A Very Merry Un-Birthday

Some of you may remember my original due date was St. Patrick's Day, but Millie was born Thanksgiving weekend.

When a child is significantly premature (earlier than 37 weeks gestation), they have an age and an adjusted age.  Millie is 16 months old, but adjusted (as if she was born in March) she is now officially 12 months old.  Hooray!

St. Patrick's Day 2010

My sweet little troll :)

St. Patrick's Day 2011

I just threw this one in so you could see how cute she is right when she wakes up.

I just love that sleepy/happy face.

For her un-birthday I was lame and didn't do anything exciting.  Buck is out of town (for the BYU games in Denver) so I didn't feel too obligated.  We did have some friends over that brought her a Mrs. Potato head, which was so nice!  In honor of her un-birthday too.  We were also invited to an Irish feast at a neighbors house which was delish.  All of that, and I didn't have to lift a finger.

At "12" months Millie weighs over 18 pounds and is more than 28 inches tall.  She walks everywhere, tries to run a little and can even walk backwards!  We're going to try and teach her walking sideways soon.  She does everything she should be doing with motor skills and fine motor skills, but when it comes to communication and problem solving she's not quite there.

My speech class is going great, and I'm learning how to help Millie.  Right now I am working on putting actions with everything we do normally and teaching her how to point.  She never tries to tell me anything, so we feel like she'd do actions sooner than words to communicate.  I think I heard her say "baba" for bottle once, but she now whispers her "words" sometimes so I can't be sure.  Don't be mistaken though...she still yells when she's happy all the time.

Millie laughs and claps very easily now.  I finally feel like my jokes are paying off.  Do you know how exhausting peek-a-boo can be when you don't even get a laugh?  Now I get full belly laughs.  It's wonderful.  She sure knows how to make a mom feel special.

Now that you've fallen in love with Millie all over again, I should remind you that we are moving from Utah soon.  Like we really only have four weekends left here.  I'm serious.  The fifth weekend is graduation.  So Utah friends, lets get together.

We love Utah more than we ever thought we would.  We've lived here for almost four years, and it is truly our first home.  We love our stores.  We especially love our restaurants.  How can I go on without Cafe Rio and the Art City Trolley?  But really we love the good ol' folks of Utah County.  We've made oodles of friends in ever walk of life.  We've made friends with young couples that I know we'll keep in touch with for years.  We've been embraced by an entire medical community, which we never expected. And I think I know every major Boy Scouter in the valley.  So many good people that have shown us so much love.  It's going to be hard to leave.

So yes my Utah friends, we'd love to see you one last time.  Oh, and Happy Un-Birthday Millie!

One last thing.  Carolina friends, we'll be heading your way soon.  We're eager to see y'all too.