Party fit for a squid princess!

So Saturday March 13, 2009 was a big day for the Larsen-Benveniste family. Olivia Marie turned one year old on Tuesday March 9th and Saturday was the day of the big party! We traveled under the sea for our princess Squidlivia! Who was there you ask? What did we do you ask? What was there to eat you might say? Were there presents? Were there kids? What kind of cake did we eat? Did everyone have fun? Where the decorations fabulous, they must have been you decide...well take a look for yourself?

Squid/Octopus Cake made by Mama Emily!

Our Fishy friends



The Cake and favors



Happy birthday!



Candles all lit and looking fabulous!


Nana amid the decor





Mama Emily


Nautical masks painted by Gma Sparkle and Aunties Megs and Ash



Hanging coral


Lovely food



Fishy cookies



Gummy fish and sharks





Just a part of the great fruit Nana brought



Presents


Of course Finding Nemo was playing



New bike from Gma Sparkle and Gpa Tony



Uncle Mike has high hopes for his Olivia and his alma mater



Toy plane


So many presents, she was a bit overwhelmed


Playing with uncle Mike

Stacking blocks from Nana and Gpa Larsen

Toys, toys TOYS!!!!!!!!!!!


Where to begin?


Kisses from Mama


Loud obnoxious toys from Auntie Ash...who else?

Poor baby was so tired!


Rachel and Connor
Tam came too!


Auntie Ally


Great Uncle Wes




Uncle Mike


Great Auntie Sarena




Auntie Ally, Rachel and Tam



Auntie Zoe :)



Uncle Bogie :)


Mama and her two BFFs



Connor



Great Grandma Anita


Gpa Larsen and Nana

I think Ash liked the pasta salad

Rachel and Gma Sparkle like the wings


Tam and Aunties Megs and Ally



Great Auntie Michelle, GG Anita, Great Auntie Sarena and Uncle Mike



Birthday Girl all changed and ready for cake!

Squidlivia and Mama

Nana and Liv

Everyone sang Happy Birthday!


Singing, singing!


Olivia wondering why Mama is crying! Shhhhh I don't think anyone knew I choked up!



I blew out the candles for her!


She didn't know what to think! She just wanted the sea animal toys!



Trying to get her to attack the cake!



Again only wanted to play with the toys



Sea horsey! Untouched cupcake :(


I'm supposed to eat this?



Little lady keeping it tidy



?


Auntie Ash trying to inspire some eating...



This is as messy as it got!

The end! Happy Birthday baby!

So that was the day! We all had a great time and Olivia was as per usual spoiled with gifts by everyone who came and even those who couldn't come sent gifts! She is well loved little Squidey and I cannot believe I am a mother of a 1 year old!

I know the anticipation is killing you....

So I am pretty well wiped out after the past week of steady purchasing, organizing, baking, frosting etc etc ad nauseam....

So here is a preview of the best part of the party....



More pictures will follow when I regain some strength....

you will have to wait...too tired to blog-bleh!

Exactly one year ago today...

Well minus a few hours...

Here is Olivia on day one

And here is Miss Baby on day 365

She really loved her breakfast today....

And if you got one of these ladies in the mail...we'll see you saturday for her birthday party....

Patience is a virtue...

A virtue I feel like I have when it comes to some things...my child Olivia as well as my much bigger and a hell of a lot more stubborn older child...Mitchell. I feel like I am generally a pretty patient person when it comes to everyday life things...lines at the grocery store, traffic as well as stupid drivers and rude employees at places such as Walmart. But my patience pretty much ends there. I am not very patient with my mother, I hate waiting for results when it comes to weight loss and exercise, not to mention having to be pregnant for 9 whole months felt like torture. My mother, much to my annoyance, likes to say that having Olivia was the only thing I never quit and followed through on and that was ONLY because I didn't have a choice. WHATEVER!

So what is testing my patience today? Other than Olivia screaming her protests to her late afternoon nap? Urghhhhhh my hair. I feel like I have been trying to grow it out for a hundred years! Okay so it was really short...and I have not cut it too much since it was this short...

Which was like 3 years ago? Okay it did get rather long when I was pregnant but I had to cut it about three months post partum. Why is that you ask?

Well what nobody really ever talks about and what I didn't believe even though my sister in law told me it would happen...your hair falls out 3 or 4 months after giving birth. Or starts to fall out rather and steadily just gets worse until about after 3 months of steady hairloss it slows down and then you just lose the normal pre-pregnant amount of hair daily. Which even that feels weird. For 9 months of pregnancy you don't lose any hair...none! Your hair is thick and lovely and then you have the baby and it all falls out until it works itself out and then you back to losing hair here and there in the shower. I don't know it's just gross and then the weird regrowth of hair is odd and sticks up and it's annoying.

But anyways when my hair started falling out I cut off quite a bit of hair...I regret that now. But long hair falling out is much worse than shorter hair falling out...so there you go I cut it off. And Mitch's sister cut it for me and thought I was hip and cool enough to pull off an asymmetrical hairdo. I am not cool and hip enough for alot of things...but especially not cool enough for uneven hair. I hated it and made her cut it so it was even and more blunt and there I was again with a bob and wanting to grow my hair out. So since then I have been at it again....growing it out and it is at that disgustingly annoying length right now....right at the shoulders, not past them, just resting above. Which makes me feel like this...
Which is not a good look outside the animal kingdom. It looks good on a lion but I have broad enough shoulders without my hair drawing attention to it! Urghhhhhh I HATE IT!!!!!!!!!!! I want to cut it so bad!!!!!!! I am also pretty over the darker hair and there is no way back to blonde without a significant hair cut.....

Oh be calm and carry on Emily...don't get impatient!!!!!! It is just driving me insane!!!!!!!

This song I first heard at the end of the movie KNOCKED UP. Funny place to hear a heartwarming song, I know. But this song, which is on my blog playlist, always makes me think of Olivia and always makes me cry....

Everything she sees
she says she wants.
Everything she wants
I see she gets.

That's my daughter in the water
everything she owns I bought her
Everything she owns.
That's my daughter in the water,
everything she knows I taught her.
Everything she knows.

Everything I say
she takes to heart.
Everything she takes
she takes apart.

That's my daughter in the water
every time she fell I caught her.
Every time she fell.
That's my daughter in the water,
I lost every time I fought her.
I lost every time.

Every time she blinks
she strikes somebody blind.
Everything she thinks
blows her tiny mind.
That's my daughter in the water,
who'd have ever thought her?
Who'd have ever thought?
That's my daughter in the water,
I lost everytime I fought her
Yea, I lost every time.

(that's MY daughter in the water)

Did someone press fast forward?

So today has not been unlike any other morning of my life. A life that seems to be on a constant repeating cycle. Like my life truly the past 4 or 5 months has been on one big redundant loop. Round and round we go all day... everyday. An endless series of waking up, bottle mixing, diaper changing, food preparing, bathing, nap taking, story reading, playing, and chasing a quite quick little cyclone of activity. It's amazing how much motherhood can be exactly all you hoped for, as well as way more boring and challenging than you ever expected. That statement seems like a paradox...it seems one would contradict the other but it really doesn't...both are true.



All you see before you ever have a child of your own is the baby, the toddler, the cute little girl... how fun to be a mother! To play with your kid and dress them up in cute clothes and get all those adoring stares from people admiring you in all your maternal glory as you carry said little child around the grocery store. What you don't see is the exhaustion, the snot on mother's shoulder, the applesauce in the baby's hair, the diaper rash, the teething, the fussing, the sweat pants and old t-shirt that become your uniform...you don't see that. Don't get me wrong, I love being a mother and I love my baby Olivia. However, having a baby changes you and your life in irrevocable and permanent ways.


Anyways this morning was not any different from any other morning. We woke up, we had a bottle, we played, we ate breakfast, we had a bath and got dressed... well she got dressed anyway. But this morning as I watched my baby in the bath-tub it dawned on me that she's getting so big! I feel her babyhood slipping away from me...and it's a slippery slope, each day seems to pick up momentum and move faster away from her babyness than the previous day. Who is out there pressing the fast forward button? All the while I felt like I was on pause...and maybe "I" was....but Olivia has been been on fast forward, picking up speed. I looked at her expertly move about the bath-tub and I began to cry...granted it is that time of the month...but watching her play there in the tub it really hit me; She won't be like this forever. Soon she will be walking without stumbling. Soon her jabber will turn to actual words. I can't take it! It's heartbreaking to know she has to grow up. I mean I know it's a process...she doesn't go from a baby to 18 in a blink of an eye...but look at how fast this first year has gone? And we all know that things just move quicker as time goes by...

I want to live in this moment forever. I want to watch her play in the tub in awe of her development over the past 11 months. I don't want to move any further. I want the only consequence of staying here in the bath forever to be pruney hands, fingers and feet. I want the water to stay warm. I want her hands and cheeks to stay babyish and chubby. Please baby, please stay as still as you can and maybe time will skip us and we won't ever have to move past this moment right here and now....

I would never claim to know much about life. I am not someone who holds many convictions or proclaims to have much faith in anything. I don't know the truth or meaning of life. Here is what I know...nothing in life makes time move faster than becoming a mother....and you can't ever get that time back....so I have to remind myself to cherish the boring times, the repeating days, and the endless cycle of changing diapers.

(Olivia and I at the Zoo, 2 weeks old)

Dear Olivia Marie.....you are the best part of me.....please don't grow up too fast.....and if you could just pretend to not be getting bigger that would be great for me. If you could always let me hold you and cradle you like a baby, that would help. I don't think it's too much to ask....I mean I did birth you afterall, and that was quite a feat!

(Oliva and I at the Zoo, same spot as above 11 months old)

Are you a Lovey or a Blanky baby?

Once upon a time....

There was a baby girl born on August 21, 1981. She was named Emily and she had a Grandma Hill who made her a baby blanket. It was hot pink with different colored animals on one side and a flannel tiny flower print on the other. It was also hand stitched with a message especially for baby Emily; "EmilyAnne Larsen, 8-21-81". Around the four edged blanket were little gingham triangles in alternating colors; blue, pink and yellow. It was a lovely blanket. Who would have ever known how much that blanket would truly mean to that little girl over the following years. Oh and that blanket eventually acquired a name... Ni-Noo.

(This is not Ni-Noo but this is an example of the triangle edges)

Well as you may have guessed the Emily of the above story is the same Emily who is now writing this blog and Ni-Noo is my blanky. Ni-Noo and I share the same age, not to mention the same bed for the past 28 years. While 28 years isn't too terribly old for a person, I am afraid the years have not been as kind to good ole Ni-Noo. She is rather unrecognizable from the bright, cheery and fluffy quilt of my baby pictures. The pink fabric with the animals is completely worn away leaving only the batting. The flannel of the opposite still bears the tiny pink flowers but is worn and balled. The triangles edges are barely hanging on. 75% of it forms a chain that hangs and drags from what is left of Ni-Noo. There have been many mornings I awake to that chain being wrapped around one of my arms or legs or even sometimes my neck. Yes you read correctly...I still sleep with Ni-Noo.

When I was 17 and left for college my mom said "Emily you are not taking that baby blanket with you". I responded with a "why not" and later gave it to my boyfriend for safe keeping for the year and a half I was away at school. Had Ni-Noo been tucked away somewhere my mother could find it she could have thrown it away and I could not bear the thought. In fact before I left as a highschool graduation present my Grandma Hill made me a new Ni-Noo. She saw the dilapidated state of the old one and figured a new one was the answer. She made the new one out of neon fabrics with neon cats on it. While I do love cats and love even more the fact that she made me a new one...it just was not the same. My time at college was the longest Ni-Noo and I have ever been apart. I have been teased by my brother, roommates, Mitchell and my mother about the fact that I still sleep with Ni-Noo...do I care?

BIG FAT NOPE!

Ni-Noo makes me feel calm. When I am sad I can cry my tears into Ni-Noo and she doesn't care. She would hold gallons of my tears and still comfort me if I had more. It's indescribable how secure I feel with that ratty old lady of a blanky wrapped around my face or balled up at my side. She is my oldest and most loyal friend. When I was pregnant I remember my mother asking me..."Emily what are you going to do once the baby is born...you can't still sleep with that thing "....well I thought "I'm going to". Then she asked "are you going to let Olivia sleep with Ni-Noo". This was met with a swift and blunt "No way, she can have her own Ni-Noo". Olivia was born and was showered with many blankets that were countless candidates for a "Ni-Noo". She didn't seem too attached to any of them. Hmmm I thought maybe she won't have a

Ni-Noo...which seemed weird to me, how could you not have one? I kept on sleeping with my Ni-Noo and in her first 5 months when she spent her morning naps next to me in bed I swear she would sleep twice as long if I draped Ni-Noo over her. And a twice as long nap in new motherhood= magic. I always knew Ni-Noo had magical powers! Good thing mother was never successful in her attempts to get rid of her!

It seems people are either blanky babies or Lovey (stuffed animal) babies. And to those of you who may not find yourself in either category...well I feel sad for you. So around 5 months I began to notice that everytime I went to get Olivia up from a nap or in the morning she was holding her little Giraffe stuffed animal.

(Olivia's Giraffe)

She had/has about 10-12 stuffed animals in her crib and everytime she manages to find that giraffe. Then just recently I discovered why she likes it so much. You see I usually put her to bed while she is still awake and it is up to her to soothe herself to sleep. In other words I don't ever see what she does exactly that induces the sandman.

Well about a week ago Mitchell and I traveled down to Milbrae to his Grandmother's house. It's a good 2 hours away and it was right during a normal nap time for Olivia. I sat in back with her as she whined and fussed about being tired and after about 10 minutes of protest she eventually settled into a trance like "gonna fall asleep soon" state. She grabbed the Giraffe, since we rarely leave home without it, and turned it around until she found the tag on it's butt. Then while pinching the tag between her chubby little fingers she began to rub the tag back and forth across her earlobe. It was pretty weird and funny but super cute. I must say it also warmed my heart because ever since she was born up until about 6 months old when I started to teach her to go to sleep on her own, I would rub her ears when trying to get her to go to sleep. It seems she remembers and it soothes her, she fell asleep soon thereafter. So you are probably wondering what does a tag have to do with the Giraffe being her favorite? Well I cut the tags off all her stuffed animals except for some reason the Giraffe escaped the scissors. I later noticed that she usually was holding the Giraffe by the tag so I just never cut it off.

So I guess Olivia is a Lovey baby. Which is okay with me...maybe the blanket attachment will come later? But I feel like it needs a name besides Giraffe. We have flirted with Jaffe the Giraffe, Geraldine the Giraffe and even just Stuffy, as in stuffed animal? But I think I am going to deem the Giraffe Ni-Noo, afterall my little sister still sleeps with her blanky and calls it Ni-Noo because that is what I called mine. So I guess Olivia gets her Ni-Noo afterall!

Olivia with her newly named Giraffe, Ni-Noo