, so naturally her costume-loving parents had hoped she would be a Halloween baby. No such luck- she came a week and a half late, which means that this year was her first Halloween. We dressed up as Charlotte's Web: Charlotte was the spider, I was Wilbur the pig, and Matt was Templeton the rat. We went to a party at the Gray's house to show off our cute costumes :)

Mermaid in distress

Grandma and Pops brought some of my old bath toys up to Seattle from storage in Monterey on their last trip down, and they were an immediate hit. Aunt Liz was visiting one evening at bath time and was playing a new game with Charlotte- mermaid in distress. The game consisted of Liz throwing the mermaid over the side of the tub, begging for rescue, climbing up the tub wall, and jumping happily back into the water, with Charlotte laughing all the while. The next night in the tub, Charlotte picked up the mermaid, threw her over the edge, grabbed her by the hair and lifted her up the tub wall, plopped her back in the water, and squealed with delight. We're not quite sure exactly what lesson this game is teaching, but the mermaid is now very busy at bath time.

Aspen, CO

We couldn't miss the chance for Charlotte to meet Matt's entire Michigan family at his cousin Erin's wedding in Aspen, Colorado. We flew into Denver, met up with Grandma Mary and Riley, and drove together to Aspen. The town was beautiful and the wedding was just lovely. Charlotte had lots of QT with Riley and Grandma and charmed all her cousins, aunts, and uncles.

On the plane home, Charlotte was practicing her new skill- quacking. She went on quite a quacking jag that had Matt and I hysterical laughing, until we realized that it probably wasn't so funny to the other passengers! "It's better than crying," said the lady in front of us after we apologized. True enough.

Charlotte loves the camera

We received a gift certificate for a photo shoot when Charlotte was born and finally put it to use. C is10 months old, her dress hand knit by Nana Roe. Thanks Sarah & David!

Bon Vivant

As cousin Hattie says, Charlotte simply enjoys being a baby.

Meal times are no exception. She loves to feed herself with spoon or hand and will eat pretty much anything you give her, but fruit is definitely her favorite. Summer was very exciting with so much good fruit to choose from- Charlotte loved to stuff her face full of watermelon. Now that fall is here, she has moved on to pears and kiwi, with gusto. Num num.

Swinging is another favorite activity. Lots of squealing with joy.