Happy Birthday

So Aaliyah took Ciara's blanket that she got for her birthday and covered up Grandpa Benson with it. Ciara did not like that and went over and stole it back from Grandpa!!!

An Elmo blanket!!!

Her first Birthday cake!!

blowing out the candle

Sister love...for the moment!!!

Silly sister!

Yummmmm rigatonis

I made her an ice cream birthday cake and when I was writing I ran out of room!! Oh well-I tried.

Cool baby and her "thrilled" daddy. He hates to have his picture taken.

Aaliyah was going to the moon like Little Bear. She had her "gobbles" on.

Getting the camera

Here are some pictures from our baby girl's first birthday and a couple from the days before. Praise the Lord our baby girl is one year old!!!!!!!!! Enjoy!

Here is a video of her eating her birthday cake-she loved it.

One year ago...

This is little Phalen Manners! Welcome home!
Aaliyah riding Phalen's sister Briar's horsey

Ciara helping daddy put a shelf together

Aaliyah and kissy taking a nap

Ciara watching Yo Gabba Gabba

Her first spagetti

Aaliyah eating spagetti

notice the noodle on her chin

Corey found her playing in this tote so he carried her around in it

Aaliyah loves to stand on the register and do a Marilyn Monroe

helping with the dishes

February has been quite an amazing month. On February 5th we celebrated the anniversary of what we thought was the day we were going to loose Ciara. It was an emotional day for me. I remember the fear and sadness I felt that morning when I felt my sac out of me. But this year on the 5th I included happiness as one of the emotions. I am so blessed and thrilled to have Ciara in our lives. She is a true gift from God. As a thank you to the maternity unit and Dr. Khan and her staff, Corey and I sent them both flowers. The maternity unit called to thank me and I told them that this would be our anniversary and just like a lover I will always remember to send flowers! I will never be able to thank them enough or repay them for what they did for me and my family. Dr. Khan and her ladies were like angels to me and I will forever be thankful. God truly blessed our family with Ciara, but he also blessed us by having these wonderful ladies to help us and be in our lives today!

Ciara is doing so well and at her last Synagis shot appointment she weighed in at 14lb 11oz. She is crawling everywhere and getting into everything. She cruises from the couch to the table to the fish stand. The other day she was playing with a toy and did not realize she was standing by herself not holding on to anything! It won't be long before she is off and running. Aaliyah is not too crazy about her sister being able to get into her stuff now. She is yelling a lot for me to come and get sister because she is in her space. If I can't get there when Aaliyah wants me to she just corrects the situation herself and picks up Ciara and brings her to me. I have told her a couple of times not to do that in case she would fall or drop her sister, but if Ciara needs to be moved-Aaliyah is going to do it! Ciara continues to have therapy once a week with Kathy and she looks forward to playing with Kathy. As soon as Kathy walks in the door Ciara crawls over to her and wants to be held. We are so grateful to have Kathy in our lives and I love the relationship and bond she has with my daughter. She too is an angel. Ciara is starting to eat table food and is doing really well. We get WIC benefits and they provide us with 32 jars of fruits and vegetable baby food per month. Well lately she pushes the baby food away and wants what I am eating! Anytime she sees that I am eating something she makes her way over to me and then wines until I give her some. She is growing up so fast. She will celebrate her first birthday on the 25th. Boy how time flies!!!

Aaliyah is doing well and is completely potty trained!!! She still wears a diaper at bed time, but has been doing well getting up and telling me she has to go potty. I am so proud of her. She got her first official hair cut on Friday and was scared to death. I have been trimming her bangs for her-which is pretty much a hack job-for a while now. Lately her hair has been in her face so I thought it was time to get it all trimmed. I needed a trim as well so I went first to show her that it was nothing to be afraid of. When it was her turn she clutched on to me and kept saying "I want to go home." I finally convinced her to sit on my lap and let Pam "brush" her hair. After the trim she looked at me and said "See mommy it didn't hurt!" I was so proud of her and we had to go to the grocery store afterwards anyway so I told her she could pick out a toy. When we got to Wal-mart we went straight to the toy section and she had quite a hard time deciding what she wanted. It came down to a cinderella barbie doll and a fur-real baby parrot. She couldn't decide so she told me she wanted both! I told her she could only have one and that her birthday was coming up soon and I was sure the one she didn't get today she would probably get for her birthday. I braced myself for a temper tantrum. Instead Aaliyah looked at them both and said "OK mommy I'll get the parrot." I tell you what my little girl is so good and sweet, I gave her a hug and kiss right there. So we continued to shop and she asked if we could go back and look at the fish. I took her back and they had all sorts of new fish since we went last. They had this really long, ugly fish called a dragonfish and of course Aaliyah was fascinated. She looked at me and said, "Mommy that is so cool, we need one!" I studied it for a while and commented how ugly it was. Then she said, "Daddy will love it." After some thought I decided she could get the fish who she has named Really Big Guy. She carried her fish to the car and insisted on holding it on the drive home. It is still living and the thing is so creepy and ugly but she loves it and that is all that matters. Corey by the way did not love it and he said it was the ugliest fish he had ever seen! She also continues to be a nudest and I have a hard time keeping clothes on that girl. Most of the time she is running around in just her panties and I am happy because at least she has panties on! Aaliyah will turn three on March 16. Where does the time go? We have scheduled a joint birthday party for the girls on March 13. It will be at the community center in Punxsy. It is from 3-7 and we rented out the gym so the kids can play. It of course will be a princess party and sometime around the time I mail out invites I will get to Wal-mart and register them. I find it is so much easier with a registry. That way everyone has a wish list and has ideas of what to buy. If you can't find anything to buy...batteries are always a good option!!! We go through so many batteries.

I am doing well and have started a down a new career path. I attended my friend Kaylan's pampered chef party in December and her friend Jenna was the consultant. After the show I was telling Jenna that I thought it would be fun to be a consultant, but I didn't know how I would find the time. After some talking with her over breakfast last month, I decided to sign on. I had my kick off new consultant party on Saturday and then my mom hosted a party at her house on Sunday. Both parties went well and I had a blast at my mom's. I remembered everything I wanted to say and was not nervous at all. I so far really enjoy it and I will probably do 1-2 parties a week. This way I am still hear for my girls, but I also am getting some mommy time. I desperately needed to spend some time with adults and what a better way to do it! So if you are ever interested in hosting a cooking or catalog show, please let me know. And if you ever want to order some products, you know where to go. After my mom's party yesterday she hurt her back so I went and bowled for her on her league. I used to bowl before I got pregnant with Ciara and loved it. I did awesome last night with a high score of 222! I have never been above 160 so I was absolutely thrilled. I had a great time. I am healing well from my hysterectomy and everyday I feel stronger. The amount of pain I don't have on a daily basis is wonderful. On the 4th I went to Magee Womens hospital in Pittsburgh and met with an Interstitial Cystitis specialist. She was wonderful and after a long discussion she feels I was misdiagnosed. This was music to my ears. I have been doing all the treatments and haven't been seeing results. I am scheduled to have an MRI of the pelvis and also to have another cystoscopy so she can take a look at my bladder herself. I do not know the dates I will be going in yet, they have to call me with those. I am excited to maybe figure out what is going on and help ease some of the discomfort. All I can do is pray and hope that God sends an angel to be with the doctor so we can get some answers.

Corey is doing well and continues to work long hours. He loves his job and never complains. His newest passion is plowing all the snow we have received the past couple of weeks. He has been plowing the yard into a big snow pile and turning it into an igloo for Aaliyah. I guess mom said the neighbors have been making fun of him because he plows the yard!!!! The things we do for our children. He also enjoys going down the sidewalk and plowing all of our neighbors out. He seems to like to plow as he is out there for 4 hours at a time! It is nice that he helps our neighbors, some of them are elderly.

Update on Phalen Manners: She is home!!!! She came home about 2 weeks ago and is now over 5 pounds. I took over some dinner for them the day after she came home and I got to cuddle her for a bit. She is so precious and it is hard for me to believe that Ciara was that tiny! The girls and I are going over on Thursday to visit some more. I will continue to give you updates. Please remember to keep her in your prayers.

God is so good and I praise him for the joy in our life. Prayer does work and Ciara is living proof.