A Princess Turns One

One year and eight months ago, our family was excited and surprised to learn that we would be increasing in number.
One year ago January 3rd, Chris and I were putting away our Christmas decorations around the house, when a most unexpected thing happened. 
My water broke.

Taken the day my water broke...37 weeks on the dot.  And no, it's not twins. :o(

Unexpected because I had a full three weeks before my due date.
Unexpected because my water had not broken on its own before in my four other pregnancies.
It was followed by an unexpected eventful birth the next day, January 4th, followed by a one week stay in the NICU for our little one.

This was taken after a tube was taken out of her mouth and sensors were taken off of chest.

But though a lot about our fifth child was unexpected by us, we are happy that God knew all about her and decided she was to be.

Happy Birthday to our sweet Anna Leella.  We love her so.

And we celebrated her with lots of pink.  Because she's a princess and after three boys, I still haven't gotten my fill of pink with her and Leah.

Her birthday was actually on January 4th, the same day as Chris' promotion.  So we had leftover promotion cake for her that evening.

And we had a pink princess party for her the next day with her friends.

Awesome cake made by her daddy!

Now here's a pretty non-princess-y story...see the octopus bubble machine to Anna's right?  She stuck her hands into the bubbles and then like usual, into her mouth.  I was laughing as I took pictures of the funny, gross faces she was making.  Not very nice, right?

Anna didn't think so.  This was taken about one second before she vomitted all over herself and the counter.  Take that, Mommy.  She was kind enough to miss the cake though.

Here is Anna with her guests eating brunch...mini pancakes, mini bagels, mini muffins, tator tots, bananas, mini meatballs and mini quiches.  It was all easy to make; we may have brunch parties more often.


Anna had her own little 'smash' cake. 

This was 100% the best cake eating show I have seen from a one year old.  She was chewing this thing without even lifting her mouth from her cake!  She looked like she was sucking on it.

I'm not sure that she looks very proper princess-y here!  What a mess!

Anna with her birthday gift from Mommy and Daddy...a new pink rocking chair!

I'm pretty sure that Anna had a really fun time at her party and while it makes me a bit sad seeing how quickly she turned one, I'm so excited for the little girl that she is growing up to be!

A MAJOR Accomplishment

Nine years and seven months ago, my super duper hubby graduated from the ROTC program at the University of Florida (Go Gators!) and was commissioned into the United States Air Force.  Two days later, we moved with our two month old son to San Antonio, Texas. 

I had no idea about military life or being a military wife.  I learned quickly, and I loved it.  I still love it.  Most of it anyways.

And I love being married to my man who just pinned on his new rank...Major. 

And we were thrilled that his dad and step mom as well as his mom were able to come from Arizona and Florida to celebrate with us.

I am so proud of my husband and so blessed and thankful for the job that he has.

New Year's Eve

In 2008, we celebrated New Year's Eve with my sister at the San Antonio Children's Museum.

In 2009, we celebrated New Year's Eve at Sea World.

They were both fun and we couldn't decide which we wanted to do for our last New Year's Eve in San Antonio, so we did both.

We celebrated welcoming 2011 at noon (on New Year's Eve) at the Children's Museum with lots of confetti and sparkling apple juice.

The boys collected as much confetti as they could to take home.

We walked over to the Riverwalk and had BBQ for lunch at The County Line and then headed over to Sea World to see the dolphins, sea lions, Shamu, and fireworks at 9PM.  It was a long day!

Chris and I took turns watching the girls and going on the big rides with the boys.  Chris took the big boys on the big roller coaster while I stuck to the Journey to Atlantis ride...much less motion sickness!  The toddler rides were closed down but there was a playground there that the girls enjoyed.

Gabe wasn't tall enough to go on the big roller coaster with his brothers yet, but he was happy to ride the Shamu Express.

We watched a couple of the shows...the Polar Express 4D show and the Clyde and Seymore Christmas show. 



Once it got close to being time for the fireworks, we all cuddled up under the blanket for the show.  After not napping all day, Anna finally gave in to sleep snuggled on the blanket.  Unfortunately she woke up when the fireworks started and was not a happy girl, but she did peek at the fireworks every minute or so.  Leah wasn't too sure of the fireworks either, but her daddy holding her kept her a little happier.

Anna is under the blue sweatshirt above Christopher's head.  It was pretty chilly and one blanket just didn't work for five kids!

Thank you to Sea World for gifting military familes with up to four free admission tickets every year! 

We got home at 10:50 that night and were just in time to see the New York ball drop.  Christopher wanted to stay up to bring in the Central time zone New Year, so I stayed up with him until midnight.

The boys didn't even sleep in the next morning.