For Your Viewing Pleasure...

Kaylie is just like her Dad, in more ways than one. She looks like him, laughs like him, and she is a thrill seeker, just like him. She loves it when we spin her around or toss her up in the air, or when we drive fast around corners in the car. And now, she likes to flip. Mark has been doing this flip trick to all my nieces and nephews for a while now, and now he gets to flip Kaylie. I was worried that she would be too young for it, but she seems to really like it! :)

Cute video of Kaylie playing with a toy car. (Mainly for family to hear her cute laugh!)

One more video...Kaylie isn't talking yet, but she likes to babble a lot! Her newest thing is this funny "giggle, gurgle" sound she makes with her tongue. It sounds like she is speaking a different language, and I'm just not understanding it. Maybe one day she will speak English!

Christmas and after...

More holiday highlights:

1 - Christmas Day!  We had a great time opening presents, trying on new clothes, and eating yummy food.  One highlight that I am especially proud of is the fact that Mark liked ALL of the clothes I bought him this year.  Not one return clothes-wise...sweet!  We had an interesting visitor this year too (Santa wasn't the only one to visit the Jensen household).  Mark and Ben (posed as Dale Jr) bought gag gifts for everyone from the dollar store.  Everyone had fun opening gifts from Dale, which included a Tinkerbell snap-bracelet for Kaylie, a "Wow" (not a Sham-Wow, but similar) for me, plastic swords for Becca & Kurt, and the list goes on.  The Jensen's hosted an awesome dinner Christmas night for family and friends, and invited more friends to come over later for dessert and games.  Some friends from Ann Arbor (Amy, Nate, and Lucy) were able to come celebrate too.  It was a packed house, and tons of fun!

2 - Football Game the Day after Christmas (Little Caesar's Bowl).  Mark's family was able to get amazing first and second row seats to the Little Caesar's Bowl.

I think Marshall and Ohio played, but to tell you the truth, I'm really not sure.  I don't even know who won.  Kaylie wasn't the least bit interested in watching football that day (or any day for that matter).  All she wanted to do was this...

...and this...

...and this.

She is a walking/exploring machine!  We were out in the hallway for a lot of the game.  It was cute though when she could hear everyone cheering inside the stadium.  She would stop and clap with everyone, and then keep walking.  :)

3 - New Year's Eve!  We had fun celebrating New Year's Eve with the family.  We played a few games (Rook, Tri Bond, and Apples to Apples), and watched Kung Fu Panda.  We were all pretty tired when midnight hit, but made sure to watch the ball drop and drink some sparkling cider.

What a lively bunch! :)

4 - Bowling with the family - always fun!

Now back to real life!  We had fun on vacation, and enjoyed spending lots of time together.  I hope you all had a great holiday break too!

Pre-Christmas

I am WAY behind on my blog posting.  So, to get started, here are some pics of our pre-Christmas fun!

This year, we celebrated Christmas at Mark's family's house in MI.  Mark had three weeks off school (which was AWESOME), so we were able to spend a lot of time with family and do a lot of fun things together.  Here are a few of the highlights:

1 - Gingerbread houses with the Johansson family

2 - Christmas caroling around the neighborhood (in the FREEZING cold!)

3 - Christmas Eve

Everyone got to open a present on Christmas Eve, and Mark opened a present from Kaylie...a U of M snuggie!  Love it!

 Next up, Christmas Day!  To be continued...

Happy Holidays!

Kaylie, Kaylie, Kaylie...when will you get over your fear of strangers (or anyone other than mom)??  Ever since Kaylie was about 4 or 5 months old, she has been extremely wary of going to anyone other than me or Mark.  If anyone tries to touch her, pick her up, or even sometimes just look at her who is not mom or dad, she cries and cries until I come to the rescue.  Mark's mom has been trying to help me and Kaylie work on this, and she is making some progress.  It usually takes about a day for her to get comfortable every time we visit Mark's family's house, and then she will finally let Grandma and Grandpa pick her up and hold her.  But anyone else...no dice!  (Although, that progress is not totally evident in this picture...)  hehe

We visited Mark's family again this weekend so we could go to a few holiday events.  We went to a "breakfast with Santa" this morning, and a cookie/story time/visit with Santa this afternoon.  I knew that Kaylie was going to scream if I tried to pass her off to Santa, so I stayed with her during most of the pictures.  But we thought it would be funny to get the classic "screaming with Santa" picture, and Kaylie did not disappoint!  (Hope you like the new pic at the top of our blog!)

Other than visiting Santa today, we have been getting in the holiday spirit by baking yummy goodies, decorating our apartment, and teaching Kaylie to shake bells every time we sing Jingle Bells.  She is a cutie pie, despite her fear of strangers.  :)

What else is Kaylie starting to do now?  She likes to climb on EVERYTHING!  She is constantly trying to climb on our ottoman, or climb into her shopping cart or toy tub.  When we read books, she is also starting to grab my finger and point my finger at different pictures on the page.  I tell her what I am pointing at, and then she points my finger to something else.  It's kind of cute.  :)  She also likes to stand in the bath tub (not safe at all!), and completely clear the table of all food when she has decided that she is done eating.  Kaylie hasn't started talking yet, but I am sure that will come soon.

Hope you are all doing well and enjoying the holiday season!

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!!

The food was DELICIOUS!  Even Kaylie chowed down...

Thanksgiving sugar cookies.  I stole this idea from my sister Cindy.  She made some last year, and I loved them so much I had to try them myself this year.  Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

Happy Birthday - Part 2

Yesterday, we had a family b-day party for Kaylie.  All of Mark's family came over, and Mark was able to take a break from school stuff so we could have dinner, cake, and open presents.  Here are a few pics from the party.     

Kaylie and her cousin (baby Justin)

Is this girl spoiled or what?  Look at all those presents...

Kaylie loves books, so I decided to try and create a b-day cake of one of her favs:  
The Very Hungry Caterpillar.  

Happy Birthday, Kaylie!!

Birthday girl!

Happy 1st Birthday, Kaylie!

Wow, I can't believe my little girl turned 1 year old yesterday.  It is crazy to think that just one year ago, I was in the hospital with Mark welcoming Kaylie into the world.  Our life has changed so much since that day, and we are so grateful to have Kaylie in our family.  She is such a cutie pie!

We had a great day yesterday, despite both being sick.  (Kaylie came down with a cold, and we found out on Monday that she has an ear infection too.  Poor girl!  I have a cold as well, but we decided to party anyway.)  Here are a few pics of Kaylie's b-day...

In the morning, Kaylie had fun playing with her birthday balloons, and a new birthday toy.  Then we were off to Chuck-E-Cheese for a lunch party with friends!

Even though she was sick, Kaylie really liked crawling/walking around all the fun games at Chuck-E-Cheese.  She got to meet Chuck the mouse (is that his name? Chuck-E?), and she ate pizza for the first time.  And she got tons of fun presents from friends, which we did not expect at all.  Kaylie was pretty spoiled yesterday, and I think she had a great day.  Thanks everyone for the birthday wishes, and for celebrating with us!  Happy Birthday, Kay-babe!  We love you!