Happy Birthday, Baby

One year ago today (in about 3 hours at 12:45 PM), Carina arrived. It is absolutely unbelievable that it has been that long. And yet, also unbelievable that we ever existed without her. It seems like her little arms around my neck and her little face snuggled into my shoulder are as necessary to my existance as breathing.

Her party yesterday was a huge success. She pulled in quite a haul, as expected. Everyone loves shopping for kids. In addition to enough clothing from Grammy and Grandma to keep her dressed to the 9s for the next year (or at least 6 months) of her life, she got some very cool toys. There were several aviation-themed gifts, including this Elmo ride-along airplane that has more buttons on it than Cari's Prius. This was both an adult and child favorite; Becca set about getting it out of the packaging right away as Aerik was fascinated.

The slip-n-slide got lots of use. ("Not for adult use", whatever. I think we proved that thing is fun for ages 3 to at least 31.) They've gotten quite a bit more sophisticated since our Version 1.0 we had as kids. I remember it was always a challenge setting up the sprinkler to evenly wet the slide, but that has been taken care of by the addition of an integrated sprinkler tube on the side. And then there is the splash pool at the end - definitely satisfying. The water in the wading pool was also dirtied with grass clippings from all the comings and goings. I never turned on the sprinkler as it didn't seem to be missed.

Carina opened her presents, and then had to go take a nap. She woke up in time for cake, but she was still groggy and wouldn't eat any of it. She did play with the frosting a bit on her hands, thoroughly decorating the table in front of her. No cake on the face, unfortunately. Maybe we'll try again tonight with a smaller piece.