Taylor's birthday cake...

" Yum, Yum! This cake stuff is pretty good!"


"O.K! I think I'm done now!" I was actually glad that she didn't want to eat very much of it, but she seemed to have fun playing with it and trying it.





"Here Mom! You try it!" (I think she actually just wanted her fingers to be clean!) That's our dainty girl!
See! Now she tries to get Maddie to clean her fingers and Maddie did a much better job than I did! And, I think she enjoyed it much better too!
getting ready to eat some cake!!! Taylor is going to have more sugar today then she's ever had!
If you haven't realized, these pictures are way out of order! Sorry!
Our little family....and Taylor's lone #1 candle!
giving it a try...we let her go all at it, but she was still pretty lady like.

More of Taylor opening birthday presents....

Trying out some of her new toys (the other little girl is our friends 17 month old daughter)

This is how Tom decided to wrap this present! :-)
I got it at a garage sale for $2 and Taylor loves it. It plays lots of cute music and

sings the alphabet, numbers and colors.
A stuffed bunny puppet from her grandparents...

This is when Taylor got a phone call from family back in Utah....they (I think it's mostly the youngsters in the family-but who really knows?) have a special way of singing happy birthday that makes you glad you only have one birthday a year... :-) They were all together in Utah because it was Taylor's Grandma's birthday too!

Sunday July 15th 2007: Opening Presents!!!

Checking out her new toys.
Tayor's cool phonics radio from Uncle Dale, Aunt Nancy and cousin Clara (our really good friends from back in Utah) Thanks guys! It is so neat!
She loved opening her presents... it's so fun when they get more alert and aware of things.
This was a gift from her grandparents in Utah. They sent her some really fun books and the bunny puppet pictured above. Her other grandparents sent her a couple dresses and a monkey puppet toy too! How did they all know Taylor loves puppets?

Upside down...

Taylor loves to sit on my lap and hang upside down....
"Hey Maddie! I have an idea...why don't you make a funny face and try to make Taylor laugh?"
"Wow Maddie!!! What a face! It worked! Taylor is cracking up!"
Taylor in her pretty church dress and hat...
"Daaadddd! I'm finnnissshhhhed!"

Taylor's best buddy...

It's fun having a dog like Maddie to raise Taylor with. Sometimes I feel like Maddie is helping me mother Taylor. She likes to lay by Taylor's crib when she's napping or crying. She also sneaks licks to Taylor's head and does it so sweetly. We actually just got back from taking Maddie to the dog park. It's only about a mile from our house so we try to go often and Maddie loves it. She's so social. She bounces along running after other dogs with a big grin on her face. We get a big kick of going their too. Taylor loves to watch all the dogs and I get a kick out of the dog park drama that occasionally takes place. Oh, and Tom says he thoroughly enjoys picking up Maddie's messes and dragging behind Maddie as she rushes him to the park entrance! :-)

Our good dog Maddie...

Taylor's taking horseback riding lessons from Maddie...they both just need to realize that she's supposed to sit the other direction!

At one point when Taylor was sitting on Maddie she started bouncing up and down! And Maddie just sits there with a big smile on her face.

GET ME OUTTA HERE!!!!!

Recent Moments in the Highchair...

Tom feeding Taylor rice....lots of rice....


Feeling full of spaghetti.....and not looking too happy about it.
Deep in Thought.

Our news lately...

Hey everyone! Well, we've been doing well. Last Thursday Tom came home at noon and announced that he was done with work for the day/week and had off until today! So, in his first month of work he was given 4 1/2 days off. It was because his council accomplished their bi-annual goals and if they do it again in December than he'll get extra time off then too. We're just hoping he'll get 2 1/2 weeks off then! :-) So, we've gotten to do a lot of work looking for homes in his time off. We're getting closer to a point where we'll start making offers, but it's also been a bit frustrating b/c most of the homes in our budget are not in very nice neighborhoods. We just hope something will work out sooner than later. I'm going with our agent in a few minutes to look at a bunch of homes. We'll see how it goes!

It's been so nice having Tom home for a few days. It's nice spending time with your best friend! Oh, yeah if anyone reads this today--go to Old Navy! They're having a big sale starting tomorrow (50% off clearance items) but if you buy today and beat the crowd you can take your receipt in with in 14 days for a price adjustment. I went yesterday while Tom watched Taylor and found some great deals.

We've become good friends with the couple we ran into a few weeks ago who I knew from Oklahoma. They have a little girl a few months older than Taylor and have been really nice to invite us to dinner and out shopping and to their luau last Saturday. It was fun to go to that b/c there were about 6-7 other couples there that we got to meet. I'm not feeling so unfamiliar and lonely now. Especially with being so busy looking for a house.

Other news? Last Friday I went to 24hour Fitness and had a 2nd interview. It lasted 3 hours and part of it was spent in the swimming pool being trained on teaching water aerobics. Anyway, they hired me to start out as a sub instructor but it could be very promising and soon that I could get more regular classes. We'll see.

Taylor is doing fantastic! She turns 1 in 10 days! We've been trying to teach her sign language for quite a while now and I think she's trying her hardest to rebel and not do it, but the other day Tom was playing with her and taught her to fall over backwards while he yelled "Timberrr!" and he would catch her and tickle her. She learned that in about a minute and a half and has been doing it everyday since, but we've been trying to teach her the sign for eat, drink and more for a couple months and she hasn't done it once on her own! She just looks at us like we're crazy! :-) She did just start waving the other day though so at least she's catching onto some stuff!

Yesterday for the 4th we went up to Monument and Palmer Lake for their little festivites. It was fun. Taylor looked so cute in her little outfit that we've been waiting a year for her to wear. Then last night we went to a party and watched the fireworks from this couple's pool. It was a lot of fun. Well, I hope everyone's having a great day! I have a bunch more pictures I'll post soon maybe later today if I have time.