Ayla's Birthday Party!

Well it has been a while since my last post. Kurt has been on the main computer, doing a lot of work. So I haven't been able to get the pictures I wanted from the desktop until today. Anyway, I got them and I am posting from our laptop.

This seems like a very long post but it will be mostly pictures, so it shouldn't be too long.

Anyway, this is how Ayla's 1st birthday party went:

Here is the invitation I sent out. I made them myself with material from around the apartment. I found the Kermit the Frog image on google images. It was on a t-shirt. I photoshoped him out and used this image for everything. Kermit was the theme of the party because Ayla loves the clip, disco frog. Kermit is singing and dancing in it. If you want to see it, it is on my sidebar with the links.

The invitation reads "Hi, Ho, Kermit the Frog here, wanting to announce that you have been invited to Ayla Dawn Perry's 1st birthday party!!" Cute huh?

The Decor:

Here is the large cake I made for the party. I had to draw him on with a toothpick and then fill him in because I didn't have a large enough freezer to do a transfer. So I free handed him. I think it turn out great.

I also did a small 6" round cake just for Ayla.
I was able to do a transfer on this one. Then I filled him in.

Here is the picture I took for her 1st birthday.
I made the T-shirt and had her pose with Kermit. I had to take 50 pictures to get this cute one!

I put the picture in a frame for decoration with the cakes on the cake table.
We had the party at my church because there was no way I wanted to cram everyone into our small 2 bedroom apartment. I thought the cake table turned out cute.

Here is the gift table.

Kermit is sitting on top of the gift that Kurt and I got her. I have 2 of these Kermits because I love Kermit. I gave one to Ayla though, because she loves him too now. The Kermits were great to have on hand to use for the decorations.

Here is the gift table when it was filled up after everyone had arrived.

I put Ayla's high-chair between the cake table and the gift table. It looked cute. I wish I had a picture of that but I don't.

Here is what all the tables looked like. I had 5 set up with white and green table clothes and white and green balloons as their center pieces.

This was my first party that I had planned all by myself. Speical thanks to al those who helped me set up. I was very proud of how it turned out.

Who was there:

Arron, Melissa, John and Amy - some of my close friends.

My sister-in-law, Carolyn and my brother, Robert.

Notice the hot dog Robert is modeling? We had hot dogs for dinner.

Lane in front, my Mom, my Dad, my great uncle Monty, my great Aunt Zora and my little cousin Jasmine.

Chris holding Baby Kurt, Brooke, Suzanne, my Father-in-law and my Mother-in-law.

I like to refer to them as my other Father and Mother, not just my in-laws.

My uncle Ernie and my good friend Cori.

And of course, the guest of honor, Ayla, with her Daddy and Mommy.

This was the only picture I got of the 3 of us together and the green balloon is in front of my face. Oh, well!

Kurt with Baby Kurt.

Ayla with her Mommy.

Aunt Marion came too.

Her boyfriend, Monty came too but I don't have a picture of him there.

Plus our good friend Jolene came too but was only there for a little bit. So I didn't get a picture of her either.

Here is my niece, Morganne playing with a balloon and in the background is her mother, Krista. This was the only picture I got of Krista.

Well that was everyone.

Now some pictures of the kids having fun!

They played on the stage a lot.

Love this picture of Morganne.

I had to take Ayla's shoes off because she kept tripping on her pants with them. So I rolled up her pants too. She looked so cute in her Kermit shirt.

She loved playing with the balloons

Cute!

Cute again!

And here is Morganne and her playing together.

Totally cute!

Next we let her open presents.

She loved the paper of course.

She had a lot of fun!

She got a lot. Everything was everywhere.

I will show what she got in a different post.

Then we sang "Happy Birthday" to her and let her eat her cake.

She started to dig into her cake when we were still singing. LOL!!

She loved it.

This was when she was nearly done.

Top view.

My dad leaned into her and she actually started to poke his face with her messy fingers. It was so cute.

After cake and after being cleaned up.

Hanging out with her Grandma Perry. She loves her necklace.

We all had a wonderful time and I was pleased at how the party went. It was fun to plan and see it come to life.

Below are two clips from the party.

The first one is Ayla and Morganne playing together with balloons. It is so cute to listen to Ayla trying to talk during the clip.

Wasn't that cute?

The second one is when we were cleaning up after the party and Kurt was dancing with Morganne on the stage. Krista was filming them with her camera. She took a couple of clips of them dancing and made one clip, to music. It turned out so cute.

Wasn't that cute? Kurt always dances with Morganne.

I hope you enjoyed the clips. Thanks Krista, for filming them.

I also hope you enjoyed the post of the party and felt like you were there.

Kurt's Birthday and Beard!

Kurt is in a sign language class and his last assignment was to sign about a life changing experience he had. He didn't want to talk about anything serious in front of his class so he decided he would grow a beard for his first time and sign about that.

Here is a picture after a couple days of not shaving.

And another couple of days later.

Kurt's work's "Kick Off" meeting theme is Access Rocks. So they gave T-shirts to their employees and they were packaged like this.

So here is Kurt rocking the guitar and rocking the beard.

Now for Kurt's birthday and what we did. 

Ayla and I started the day at her one year check up. I found out that I was right about her not growing the past few months and that I should be feeding her more regular food to help her grow. She has been eating baby food. I had given her food in the past but she choked so I was afraid of giving her food because I didn't think she was ready. But then her doctor told me it is okay if she chokes a little because she needs to learn how to eat.

So after her appointment, Ayla and I met Kurt for lunch for his birthday. We went to Cafe Rio because we had a free meal from winning it at our ward Valentine's party, playing the Newly Wed Game. While we were there, Kurt and I started to feed Ayla our food.

After Cafe Rio, we stopped over at Smith's to pick up some real food for Ayla. Then we took Kurt back to work.

Here she is trying Vienna Sausages. 

I have discovered she doesn't like them. What a shame. That is another problem with Ayla and food. She doesn't like many different foods. I guess we will have to keep trying.

And this is what Kurt got to come home to.

Of course I made him a cake and a card. The card said "I didn't have enough time to make you an awesome birthday card." And on the inside it read "But then I thought about it. It wouldn't matter how much time I had. I couldn't make a card awesome enough to match your awesomeness! Happy birthday Kurt!" I know I am cheesy but he is awesome and he did like the card. I also got him the Back to the Future trilogy.

Also, while we were at the Ayla's doctor appointment that day, she told me to introduce dairy back into my diet to see if Ayla still had the milk allergy. You see, I breastfeed and I love milk. I never would have thought that I would stop drinking milk ever in my life but I did for Ayla. The things we will do for our kids. Anyway, I hadn't had any dairy since June of last year and so when she told me to introduce it back into my diet, I was pretty excited.

So I bought my favorite Ice cream and a gallon of milk while we were at Smiths.

I finally was able to have cake and ice cream. It felt like my birthday.

Here I am taking the first bite of ice cream and I loved it.

Here is my first glass of milk.

My first drink. I was in heaven. 

I regret to inform you that I think Ayla still has the allergy, so dairy, once again, is being put on the back burner. This time it won't be as long though. I will be weaning Ayla soon.

Here is Kurt opening his present.

Here is his reaction.

He was pretty stoked.

He had wanted that trilogy for a long time.

And here is Ayla looking at his reaction to his present. She is so cute.

Well, we all had a good time on Kurt's birthday and Kurt finally shaved his beard the next day because he was going crazy with it and he had passed off his assignment on his birthday.

Plus, Kurt's parents took Kurt and I out to Sizzler on Saturday with his whole family.  We had a good time. We got to see his family twice that day because we had Ayla's birthday party later that evening. Which I will post about next.

Flash Back Friday! #5

A year ago from this past Wednesday, Ayla was born. I chose to do a Flash Back Friday on this event because I didn't have a blog back then. I wrote about it in my journal but I haven't really shared pictures with everyone. So her goes.

Ayla was born February 25th 2008 at 8:19pm. She weighed 6 lbs 11.8 oz. and was 19 inches long.

My labor started the day before at 7 am. At that time the labor was pretty mild. I was having contractions but wasn't sure that it was labor. It just felt like cramping but not anything big. Plus, Ayla was not due for another week so I didn't think I was in labor. Well, I went to church and lead the music in Sacrament but by the closing song, I couldn't stand up anymore. So I had my friend Brenda lead the last song.

Everyone was asking me if I was okay. I told them I was and they were all like, "Maybe you are in labor." I was like, "Nah, not yet." I went to the whole 3 hours of church and then went home. The contractions didn't seem to stop and so I called the hospital to ask what they thought and if I was in labor and if I should come in to make sure the baby was okay. They told me to. So Kurt and I headed down to the hospital.

While we were there, I wasn't dilated enough so they sent Kurt and I to walk around the hospital. The pain got more intense. When we got back to my room, they checked me again and told me that they thought that I was in the early stages of labor. They gave me some morphine and sent me home. They told me that if the contractions were still there after the morphine wore off, that I was in labor and not to come back until the contractions were a lot stronger and more consistent. So we went home.

The next day, the contractions were still there but still about the same as the night before. So I waited. My sister and mom came over to keep an eye on me. We decided to go to lunch and get me on my feet.

My mother was terrified while watching me. She kept saying, "lets take her" but I didn't want to be sent home again.

While we were at lunch at Marie Calenders, the contractions were getting pretty intense. They were bringing tears to my eyes. My mom sat a cross the table with a look of concern on her face. She looked like she could have cried herself. She kept saying, "lets go." I was like, "Not until they are consistent." Then the contractions were coming about an average of 2 to 5 minutes apart. If the table was not glued to the wall I would have smashed my poor mother with the table because I was pushing on it so hard. So we decided to go. My mom started to wave down our waitress as she was panicking. I am sure the people in the restaurant who were staring at me were thinking, "What in the world is she doing here." I know I would have been thinking that.

I look back now and laugh at how I was in labor at Marie Calenders.

Anyway, we went to the hospital and met Kurt there at 5 pm. I was far enough along to get the epidural. I hate needles but was so ready for it. It didn't bother me one bit. After getting it, Ayla was born 3 hours later. The epidural made the delivery a wonderful experience. I am grateful for modern technology.

So needless to say, I was in labor for about 37 hours.

Down below are pictures from the blessed event.

Here I am when we first were there and before I had the epidural.

I was feeling pretty tried by then and in the picture I look like I am in pain. Maybe that is because I was.

Here is the monitor of Ayla's heart.

I love this picture because this is a picture of Kurt comforting me right after they told me it was time to push. I was so scared. Thanks honey you are so sweet.

And here she is just minutes after being born.

So cute!

Here is Kurt holding her for the first time.

Aunt Marion holding her.

When they laid her on top of me and I saw her for the first time, I thought she looked exactly like her Aunt Marion. She even had red hair like her Aunt Marion.

Notice in the picture that Kurt is looking at her in the back ground. I love it.

The next 4 pictures were taken the second day we were at the hospital. It was Kurt's birthday that day.

ZZZZZ!!

Here is one with her eyes opened.

Kurt is holding her in this picture.

I love this one.

That is Kurt's arm holding her. I wish we had a better background but for safety reasons Kurt held her inches from the bed and we just draped the sheet to hide the hospital bed.

And here is Marion cuddling with her, kissing her on the head. Marion loves Ayla and Ayla loves her Aunt Marion. Marion calls her her little La, La.

I didn't think this post was going to be this long but, when I started to type it, I went into detail. I am glad I did because now I have it documented on the blog.

I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!