This will be the last entry on Karys' Totsite. It's been quite a journey and I will be sad to stop updating it. It was originally only meant to chronicle the pregnancy of my first-born, but soon turned into the story of the 1st year of her life.

I am so thrilled that she will have something so special about herself to look back on when she is older. I will be ordering a keepsake CD for her in the next few weeks, so if you would like to make a final comment in the guestbook, now would be the time to do so. All future happenings with Karys will be posted on our family website.

We have learned many things about our beautiful daughter in the past 14 months. Her personality is developing and becoming so much more distinct each and every day.

It appears that Karys has now turned into a little "monkey". While in Chicago this past week, we noticed her starting to step up on little things like shoes or piles of clothes or towels. However, last night when we arrived home, she started to step up on her chair. Within a few minutes, she was up on top of it! I've done my best not to encourage her climbing on anything because I wasn't ready for that just yet.

But it appears she had other ideas. I couldn't tell her not to do it without laughing because she was so proud of herself. When I would take her down, she'd just climb right back up. We'll probably have to move her chair upstairs since our downstairs is all tile and that could be a bit dangerous. I was able to get a video of it and you'll have to watch - it's kind of funny because you can hear Tim telling her to sit down. We also tried the stairs again and of course, she is able to go right up them. So Tim will be putting the gate on them tonight. I have a feeling this "climbing" stage will only get worse! But it is always exciting to watch her learn something new. And she is SO proud of herself.

Karys also had her first plane ride this past week. We spent 5 days in Chicago and I must say, overall, I was very impressed with her behavior on the plane and on the trip in general. She still slept 12 hours at night, still took all her naps, still ate all her meals and was still in a great mood - despite the long days. This child never ceases to amaze me. Her favorite part? Running up and down the hallways in the hotel. She would bolt out the door and want us to chase her. It was hilarious! Her other favorite part? The Chicago Children's Museum - she loved it! There were a lot of rooms for her age group that she could play in. And of course, she loved all the other children there too! She's a very social little girl :)

Make sure to check the video and we'll update you on any more adventures she has - we have a lot coming up in the next few weeks!

Happy Easter!

Our Easter was very special this year! We spent lots of time with our families and Karys LOVED hunting Easter Eggs! She had 4 (yes, four!) egg hunts in a 3 day span. She would carry her basket around to collect the eggs and was so proud of herself! It was just too precious.

We started off the weekend on Friday with an Easter Egg Hunt at Granny & Grandpa's house with cousin Zoe. The girls had a blast and got matching Easter Baskets filled with goodies. Saturday was spent with Nana and Aunts Rachel & Ashley and a special egg hunt there as well - and, of course, another basket!

On Easter morning, the Easter Bunny had left Karys a beautiful basket with lots of goodies - and she loved them all! He also hid eggs in the front yard and Karys was very excited! We went to Great Nana's and spent time with family and had Easter Lunch before heading over to Granny & Grandpa's for Easter Dinner. We made one final stop at Nana & Poppy's before heading home. We were all pretty tired but it was such a beautiful day and we were so happy to spend it with our family.

We also uploaded a video of Karys in action hunting the eggs - so cute!

We hope everyone had a very Happy Easter!

Love,
Tim, Steph & Karys

As many of you know, we have a personal instructor coming out to the house starting in May to give Karys private swim lessons. We figured this would be the responsible thing to do with being pool owners. We also figured that Karys would LOVE to swim and not be afraid of the pool since she loved it last summer and loves her baths and water in general.

I am now rethinking this previous assessment. While swinging in her swing, she has a complete view of the pool. This weekend, Tim and Brinks decided to go for a quick dip in the pool to cool off and we thought Karys might enjoy watching them. So while she was swinging, Brinks jumped in the pool and all of a sudden while watching him swim to the steps, Karys started crying! At first I thought - no way, she's crying for some other reason. So I asked Tim to get back in the pool and swim. Same thing - as soon as she saw Tim swimming, she started crying again. I don't know if she was just scared for them or didn't like the fact that she couldn't see their whole bodies or what.

I know after she starts her lessons, she'll love the water and be our little "fish". But it might be a bit more difficult than I originally thought to get to that point.

Anyway, I thought it was worth noting so that one day she can look back on that story and have a good chuckle!

Karys has been busy learning all sorts of new things lately! She's gotten running down to an art now and will zip from one room to the other extremely quick! We've had to do a bit of running after her ourselves!

She has also now learned Eyes, Nose, Mouth, Ears and Hair. If we ask her where these things are, she will point and "talk". She says "eye" pretty clearly. Last night I was in the living room with her and she kept saying it over and over and when I looked down at her, she was practically poking poor Brinks in the eye! He just kept turning his head - probably hoping she'd leave him alone soon :)

She's also learned more animals sounds in addition to a cow. She can roar like a lion and she knows what sound a pig makes - and this one is the most amusing. I'll have to try to get that one on video!

Her vocabulary is growing more and her words are becoming more clear. Some things we can recognize at once (eye, cat, dog, DaDa, etc) while other things take a bit of deciphering on our part. She's much more helpful since she has taken to pointing to show us what she wants. Usually that entails the swing outside - it's become a favorite past time of hers lately!

She's also become a little expert on slides as well. Miss Yvonne has a small one in the backyard that the kids play on and she helps Karys up the stairs and Karys goes down the slide by herself. This is another source of great fun for her :)

The weather is finally getting warmer and we're excited about being able to spend more time outside with Karys. Plus, she got a lot of really cute spring/summer outfits for her birthday that we've been anxious to see her wear!

Easter is next weekend and we will be spending a lot of time with our families. She has a really cute Easter dress that comes in today too!

Then the weekend after that we jet off to Chicago for Karys' first plane ride to see some family and have a mini-vacation! Lots of fun stuff coming up!

We hope everyone has a great weekend!

We took Karys to the Houston Zoo for the 1st time yesterday with our friends Travis & Jennifer and their daughter, Haylee. The girls had a really great time and when they weren't too busy playing with each other and the toys in the wagon, they enjoyed looking at all the animals.

We were impressed Karys did so well considering she missed her morning nap and we were at the zoo for about 5 hours! She loved the goats in the petting zoo and loved running around to pet them all. The wagon was definitely the way to go too! It held all our stuff, the girls and the toys.

Karys passed out the minute we put her in the carseat, slept all the way home and then in her crib - for a total of over 3 hours!

We did lose Karys' beloved Elmo at some point during the day - even going to Lost & Found to try to find him. One of the girls must have thrown him out of the wagon and none of us noticed :( I think Tim & I were more upset than Karys was so we went to ToysRUs today and got her a similar one since we couldn't find the special Valentine Elmo again.

We had a really good day though and plan on taking her to the Zoo again when she's a bit older. She had a lot of fun now so we know it will only get better each time!

Karys had her 1 year check-up this afternoon at the doctor. Her weight gain seems to be slowing down, as she only gained 1/2 pound in the past couple of months, now weighing in at 23.5 lbs. She grew taller though and now stands at an impressive 31.5 inches! So she is long and lean - just like her Daddy (thank goodness!).

We had her vision tested today too and we're happy to report that it is at a perfect 20/20! She was also cleared to eat anything we'd like to give her - including eggs, shellfish and berries. We'd already given her scrambled eggs and she loves them! The only thing we were told to hold off on was peanut butter until she is 2 years old. We're excited to let her try some fish and shrimp soon though!

The doctor was impressed that she was walking so well, off the bottle and drinking her whole milk like a champ. She said there wasn't much more advice she could give since we'd already done everything. Yay!

Karys had a few shots today and a TB skin test in her arm. She screamed and cried during all this and I forgot her pacifier so I handed her a cookie and she immediately stopped crying ;) Food usually seems to work pretty good with her - haha!

All in all, the appointment went really well and we don't go back until May 29th for her 15 month check-up!

After her doctor appointment, we headed straight over to the local high school to vote in the Texas Primary. Karys got to watch Daddy place all his votes - her first experience with voting! We gave her the "I Voted" stickers and took some pictures (which are already uploaded). Our Lil Republican :)

This evening we also switched out her earrings for the first time. Aunt Rachel gave Karys a very nice and beautiful pair of pearl earrings for her birthday and we decided to put them on her. She looks just beautiful in them! There are pictures in the photo gallery already. So sophisticated!

We hope everyone has a great week!!

Karys is 1 year old!

What a special day it was! We had her 1st birthday party at the house yesterday with a huge turnout of family and friends to help us celebrate. It was a perfect day and the weather was just spectacular.

She wore her special birthday dress and was just adorable! She, of course, wasn't too involved in the opening of the presents but she did really enjoy the Elmo's (the pizza one in particular) and would kiss him over and over while Tim and I "helped" open the rest of her presents. She got a lot of money for her college fund, some cute summer clothes, Elmo DVD's, learning toys and much more! She is one blessed little girl to be so loved and spoiled!

Karys really enjoyed the cake and it was everywhere - all over her face and in her nose! She just dug right in without any help. She knew what to do ;) We got a lot of great pictures with the cake. Talk about a sugar rush! She was anxious to get back down and play with everyone afterwards!

The party went really well and we couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day or better people to share it with.

We still cannot believe she is already 1 year old. The time has gone by so quickly this past year and it almost seems unfair for doing so. We witnessed so many of her milestones the first year: smiling, crawling, first words, walking...she is just such a joy and we can't wait for all the fun her second year of life will bring as well. She has truly been a gift from God and we are still so thankful for her every day.

At the end of the day, when all the guests had left, Karys "wrote" a letter to Jesus thanking him for how blessed her life is and for everyone who loves her so much. We put the letter in a bottle and tied some balloons around it before letting it go and sending it to Heaven.

Tim and I want to thank everyone for sharing in her day and making her 1st birthday one to remember. She has the best family and friends any little girl could ever hope for. She is truly loved and blessed.