November 11...

November 11, 1885: (General) George S. Patton is born. November 11, 1918: Armistice Day (Veteran's Day) signals the end of fighting on the Western Front in WWI on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. Oh, and then of course there is one other minor event on this date, and that of course is November 11, 2008...the birth of Riley at 12:18pm.

(November)

It is hard to believe that one year has already passed, and what a year it has been. One year since we heard Dr. Webster tell us on the evening of November 10 that we would be parents less than 24 hours later. I can still remember one of the tests they did on Melissa that evening to see how Riley would respond...giving her a Dr. Pepper to watch Riley's heartbeat. As the Dr. Pepper went down, the heartbeat went up. From the moment she made her first appearance the next day, cracked that one eye open to take a peek around before breaking out into that beautiful cry, she has stolen both of our hearts and taught us many lessons about love, life, and of course being parents. On a personal note I had debated as to whether or not I wanted to stand up and take a peek over the curtain...and in hindsight what a moment I would have missed. I am fairly certain I will never forget seeing her crack open that eye to take a quick look around for the first time.

(December)

365 days of washing bottles...changing diapers...struggling to find just the right remedy for naps (or lack thereof)...worrying (and often over-worrying) about every little thing...car rides (especially the return trip from Nana and Granddaddy's last Christmas) that at times felt like there could not possibly be any worse place on earth to be at that particular moment...all worth it a thousand times over. She has changed our lives in every way, and neither of us could be happier about that. In some ways the time has flown by...way too fast since she was wrapped up like a little burrito at Plano Presby...but in other ways life prior to her arrival seems like an eternity ago and we can not imagine it without her now.

(January)

We knew that she was destined to be quite the little character considering how active she was in the womb...at times seemingly running a marathon. Or wrestling alligators...it was hard to tell which. Either way, she was all over the place, and many nights our entertainment consisted of watching Melissa's belly jump around in ways one would not imagine a belly should. Since her arrival, the only thing which has changed is her location: She's all over the place. From rolling...to army crawling...to crawling...to now taking a few steps...she has kept us on our toes.

(February)

Somehow we have been blessed with the sweetest, smartest, prettiest little girl on the planet. Anyone is welcome to disagree with that of course, but that just means they are wrong. ;) She seems to pick up something new almost every day now. Among her "words" already are: doggie, cup, dada, mama, bottle, uh-oh, boo, bye-bye, hi, hey, ball, baby, and Yay Clemson! Ok...so maybe that last one is not entirely true.

(March)

So happy first birthday Riley, the world is a better place with you in it. You have come a long way since that little grain of rice on the sonogram, and you continue to fill our lives with joy with every passing day. We hope that we have been and will continue to be the best parents you can hope for. We can not wait to see what the upcoming year holds for you as well as for us. Without a doubt we will have our hands full, and for that opportunity we feel as though we are two of the luckiest people around.

(April)

(May)

(June)

(July)

(August)

(September)

(October)

(November)

Friday night fun with TP...

Is any Friday night complete with some fun with toilet paper? I think we can all agree that the answer to that is of course a resounding "No". So tonight Riley discovered TP for the first time. And it was quite a discovery. As I was getting changed after coming home from work I turned around and saw this...


The initial reaction was to say "no", but then I realized just how much fun that must be, and after all it's just toilet paper...so the kid side of Daddy got the best of me, and I let it go for as long as she was interested. As it turned out that was quite a while. At one point I was sure she was going to be neck deep in toilet paper before it was all over.



Earlier in the week we got our first sign of the first tooth. Just in time for the upcoming big day next week. And the baby steps towards walking is progressing a bit more with each passing day. Today she took three steps from the couch to Mommy's waiting arms. Any day now...and she'll be off to the races.

(^worst case ever of toilet paper foot^)

One small step for man...

One giant leap for Riley. Houston, we have liftoff :) Ok, enough NASA stuff...but we have steps at last. On Friday she took her first steps...aided by the lion...but steps are steps! She is very close to taking off without any help, but for now it is neat just to see her stand up, hold on to her lion, and push him across the room.



She also discovered the fork, and now practically insists on feeding herself. All in all it has been a fairly eventful Halloween weekend.

A trip to the pumpkin patch...

Today we went over to the Owens Big Orange Pumpkin Farm (http://www.bobevans.com/ourfarms/springcreekfarm/pumpkin.aspx). A little chilly out, but we had a good time. Riley was far more interested in the other people (and babies) than she was the pumpkins. And I'm pretty sure she was just as annoyed with this one particular lady taking pictures as I was. :)
She got a big kick out of seeing the goats, and watching us feed them. We saw what may have been the largest horse ever, and I think Melissa had flashbacks to Spanky in St Lucia (see first blog post for that story).
Also recently, just in time for Halloween, we adopted a black cat named Patton. Technically Patty since she's a female, but Patton sounds so much better, and like the General, she is quite the mischievous character.

(One of her her favorite activities: pulling books off the shelf)