July 2011-2nd Half w Video

So, this post is a little late. Darn movie held me up. Anyways.
Amaia turned 3 on th 19th. We got the kitchen all decorated, I made a cake from a box mix with not-enough-butter-buttercream-frosting (looked gross, didn't taste too bad). Definitely the worst cake so far I've made for her, but since it was just the 4 of us it's not like I had to impress to many people. (except you are all seeing it now..hmmm.....) I made her shirt and turned a 2 pound dry erase board into a chalkboard thing (you can see it on the wall there).
Amaia was super excited for her birthday and cake. I don't know what it is about her and cake. It's not like she eats tons of it.

So we sing happy birthday, and she's like biting right into the side of the cake. It was awesome. Check out the video for some candle lighting fun :)

The weekend after her birthday we drove down to Brighton. It wasn't too far away, but we didn't really plan this trip well. We ended up spending a lot of our time on the Brighton Pier, which has a little amusement park/carnival thing on it (that we hadn't even known about when we left). We went to the aquarium:



And, like I said, spent most of the time at the pier. The top right pic is one I took from our hotel room window a half hour or so after sunset. You see that one ride on the right that's like super tall? Yea, I went on that. Justin and I each went on one ride, while the other watched the girls. That was the ride I picked. I don't know why. We all know I'm afraid of heights. I was a nervous wreck sitting waiting for every one to get loaded up (after about a 45 minute wait in line while justin had the girls, poor thing). After we got going though, it was fun. I would have totally gone again but the line was insane. And it was getting cold.


These bottom right pics are me before (left) and after (right) the ride. Not sure if you can tell the difference between my I'm-going-to-die-holy-crap-I'm-nervous-but-still-laughing-at-justin-taking-pics or my holy-crap-that-was-awesome! faces :)

We had another birthday-Solia! duh.

She turned 1! This was also with just the 4 of us (a stark difference between the huge pool side bonanza we threw for Amaia's first in Houston. The downside of having no friends).

Anyways, I wanted to do a cute moster theme. So my monster dude didn't turn out so bad (nevermind the oreo eyes and chocolate chip nose. The antennaes? Fruit snack strings). The little monster cupcakes were just awful. My poor frosting had huge chunks of butter in it. So I was either pouring liquid frosting on, or it was coming out super uneven because I would really have to squeeze through the chunks of butter. Marshmallows halved with a sliver of chocolate chips for eyes, same antennae as the big dude. Tasted good though :)



At first, Solia was totally freaked by the cake dude. Then she warmed up to it, and eventually had him smashed all over. Oh yea, and my little monster shirt I made her (bottom right). That was the best pic we could get (post cake smashing, btw) of it. Sorry.

So here's the first half of 365 pictures:



And the second. I wish I could have put these in better order. The beachy one down there is from Brighton one day and the caracature is from the second day in Brighton. Then the rest of them are 'replicas' of Dr. Suess's The Foot Book. Justin would like me to tell you to open this image up large (or follow the link in my sidebar to the Facebook album for the 365 Project day 201-365) and really look at the details in these suckers. I took all the pictures, but Justin edited them all the put them all together. We took a final 366th picture on Solia's birthday again just to sort of come full circle with the 1st day when she was born last year.

And now some random pics of the girls we took:

Solia:

*Solia can wave good-bye

*She's started to clap her hands together when she's happy (as opposed to just for pat-a-cake)

*When we say that it's time for prayer, Solia will clasp her little hands together in front of her chest

*If I tell her that her food is hot, she'll 'blow' on her food by buzzing her lips at it.

*Her entire vocabulary consists of 'dada'. We are all dada, unless she's crying, then I'm actually mama.

*She's started pointing to where she wants to go

*If I ask "Solia, what are you eating?" she'll spit whatever it is right out and hand it to me

Amaia:

See her here at Brighton, and with her new "Rapunzel hair" (that she salvaged from a bed skirt after I chopped it off the flat part of the sheet).

*Amaia likes to say 'realize': I didn't realize that (fill in the blank)

*She likes to clear her throat and say 'heh hem' before saying things

*Amaia's become the bad word police. I'm no longer allowed to say stupid, shut up, and freakin'. I mean, she's got a point, I shouldn't say those things, but it's like every time I slip she'll get all up on me "we don't say freakin'!"

*When Solia starts screaming, she'll dramatically clamp her hands over her ears or plug them up.

*She likes to assign our family to movies. For example, Finding Nemo. Justin is Marlin, I am Coral (who gets eaten by a shark, but she doesn't seem to care), she is Dory, and Solia is Nemo. She does this to all sorts of things-movies, pictures, stuff she sees outside.

*She likes to have Justin blare the music in the car

*If I ask Amaia to please stop (whatever), she'll say "I'm sorry, but I have to (hit Solia)". But she says it in the same tone that a parent would say "I'm sorry, but it's time to go home now". Like she doesn't care what I have to say, she's gunna do it anyways

*Justin took Amaia on her first "Daddy Amaia Night". They went to the mall, Amaia had sushi for the first time and loved it (yuck) and they got ice cream.

Here is the link to YouTube for this month's (somewhat longer) movie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oq1y6nG6A-g