It's Coming Down

After almost a year Molly's big building picture will be coming down next week. Of course we took this as another photo op so Lolli and Pops were nice enough to come along to take the pictures and get a smile out of Molly. I can't believe how much difference a year makes. She was one month old in the building picture and almost 11.5 months in the pics we took today.

It feels like just yesterday I took that picture with Molly

Oh these two...

My little baby is growing up 

Walking like a big girl

Here is a little video of her walking. Her squeaky shoes crack me up!

Don't worry her picture will pop up again in the near future ;)

Christmas 2012

I can't believe it has come and gone. We had a great Christmas, celebrating the real meaning, starting family traditions and spending time with family. Santa went over and above this year - that is for sure!

This year on Christmas Eve we went over to Danny's parent's house to commence the Christmas celebration. We had a great time hanging out, eating chili, opening presents and watching Molly. Ha!

"This is how I open presents because paper is sooo good."

"It's a new car!!!"

"What - you mean there is more?????"

"Uhh daddy, Pops said I could have your football. :)"

A family tradition, saving the wrapping paper rolls and then beating each other. I conviently held the babe and watched with the preggers SIL. This is actually quite hilarious and entertaining to watch.

The Struzick family Christmas

On Christmas day we woke up and spent the morning at our house starting our family traditions. We opened presents and then had breakfast casserole and banana muffins. After Molly woke up from her morning nap we headed over to my parent's house to enjoy the rest of the day.

"No momma. I didn't just open your present by eating the paper....see."

"Perfect, I needed a laptop to email my friends."

Our family of 3 on Christmas morning.

Once we got to my parent's house Molly found the apple in her stocking and just started munchin. She was pretty protective of it. She NEEDED to eat it like a big girl.

Looking at Uncle Reece's cool camera trick.

"I got it! Santa brought me my baby doll."

"GET.THIS.BABY.OUT!"

"Oh, I love her."

"I'm pretty cute with my new tutu, I know."

"But I am not ready to go home!"

The Mitchell family Christmas

Molly did great both days. I was so impressed but then again she is always impressing me.

Got Milk?

Ok maybe a weird title but it is kind of a big deal. So we all know that when I had Molly the goal was to nurse her for a year, if I was able. Well, nursing didn't happen because of a variety of reasons so I turned to pumping. Let me tell you, lugging that thing around for almost a year was a lot of work but I am glad I did it. For some reason I produced a ridiculous amount of milk so we bought a deep freeze and started storing. The day after she turned 11 months I was done pumping and decided that I didn't want to deal with thawing the milk so Molly went to formula full time and I donated all my extra milk to the Texas Children's Hospital NICU. They sent me 3 coolers and I packed it all up and sent it to California where it will get pasteurized then sent back to the hospital. It ended up being about 1200 ounces and they pack it in 4oz bottles so that is about 300 meals for the little babies. So, if anyone is thinking about donating I definitely recommend it. It is an easy process, a little blood work, a cheek swab, they send the coolers and all you have to do is pack them and call FedEx to pick everything up.

December Happenings (thus far)

Every year Kay (my MIL) and her friends have a mother daughter cookie exchange. Well, this year Molly was invited which made it that much better. There was good conversation and delicious food. Is it bad that the dozens of cookies that I brought home are almost gone now.....

We went to a live nativity at our church and well, Molly wasn't as interested as I thought she would have been. I thought she would have loved the animals since she loves our dogs so much but she really didn't care about them. What she did like though were the bells that we put on her wrists at the Christmas carol station. She enjoyed making noise. Hopefully she will be musically talented like her daddy.

Molly and I had a play date with my baby group friends. I think I have talked about them before on here but if I haven't....we all met at church growing up. We started hanging out and going to dinner pre babies then we all just kinda started having babies around the same time which is how it turned into the baby group. It was nice to just hangout, talk about life and watch the chaos. Here is the run down on the baby ages. Lottie who is 2.5, Liam who is 19 months, Molly who is 11 months, Cannon who is 9 months, Graham who is 5 months and then Pierce who is 3 months. It was crazy but it was fun.

Molly had her first Christmas program at school. Yes, I know what you are thinking what can an 11 month old do at a Christmas program. Well, enough to gather the entire family to come. When I say the entire family I am not just talking about Danny, and me….no, no, I am talking my parents, Danny’s parents, my sister, my brother and my Grandma all had to see the big debut. It was a big night and Molly did a great job playing a penguin. ☺ She made her acting debut at the end when she was pushed in on the massive school stroller. I didn’t even get to see her because there were so many people and they couldn’t bring the stroller up on the stage but that was ok I got to see her at the end when I asked for her autograph. ☺

The next day we had to start the tradition of the annual trip to see Santa. I thought Molly would be very curious of the big white beard and red hat well I was wrong! She was scared to death. Poor baby, maybe next year will be better.

And, her Grandma's know Santa which is kinda a big deal because she didn't make the best impression on the man. Phew, we have an in. :)

AND, my baby sister got engaged but I will do another post about that.

11 Months and Counting..

Oh Molly girl it is true, you turned 11 months old last Thursday. Here are some things that you have been up to this month.

• You are wearing size 12 month or 12-18 month clothing and size 3 (some 4) in shoes.
• You wear size 3 diapers and size 4 overnight diapers when you are sleeping.
• I feel like you have done a lot of growing up this month. You started walking for one. You don’t drink from bottles anymore when you are at school. I still give them to you at home but I know I need to transition to the sippy cup I am just not ready for you to be a toddler yet.
• You graduated to the walking class at school and sleep with the big kids.
• You will still take 2 naps when you are with me but at school you just take your afternoon nap.
• You are still sleeping through the night unless you are sick from 7ish pm to 7ish am.
• You have 7.5 teeth. Four on top and 3.5 on the bottom.
• You have been sick a lot this month. Had 2 ear infections and a major allergic reaction along with your constant runny nose.
• Likes: your lovie, going to school, with all your toys you have chosen to constantly play with my nook computer connector wire thingy – seriously you will just crawl all around with it and stop and look at it in amazement. You love to take things out of something and you LOVE to make a huge mess with your water in your sippy cup. After you have gotten your fill you could sit there for hours and take a sip of water then spit it out, take a sip of water and spit it out. At the end you are soaking wet to the point where we have to change your diaper because it is soaking wet.
• Dislikes: changing your diaper, being awake when it is past your bedtime, taking medicine and shoes (you will not keep these on your feet, you just want to eat them).

Molly Grace Struzick. You are almost 1 years old and I can’t believe it. Time has flown by. This past month has been so much fun. Your personality is coming out more and more. You are definitely learning how to rock the attitude when you want something which is not a good sign for the terrible two phase. You are fiercely independent and want to do things on your own but you always look around to make sure I am in the room with you. At the same time you are a mommas girl and always want me to hold you, which I love and I will hold you as long as you will let me. You are hysterical, you are always making people laugh with your big smile, funny faces or silly sounds. You can sit there and be totally content having an in depth conversation with yourself about who knows what. You love Harli and Rocki and wish they could be inside all the time. You will just chase them around laughing hysterically while they are trying to get away from you. It is quite amusing to watch. It is so fun for me to just sit back and watch you do your thing and see how you put things together and learn how they work. My little goose, you do something to me that moves my soul and makes me want to be a better person everyday. You are my best buddy and I love you oh so much. Next month is going to be hard for me because I feel like you are turning into a little person already and no longer a baby and once you hit one it just makes it official. Molly grace I just love every moment with you!

And She's Off....

Officially taking more steps today than ever. I think she is going to be on the go oh so soon. Basically going to college tomorrow. Oh Molly....





And, I needed to add this video because it makes me laugh. She was quite proud of herself.

Time For Some Videos

Thought I would share a couple of my favorite videos.

She is all about throwing things on the floor. If it is on the table it NEEDS to be on the floor!

At least she is showing interest in laundry. :) I will take it!

My favorite. Her love for her lovie.


AND....she took 3 steps in a row yesterday and 4 today. It won't be long until we have a walker on our hands! I will work on getting a video of that.

Allergies Already?!?

That is what I was thinking when last Friday hit. That and quite a few other things..... Danny was out of town on a hunting trip and if things were going to go like the last time Danny went out of town I knew I had an interesting weekend ahead. That theory still stays strong. Friday morning hit and I woke up to a lightly spotted baby. She was still happy for the most part but the rash was only getting worse so we went to the doc. She said she was having an allergic reaction to amoxicillin which she had been taking for a week because of an ear infection. Weird that it took a week for anything to happen. We were told to stop taking the amoxicillin and start taking something else. Great, no problem, the next day everything would be better, right? WRONG! My sister spent the night because I had to wake up super early for a work event. Well, thank goodness she was there because Molly did not sleep well and was up most of the night crying because she was not feeling well. It was a long night for everyone. Since I had to wake up so early I wasn't there when she woke up so I worked for a couple hours then I rushed home to take Molly back to the doctor because the rash went bananas overnight and she was covered from head to toe (the pics below just don't give it justice). She was like one massive red dot who was NOT a happy camper. She was constantly scratching her ears so I thought the ear infection came back but Dr. D said no and still said it was an allergic reaction and it looks like she could be allergic to the second prescription as well. So, potentially allergic to the penicillin family drugs…grreeaaatttttt. Hopefully she will grow out of it because I feel like penicillin is always being prescribed. Oh well, Molly will just have to never get sick or get something else. I vote for the never get sick thing. Anyway, I digress, Saturday night was so much better. She only woke up once and was back to her normal self , the normal self that looks like a cheetah that is. I can say that the dots are starting to fade, starting key word but we are making progress. But poor baby.....it was a long weekend but I was thankful for all my help! When people say it takes a village....they ain't lyin!

Sunday night- spots fading, smiling and eating dinner....it was a good night. :)