Mary and Ronald really hit it off...she didn't want to leave.
Mary Catherine Parks is a walker!
She took her first itsy bitsy steps when we were in New Hampshire for Christmas. She had a a big audience (all eight of the Broadbent kids) cheering her on and she seized the moment.
After all of the fanfare she took a hiatus until Jan. 27th. We went to Virginia to visit Mom mom and Mary decided Monica's apartment was the perfect venue for walking. She let go of my hands and took about ten steps right into Daddy's arms. Picture perfect, except there are no pictures :( Marilyn was there and is always prepared with her camera or video camera. She got what we thought was great footage but come to find out the room was way too bright and nothing came out.
This week she is really getting the hang of it and is choosing to walk instead of crawl about half of the time. Truly amazing. I was beginning to think she was going to crawl to kindergarten.
Stay tuned for pictures and video of the walking. She is too smart and stops walking when she sees the video camera come out.
Chris and I are in such trouble, aren't we?
Here are some pictures I took of Mary on Monday night. Chris was in class and I had to keep Mary up past her bedtime so we could pick Nana up at the airport.
When is the best time of day to watch Teletubbies? Anytime, silly!
Mary Catherine cannot get enough of these strange Bristish ummmmm....creatures. She wakes up asking for Tubbies, points to the tv and asks for Tubbies after dinner, picks up Daddy's remote and tries to turn on Tubbies.
No, we don't indulge every request for Tubbies but we get weak, you know? An adorable toddler can only ask for Tubbies so many times before you give in and watch the creepy show.
MC had her 15 month check up on Wednesday. Here are the stats:
21 lbs 7 oz
30" tall
She is in the 40 percentile for height and weight. Her head size is in the 75%. No surprise there :)
She has started to take a few steps here and there but is not a "walker" yet. The doctor explained she was most likely focusing on her fine motor skills and that has resulted in being a late walker.
She has lots of words such as Mommy, Daddy, puppy, cracker (we hear this one a lot), bath, nigh-night, go, bye bye, up, ducky............ok I'll stop. I'm just so proud of our little girl.
She insists on feeding herself with her fork and spoons (same ones that Daddy usesd, thank you Mom mom). It has been a messy process but she now gets more in her mouth than on her belly.
Mary had her catheterization to close her PDA on January 3rd. It went very well and she was back to herself in no time. It was an incredibly stressful day, the six hours in recovery were the worst! But we are only looking forward at this point. Her follow up appt is in July.
So that is our Peanut in a nutshell (pardon the pun)! We are enjoying her every minute. I think this is my favorite age so far. Many of you will remind me I said that at 6 months, 9 months, 12 months....
Here are a few new pictures. Ok, so technically the Halloween pictures are not new. But they are new to you :)
Last Wednesday Mary Catherine started barking like a seal (a cute little baby girl seal) around 3:00am. By 8:00pm the same day she was admitted to Anne Arundel Medical Center with a serious case of Croup.
After lots of nebulizer treatments, a few steroid shots and lots of hugs and kisses from Mommy and Daddy she was back to her wonderful little self.
The picture below was taken the morning after she came home from the hospital. She was not very thrilled with me but cute nonetheless.
Needless to say, Chris and I are relieved our Peanut is back to normal. We are also proudly displaying our newest Parenting Badge: "Overnight Stay in the Hospital".
It has been a while since I have posted. Like everyone else out there we have been busy with the early bustle of the holidays.
Here is a quick recap of the past few weeks:
* Mary got tooth number two. It is a big top tooth.
* Chris's company moved (from Rockville to Rockville, just a new fancy building). This meant no downtime for him this past weekend. If you see him and he is looking a little weary cut him some slack. Mary and I will see to it that he gets at least one "sleep in" morning this weekend.
* We've had a few appointments with Pediatric Cardiologists regarding MC's heart murmur. I'll make a very long story short. We all have a valve in her heart that is supposed to close permanently soon after birth. Mary's did not. It is called a PDA. When she was a newborn she went to the Children's Hospital annex in Annapolis, got lots of pictures taken of her heart and we were told to come back when she turned one. It was their hope (and ours) that the valve would have closed sometime during the year. Unfortunately hers remains open and will need to be closed. Letting the valve remain open allows too much blood flow to her lungs which would force her lungs to work harder than normal. It also leaves her susceptible to a viral infection in the heart called endocarditis. The procedure Mary will have done is called a Cardiac Catheterization. The doctors insist we call it a "procedure" and not surgery. We like this and are playing along.
She will have a small blocking device inserted into the open valve. It will be inserted via her femoral artery in her leg. This is much less invasive than the surgery that this condition used to require.
The doctor performing the procedure has the most experience on the east coast and was a pioneer of the procedure.You've just got to check out this site.....
http://www.freerice.com
During a little "down time" here at work I managed to donate 600 grains!
The Tooth Fairy finally found her way to our house!
Mary Catherine is now the proud owner of one lower front tooth. We have no pictures of the blessed event because:
1. MC is currently very under the weather. She is fighting through a reaction to her Chicken Pox vaccine. She is grumpy, feverish and in NO mood to be photographed.
2. While you can feel the tooth with a freshly washed finger, the little guy is barely visible to the naked eye.
I use the term "happy" very loosely. Mary didn't have the best of days. I am almost certain her first tooth broke the surface today. She has another tooth very close to popping through as well. All of the tooth trauma has made the peanut cranky and very rashy.
While in the tub to help said rashes she stood up briefly and quickly fell and banged her mouth on the side of the tub. Oh the horror! There was blood and everything!!
She is resting comfortably in her crib with her three "honey bunnies", cookie monster, pooh bear and a fistful of binkies.
My poor baby. Keep your fingers crossed tomorrow is a better day for Miss Mary.
About the picture below.........while MC doesn't usually have a binky in the tub, tonight was that kind of night. Thanks to her Mom Mom she had just the right binky for the occasion.
Here is a picture of Mary Catherine one year ago today. My goodness what a difference a year makes.
You will have to trust me when I tell you she was having a good time in this picture. She was seven days old and in between a nap, a feeding and a diaper change.
Here are some new-ish pictures of the peanut enjoying her new chair. I could watch her ignore me and the camera all day.
Here are some pictures from Mary Catherine's party last weekend. They are in no particular order and are a bit belated due to some technical difficulties.
She had a wonderful, albeit very tiring day. She partied pretty hard and was sleeping soundly in her crib by 6:00pm. We didn't hear from her again until 8:00 am the next morning. Sure sign of a good birthday, right?
Thanks to everyone that made it to the party. Our little pumpkin had a wonderful birthday.
Yesterday was Mary Catherine's 12 Month Check Up. I scheduled the appt for her actual birthday as it made a great excuse to leave work early and celebrate with our Peanut.
Four shots later and we were leaving the doctors office with a teary eyed birthday girl. A little nap and a few nibbles of strawberry shortcake and Operation First Birthday was back on track.
Other than the aforementioned shots, the appointment went well. Here are her stats:
Birth
7 lbs 2 oz
17.5" long
One Year
20 lbs 5 oz
28" long
She is just under the 50 percentile for little girls her age.
As I put Mary Catherine to bed last night I was feeling a little nostalgic. I told her all about her first day of life one year ago and how amazed I am at what a perfect little person she has become. She looked at me, said "Eeeooow, eeooow", grabbed a fistful of pacifiers, rolled over and fell asleep. I suspect the toddler years are going to be very fun :)
Mary, this is the silly outfit the doctors made Daddy wear on your birthday. He looks very serious, doesn't he? Please note the clock behind Dad's head. It reads 11:20 am. You were born at 12:06 pm. Yeah, he got ready a little early.
This is a VERY nervous Mommy. I was SO excited to meet you. I was not so excited about the looming surgery. This is the room they put ladies in whose babies have no interest in coming out on their own. You were Frank Breech (upside down with your toes near your ears) for the last ten weeks before you were born. You requested an escape hatch and we obliged. Just the first of many outrageous requests I'm sure.
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