I am sad to say that Mimi is no longer a baby . . . she is a wild little monkey! I don't exactly know when this happened, but it seems like it was overnight. Since she turned one she has become so independent and fiesty (these are the exact words of her preschool teacher, Miss Jackie). For example:
She wants to walk everywhere and refuses to hold my hand or be carried . . . and her little knees are covered in scabs :(
She HATES to be fed. She only wants food that she can eat by herself (tomatoes, bananas, strawberries, and pasta are her favorite), and she sweeps all her food off the table when she's finished.
She insists on stealing small liquor bottles out of the cabinet and yells at me when I take them from her (I finally put a latch on this cabinet today . . . and she yelled at me when she realized it!)
I have to put her in the sleeper hold to change her diaper.
She wags her finger at Ruthie whenever she barks too much and tells her, "no, no, no."
She plays tug-of-war with Ruthie and her toys and squeals with delight if Ruthie jerks her down.
I have observed her push others out of the way to get to a toy.
On the other hand, she has learned SO much at her new preschool just in the past month:
She can play "Ring around the Rosies" but likes to sit down way too early.
She tries really hard to do the hand motions to "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and "Wheels on the Bus."
She sleeps on a mat at school.
She comes home with coloring pages and other "art projects" she's worked on that day.
If she accidentally drops a toy, she says, "pick up, pick up" . . . and then she usually throws it down.
When I ask her "where's the blah blah" on the page of a book, she usually gets it right. Well, sometimes she gets it right :)
Mimi LOVES being outside and picking up sticks, acorns, and leaves . . . and sometimes she even pulls weeds!
She is so sweet to Spike and likes to share her food with him (but never offers any to Ruthie!).
Mimi has been trying to play with her toys in the dogs' water bowls (and sometimes the potty!), so I have been taking her bath toys outside and letting her play with them in big bowls of water. She gets herself, the patio, and anything within a ten foot radius completely soaked.
I was cleaning out her closet and found my favorite baby gown of hers. I tried it on her and it still fits! I thought it was so sweet but I could tell the length was annoying her.
What a perfect way to END the post -- Way to go Rebels for beating the Memphis Tigers!
We visited my parents in Corinth a couple of weekends ago when our air went out and rode to Pickwick on Saturday afternoon. Mimi loved seeing the water and the boats.
Last weekend we went to Jackson for a wedding, and Mimi went crazy in the hotel. She loved to run full speed into the closet mirror, stick her head in the air conditioner so her hair could blow, and pull all the toilet paper off the roll. I'm so glad she's able to entertain herself in a small hotel room!
The Botanic Gardens has recently added "My Big Backyard," which is a couple of acres of treehouses, sandboxes, creeks, little play houses, bridges, and flowers that are all geared towards children. I had no idea what we were in for when I decided to stop by and check it out this afternoon. Oh. My. Gosh. It is absolutely amazing.
Mimi's favorite part was the "rain," which is an area that looks like a front porch with a tin roof. Every 15-20 minutes it thunders and kids start running from the other areas to get drenched under the rain. I had no idea how Mimi would react to this, but she ran straight to the middle squealing and giggling. We were so not prepared, so her clothes (and mine) were completely soaked. 
And this is what she did when we got home . . . 
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Here we are about a year ago with our new little bundle . . . we had no idea what the first year would be like. As Mimi grew bigger, we grew wiser and a little less selfish -- 3 feedings a night will do that to a person. Before we had a baby, our lifestyle consisted of sleeping in as late as possible, going out to dinner almost every night, sending our dog Ruthie to doggie day care (which is more expensive than Mimi's!), watching TV all night, and basically feeling like we had very little responsiblity other than work. Needless to say, the priorities have definitely changed, and we have changed for the better. Clint and I know all the songs on Sesame Street and we buy organic produce. I don't even pay attention when Anthropologie or J. Crew has a sale, but I go nuts when Cotton Tails has smocked dresses for $35! In the past we watched Dave Chapelle when we wanted to laugh -- now we just sit in the floor with our little one-year-old and crack up at her trying to dance or be silly. .JPG)
Mimi with her cousin Nick.
Mimi's first wine-tasting . . . well, she had a sippy cup of milk instead.
Mimi was a fantastic traveler as always. We had Curious George on for about 2 minutes before she fell asleep on the way home.
Since Mimi is getting close to the one-year-old mark (yes, I'm still in denial about this), we bought her new, forward-facing carseats so she can see the world from a whole new perspective. And the most excited part of this of course is the boxes! She has had so much fun crawling in and out of them . . . and it looks like Clint did too! 
At eleven months old, these are some of Mimi's favorite things (sorry this is so long but I'm afraid I'll forget if I don't put it somewhere!):
Last weekend Mimi made her second trip to the beach in Santa Rosa, FL. The first time we took her she was 8 weeks old, so it was much different this time around. For one, she doesn't sleep quite as much during the day now, so we were concerned about making the long drive and keeping her happy. Despite all our worries she was such a trooper in the car and was easily entertained. Clint even let her drive some!
One night we went to the beach to search for crabs and for Clint to fish a little, and Mimi was so excited. Maybe it was because the sun wasn't so bright and there weren't as many people around, but she really didn't mind the water and sand as much as she had during the day.
