Morgan's First Birthday!!

Well.. tomorrow is Morgy's Birthday! And  yes, it happens to also be Christmas day.. so what.. a birthday is WAY more important than Christmas.. (well.. whatever.. )
So.. what has Morgan been up to this month?
Well... she's FINALLY learned to crawl!! YEAH! We went up to the inlaws at the beginning of the month to celebrate Christmas there and she finally took her first forward crawls. She was managing to manuveur herself backwards for quite sometime but finally managed to get some forward momentum. Some people thought that she was just watching her odler cousin and learning from her - but I think that's quite unlikely. Her cousin still does the commando crawl and hardly ever crawls properly.. I think Morgan was just waiting till she knew she could do it properly.. and then away she went.
She's learning more signs every day - the speed that she picks them up is so amazing. YOu can just see on her face how clever she thinks she is.. So far she does, More, all done, milk and food. She says Amen after we pray ("Ahh.... ma") and she says Bye bye when she waves. She can also blow kisses and fold her hands to pray.
On a negative note.. she's becoming quite prone to tears lately. AS soon as you nsay no to her (whihc is frequently now that she's a crawler) she gives you this pitiful look and bursts into tears. The only way she'll stop is to actually cuddle her too. One time we left her to "get it out" for 15 minutes and it took 30 mintues to calm her down again..
I tried blanket time with her yesterday. I've always sort of figured that before they can crawl, its sort of pointless.. it seems a bit silly to teach boundaries to a child that can't yet move! So.. in the spirit of her newfound crawling we did blanket time yesterday. 15 minutes, on a blanket with toys. She screamed. She cried. She played. She screamed. It did not go overly well. 9 minutes had passed - with Morgan crying the whole time. She'd finally calmed down a bit, and picked up a toy.. so I decided to end on a high note and made the timer go off. That worked. So.. today then? well, it went ok for the first 5 minutes. She got off umpteen times.. but at least she wasn't crying. Then she started picking up the blanket.. my "no" to that got the tears flowing. She's certainly grasping the concept.. but its not making her happy. I think my biggest problem righ tnow is that I'm trying to do both kids at the same time. Smae room, different blankets. Kelsey can do it, but she's attention seeking.. so one foot off.. and then a giggle to see if I'll notice. I've gotta get her doing something else tomorrow. At least we made the 15 mintues mark today. a couple more days and Morgan'll have it for sure.. and I bet she won't even be crying anymore.

And, what are we doing for her birthday?
Well.. seeing as how most people have family things on Chrismtas Day..w e opted for the Sunday route. So.. Sunday after church we have some "adopted" family comign voer for cake, coffee 7 lunch. Should be fun. I'm currently still working on the menu.. which of course meant a trip to the grocery store on Chrsistmas Eve - that's just dumb! But I only ahd to take Kelsey so it worked out fine. we sang Christmas songs and smiled politely at the stupid people rushing around all stressed out. 
I'll probably decorate the house tonight, blow up some balloons.. but tomorrow we'll celebrate and tlak about Christmas and not Morgan's birthday. And Sunday we'll make into Morgan's big day. Well.. asmuch of a big day as a Sunday can be for a 1 year old.. maybe I'll splurge and make pancakes for breakfast.. Of course, maybe I"ll do that tomorrow too.. we'll see.

On a compeltely unrelated to Morgan note. I have a new project htat I'm quite excited about. Our church was looking for an admin assistant. I wanted to offer.. but realised that with 2 small kids and a husband who worked odd hours, there was no way I could without having to rent out my kids (and for a volunteer position.. well.. that'd be dumb). But I was approached, and it was explained to me that it could be job shared nad a lot of it could be done from home.. and to top it off there's lots of IT/computer geek stuff to do. So right up my alley.. so I got started right away. Our church is currently operating in the dark ages. So.. first project - a church calendar that can be viewed online. Second project ..w ell.. the list will go on and on and on I think..
its a big learning curve for me.. mostly becuase I've been out of it for over 3 years.. but I love it. I love experimenting and playing. And, becuase its volunteer, I don't have to worry about someone paying me to play on my computer and experiment.. its perfect!!
Anyway.. have a great Christmas, wahtever you do.

Hubby's Birthday!

Well, its my hubby's birthday today. He has to work though - sucks to be him! I think that it should be law that you get a day of annual leave on your birthday - or if your birthday falls on a holiday that you get a day in lieu. I mean, why should new Year's Day be a holiday but not one's birthday!?!
So.. with the help of both parents.. I got Marco the BEST birthday present this year. Firstly though.. allow me to tell you what happened last year. Last year he wanted a welder. He'd been researching for a year, and knew what he wanted. And.. I thought I'd been listening for a year.. and knew what he wanted. So I went to a local store. Asked a few questions.. and they assured me that "this" welder was the one he wanted. But they didn't have it in stock. They could order it in though. Excellent. It wouldn't arrive till the next day. OH. I had left it sort of late.. the next day was his birthday. Well, if they got it sent to a different store 30 km away, it'd arrive by this afternoon. Perfect. Went home, confident in my purchase. later that day, drove the 30 km to pick up this new welder. drove back. wrapped it, hid it. threw something together for dinner. The next day I gave him his present confident that he'd LOVE it. He opened it. Looked at it. Said thankyou and kissed me. then shyly remarked that it wasn't the right kind. let down. He returned it, got his money back. All was good - although in hind sight, I don't think he actually bought anything with that money.. Hmmm...
Anyway.. so this year.. I compiled his parent's gift money, my parent's gift money and a few bucks from my measely savings and ordered the gift I KNEW he'd love - Guitar Hero Metallica. Not just the game either.. but a guitar too. So now we'll have 2 guitars. I gave it him last Saturday.. I was right.. he loved it. But now I have to play with him.. that's not so great.. I've really gotta think through these gifts better!
Anyway.. happy birthday honey. Can't wait to celebrate 60 more with you.