happy 1st birthday, reese!

wow! reese turns one year old today! it's hard to believe we've had her for a year now, but we can't imagine (or remember) life without our little reesey boo. she is such a joy and we are so thankful the lord brought her into our lives. we love everything about her...the way she pushes her two big toes on the highchair tray, the way she crosses her legs while sitting in the highchair, the way she points at everything and says, "da", the way she looks at you when she wants you to hold her, the way she holds her food up to feed you and then feeds herself, the way she tries so hard to stand up at everything, her cute scrunched nose and closed eyes smile, her soft little giggle, the way she headbangs when she wants to dance, the way she looks and points at the front door when you ask her where dad is, how she gives the best hugs, and i could go on and on. it is the most awesome experience to watch our little girl grow and learn. one year ago she was so tiny and new...

and now, she's so big and so fun! we had reese's birthday party a few days early so we could celebrate with our family. we had a party at gram and papa's house with balloons, cupcakes and presents. it was fun to watch her open the presents. i think she liked the tissue paper in the bags better than the wrapping paper. she didn't quite know what to do with the wrapping paper. i bet next year will be a different story! she immediately started playing with her toys and hasn't really stopped since. she got this great house with all kinds of fun things on it! (see in the pictures) we did the typical first birthday thing and let her dive into a cupcake. she gave us some pretty cute smiles when she licked the icing. it was YUMMY! she is a pretty neat eater, so that made for easy clean up. i forgot to put reese's party hat on, so we took some pictures of her with it on the next day. she liked it. here are some pics from the party. since i couldn't pick just one, i put a slideshow together.