Life after the big ONE

To our feisty little Bear,

Your personality has certainly blossomed over the past three months, and we have loved every minute (well, most of them) of watching you grow and develop into your own tiny person.

You are independent.  You are loving.  You are HILARIOUS.  You are smart.  You are so much fun.  You love music, dancing, books, and bath time.  You love your puppies (the real one and the stuffed ones), the color pink, and pushing all the buttons on your toys so they make lots of noise.  You are more than I could have ever dreamed, and I am so thankful for every moment that I get to be your mommy.

The last three months since you turned one have been a roller coaster of emotions and your smiling face has kept us going every step of the way.  My prayer is that you always find the funny in life and don't take things to seriously, but you're going to have to start listening to your momma and daddy at some point!  {The words "No" and "Stop it" tend to cause a laughing fit and that's just not going to be acceptable at the age of 13...}

In the past few months you have gone from learning to take your first steps to running laps around the house.  I will say that you run the fastest when you know we are coming to wipe your face off, fix your hear, or put you in bed.

And I'm not sure if it's too early, but I'm predicting that you'll be standing in front of people delivering some very important messages one day because you are VERY passionate about everything you have to say.  Sometimes you even look like you are preaching to us!

Thank you for adding so much joy to our life and for teaching us daily how we are to love unconditionally.  

Fifteenth Month Stats

Wearing: Some 9 month, all 12 month, and some 18 month (some due to the fact that the seasons were going to change without being able to wear these cute outfits at all, so we made it work!)

Eating: Everything and anything. Seriously. She will eat anything you put in her mouth (and unfortunately anything she puts in her own mouth).  She LOVES her milk and still has some issues with quite a few fruits, so we have to watch those.

Sleeping:  Still loving our sleep, but she is an *EARLY* riser, and I'm sad to say that those 2nd naps are a little sporadic these days.  (She has a harder time napping on the days her daddy is home.  She'd so much rather be out playing with him!)  We had some pretty early bed times after turning one...that's tough stuff!!  We also had a hard time adjusting to the time change (including being ready for dinner at 4:00 every night...still).

Teeth: 16. Yes. 16!  (Please note that three short months ago, the last time I filled this little questionnaire out, she had *EIGHT*8*EIGHT*.  She cut 6 at ONE TIME.)  We've only got the four, 2-year molars to go!

Official Measurements:  Baby's brain is still growing off the charts at 49 cm (99+%).  She weighed 23 pounds (75%) and was 31 inches long (68%).  We are so thankful for these healthy numbers, which you can read a little bit more about below.

Last three month highlights

As I mentioned earlier, the last three months have been a bit of a roller coaster ride with lots of questions, lots of tears, and some fear, but we know that in ALL things God works for them together for our good (Romans 8:28).

At Bryleigh's 12 month/1 year check up, our doctor was concerned that Bryleigh had slowed down so much in her growth.  She had fallen from the 95th percentile to around 60 percent, and was dropping each time we took her in.  Thankfully, over the next few weeks and months, we met with the doctors and nurses for follow up visits, talking through all she was eating (which exceeded their expectations for a toddler), sleeping, and playing.  By her 15 month appointment, she had evened out and fell right around the 75th percentile which is where they are wanting her to be.  We are so thankful to have the questions and fear behind us and our happy, growing girl is definitely perfectly healthy (and that is something we don't take fore granted)!

The tougher part came a month ago when we found out that we were expecting Baby Hammons #2.  Bryleigh was going to be a big sister!  {Cue the tears, excitement, and planning} But before we were even able to share the good news with our parents and siblings, we got the devastating news that I was actually having a miscarriage. (Did you know that sometimes those things don't just happen, they keep happening over the course of a few days or even weeks? I didn't, but I do now!)  For the first time in all my blogging/writing history, I don't have the words.  Maybe at some point they'll come and I'll be able to share more, but right now, all I have are the facts, and the fact is, our 2nd little miracle that was due on Thanksgiving Day is already resting sweetly in the arms of Jesus (and in the moment I knew that, I became more homesick for Heaven than I've ever been).

Thankfully, along with the tough stuff, we've had a whole lot of GOOD stuff to carry us along.  Have you seen our daughter's smile?  Or heard her laugh?  Yeah, she makes the bright days brighter and the dark days full of light!

Bryleigh LOVES to play.  She keeps herself entertained every day, all day.  She is a busy-body, always on the go, and she loves playing with all of her toys.  She enjoys dancing to the songs that come on during her favorite shows (Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Doc McStuffins, and Sophia the First), but she's not a big tv/movie watcher.

One thing that HASN'T changed over the past three months (since so much else has) is Daddy's schedule.  He leaves the house on Monday morning (early...he tells his girls bye on Sunday nights) and comes back home on Thursday nights.  We make the most of every minute we have with him over the weekends, so Friday through Sunday is full of memory-making moments, snuggles, and lots of laughing!

My personal fave - the first time she
saw daddy for the weekend!

Not only does B-girl love her daddy, she loves her puppy too!!  They are best buddies.  Bryleigh loves to say puppy, bark like Emmitt does, hold his tongue when he licks her, and pull his legs.

I was able to run my second 5k in February at my "dream 5k" - The Hot Chocolate - with my favorite running partner, my Momma!!  We've been wanting to run THIS very race together for a long time, so we were excited to check another one off our racing bucket list.

Brad and I were so blessed to spend Valentines evening on a very special date - with dinner at Del Friscos Grille, followed by a hotel stay at the Ritz in Downtown Dallas.  We had brunch the next morning at Crossroads Diner (Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives selection and Carrie approved).  It was my first night to stay away from our sweet little girl, so it was definitely time for a getaway with my hubby.  We had so much fun enjoying some "grown-up" time, but we were so thankful to get home and spend time with our girl!

Valentine's Day included some quick time with Mimi and Pappy, chocolate covered strawberries, and a little gift for our sweetest Valentine.  We spent spent the evening with our family of three having a pizza party and watching some college basketball, PERFECTION.  

We had quite a few snow days to end the month of February, and although they weren't Bryleigh's 1st, it was certainly her first time getting to enjoy it (and next time, she'll get to even more!).  We were thankful it didn't mess up any of daddy's transportation, and that he was here during the worst of us.  (The hardest hit day was right in the middle of us going to one of Bryleigh's follow up appointments.)

March is always a fun month, and one we always seem to be counting down to, because it's Daddy's birthday...and he loves reminding us!! We had fun celebrating Brad the weekends before and after his birthday since he was in Winston-Salem on his birthday.  (But don't worry, he celebrated while he was there too!)

Another reason we I love March so much is because of ST. PATRICK'S DAY!! I mean, how can you be a red head and NOT claim it as your own personal holiday?! ;)  I love a good reason to celebrate and do fun things with my girl, and when my momma is around, it's even better!  My mom came in town on her Spring Break and we took our very FIRST shopping trip mother-daughter-trio, and we got Bryleigh some {much needed} shoes!  We also had lucky charms for breakfast, wore our green, had green milk and a green bath, along with a special St. Patty's Day punch!!

Since we got the whole "shoe" part covered, I decided to give bow-wearing a try!  We did a little bow bootcamp at our house, and it made for quite a few laughs.  I'm pretty sure I put that bow in her hair 500 times...in 30 minutes.  (And in case you are wondering, she's not any better at wearing bows.)

We were so blessed to spend Easter morning with our church family at Fielder and then had lunch with Brad's family - DeDe and Poppa B, Aunt Erin, Mema and Cliff, Grandma and Grandpa, and Aunt Lou.  We are always so thankful to be able to spend sweet time with family as they love on our sweet girl.

This family LOVES sports, and one of our very favorites is baseball! One tradition we kind of fell in to was going to the Sunday game of Opening Weekend, and this year it was PERFECT for taking Bryleigh to her very first game.  The weather was perfect, the game went pretty quickly (until it was tied and lasted 12 innings, but we didn't stay quite that long), and we didn't have to mess with any meal times! #lifewithatoddler  Bryleigh got a little scared with all the cheers from an early double play, but she was easy going the rest of the game.  She LOVED dancing to all the music they played, and there was lots for our little people watcher to see!