Zoie's 1st Birthday! Woohoo!!

Miz Zoie turned 1 on Friday, April 20th...and I can't believe how this first year of her life has flown! I can honestly say it's been the best, craziest, most awesome year of my life so far. I've come to appreciate what's really important in life and my confidence in myself has grown so much!! Zoie makes me feel like there's nothing I can't do! It doesn't matter what kind of day I've had, seeing her makes a bad day good and a good day great!

Zoie's running around everywhere and starting to climb stationary objects (she's been going up the stairs for a couple months now)...she gets up on her tiptoes at counters/tables to reach things that might be of interest - especially my comb and her little toys that I leave within her reach on purpose. We have a game we play that she really loves too...we chase each other!! I'll tell her I'm gonna get her and she turns on her heel and takes off into another room or down the hallway and will peek behind her to see how close I am...so of course I run up and grab her and she just squeals with the greatest laughter ever! Then, I'll put her down and she roars at me and starts chasing me! It's so much fun! We still roll around and wrestle on the bed too. Zoie LOVES to go to the swimming pool and splash around and go underwater! Her vocabulary continues to expand...on top of 'mama', 'pop pop', 'uck' (duck), 'ack ack ack' (quack, quack, quack), she also says go, wow, uh-oh, grandma, bb (baby) and a few other words that I can't quite make out but I can tell she's saying something!

On the day of her first birthday, Zoie was at home because our daycare lady, Pat, was a little under the weather for the week. We had a casual day...just following our routine and then that evening we were very happy to have visitors - Wendy, Porkchop and baby Piglet stopped by. It was so great to see them and was Piglet's first visit to our house! After they left, Jill, her mom Diane and Brayten came by...Brayten is so cute with Zoie! He'd kiss her head and say "Hey, punkie...how are you?" Grandma Lucy read a story to both Brayten & Zoie and they really enjoyed it.

Saturday was Zoie's big party! Grandma stayed up ALL night Friday night baking and decorating Zoie's special cake - it turned out really beautiful! Some people weren't able to make it to the party and we missed them! The ones that were able to make it were Mommy, Grandma Lucy, Papa Jim, Bob & Marge Birkett, Auntie Lindsay, Auntie Michelle and her boyfriend, Josh, and Angie & Madalyn Stemley. We had a casual dinner of salad & pizza then Zoie opened her presents...she was so excited! She got some really fun things - a crocodile that hold blocks, new pajamas & socks, a newborn cabbage patch doll, toy cars, a Little People Airplane, a new swing, a book, a toy camera, a 'fridge farm', a pool floatie shaped like a whale, some more Little People animals, a new purse, some hair bows, and some neat hats. Then came the best part - CAKE!! She loved tasting the cake and frosting off of her fingers - she got into it but didn't go too crazy. After all this partying it was time to relax and get ready for bed...and you can bet she slept really well that night! The party girl was partied out, but fun was had by all!