Meredith Meets Chef Boyardee!

So, last night was one of those nights where I just didn't have anything great to fix for dinner, so that can of ravioli in the pantry came in handy....she had a blast. It was just easier to let her go at it while wearing only a diaper than fight with her about a bib!

Birthday pictures...late

I'm feeling quite unproductive today since I finished my last exam last night, so here are a bunch of Meredith's birthday pictures. I think most of you have seen them, but wanted to get them out here anyway! Her hair is a little longer since this, but she doesn't look too different!
She'll be 15 months old next week! Hard to believe.

April

Let's see. What's going on? First of all, my baby girl isn't a baby anymore. She really is turning into such a little kid! She said what I believe is her first sentence last week. Now, mind you, this is with mommy ears, but she said "I go outside". It came out more like "Ah go oussie", but she was standing at the storm door pointing outside while she said it. Which also leads me to say that she is totally an outside girl. If you have the door open, she just bolts for it so that she can run around in the grass. We really need to invest in a fence because she just wanders/runs between our yard and the neighbors yards on both sides (don't worry, she is under supervision!). She would definitely take off around the front of the house and head for the road for sure if we weren't watching. I'd love to let her just run around, but without a way to keep her corraled, it makes me nervous. She has so much energy that it just makes me tired!
We went to her first baseball game this weekend out at the Mudcats in Zebulon. The whole Smith clan went and we had a really good time. Meredith quite enjoyed climbing underneath everyone's chairs and going up and down the stairs many times. She also found a water fountain with her Nana and she thought that was the coolest thing ever. Got a little wet, but that was the least of our worries! She kinda started falling apart towards the end of the game, so we left a little early and had dinner at Knightdale Seafood, which I highly recommend. I'm an NC girl and have had a lot of bbq, but this place was the best I've ever had! Meredith also enjoyed her first taste of fried okra. She still isn't digging much meat, but we keep trying!
She is working on getting two more teeth on the bottom. One has just popped through and the other one isn't far behind. Her gums have been so swollen lately, that it has to be a relief for these to come through, but once again she has handled it really well.
She's getting better with feeding herself with a spoon. We sat outside on the patio last night for dinner, so I just let her go for it. My goodness she was a mess, but that's what it's going to take for her to really figure it out! I haven't been all that willing to give her free reign to make a disaster (well, more of a disaster) in the house by feeding herself with a spoon, but now that it is nice out I'm just going to let her make a mess when we sit outside! Still not much luck with milk out of a cup. I even tried putting a couple of drops of chocolate sauce into it and she still wouldn't drink it. I just bought two new cups last night, so maybe that will help! I'm going to have sippy cups coming out of my ears soon!
One more bit of excitement is that I am done with school for the semester after tonight! I have a final exam tonight and then I'm off for about 2 weeks before summer session starts. Then I'm on the official 6 week countdown!! This summer class should be a lot of fluff, so overall the meat of my program is OVER!! Yeehaa! I had a presentation on Thursday that just beat me up, but overall it went well. So, my final MBA class will be on June 21st my friends!

Funny girl

We have had several successful teeth brushings this week. I have been trying for awhile, but Meredith just clamps those lips together and nothing is getting in. I decided to try to other night again with her pink toothbrush and Dora pink toothpaste and she actually did pretty well. Only on the bottom teeth though. It must feel funny when I brush the top teeth because she immediately turns away. Hopefully this will improve with time. Her bottom gums are so swollen that I'm sure we'll have more teeth to brush in no time.
On another note, still no milk from a cup. She might take a sip or two, but she pretty much still makes a face and wants nothing to do with it. We are at least completely on milk now, but only out of a bottle. Hopefully this will improve with time too.
She also loves taking my shoes off, attempting to put them back on and then immediately wanting to take them off again. She also loves playing with her own shoes and acting like she is putting them on. Of course she can't get them on, but I think it's funny that I have a little shoe lover already!

Easter 2007

I am having such a blast with Meredith. She cracks me up every day. She has started this silly toothy grin and she squishes her face up at the same time and just giggles. She will just run through the house hollering happy noises and waving her arms around like a crazy person. She has so much personality! We got her a one of those kid size soft chairs with Dora on it for Easter(I decided that dark haired Dora was a better choice than blond Cinderella for my brunette baby!) and oh my goodness, I think we may need to take it back. The acrobatics that have ensued since we got it have made me quite nervous. First of all, she had her first meltdown in the toy department because she couldn't take everything she saw and then when we put the chair in the cart she about vaulted into the back part of the cart from the front of the cart, so we had to shove it underneath. We should have know that this thing was going to cause problems! She now climbs in it so she can climb into the couch and chairs easier, but then she likes to bend the back of it over and flips the whole thing. She is quite amused by it, so we'll see if the newness wears off.
She was a pretty good girl for church yesterday, mostly because she spent most of it in the nursery! She was just being wiggly and squirmy and we were trying to get her to make it to the children's sermon, but Chris and I both smelled something, so thinking she was dirty I went ahead and took her out. Turns out it was the kids in front of us with real hard boiled eggs in their easter baskets that we were smelling! Oh well, she seemed to have a pretty good time in the nursery anyway.
We did a little Easter egg hunt too. She immediately locked in on the colorful eggs in the yard, but it took her a minute to figure out that she should put them in her basket. At first, she would pick up one, then another and then drop one to pick up another since her hands were full. It was pretty cute. I just filled them with goldfish and cheerios since we aren't doing candy yet and she thought that was pretty cool too once she figured out that they opened up.
Meredith will be home with Chris all this week for Spring Break, so I'm jealous, but I'm thinking of taking Friday off too.
No pictures again. She barely sat still to take any decent pictures yesterday, but I'll try to get some uploaded soon.