First Birthdays and More!

I'll first start by saying I suck, yes, I know.  Over a month without an update is unacceptable.  I feel as though I have been saying this in many of my posts lately, but alas, I am here to fill you all in on life at the McMillan household.

It's been so long since our last post that I'm not sure where I left off so I'll just fill you in on the recent stuff.  For starters my beautiful baby girl is now 1!!!  Well, I'm so late in posting this that she's actually 1 year, 2 weeks and 5 days old but who's counting?  On the actual day I arranged to have the day off so that we could relax and hang out.  For her 'big gift' Jamie and I bought her a playhouse and spent the night before putting it together since work would be keeping him away on the actual day.  I was dead set on her receiving her gift on the actual day, so after our late night out (I almost forgot about that but I'll fill you in below) we came home and stayed up until almost 2am putting it together. I have to say that is was as much fun as I envisioned! <--- lots of sarcasm intended!  Slightly buzzed and trying to be quiet is not a good combination for putting together a kid’s toy!  We managed it however and this was the end result!

The next morning, at 5:30 am Kylie woke up and Jamie brought her in to see her gift.  She LOVED it and hasn't stopped playing with it since.  I was exhausted but this face made it all worth it!

After playing with her new house it was time for the 'Birthday Girl Breakfast'.  Instead of the usual toast and eggs, french toast or pancakes I decided to change them up and replace the blueberries for chocolate chips.  This was the first time she's had chocolate and after eating 2 entire pancakes I think it's safe to say that she enjoyed them!

We spent the rest of the day shopping, meeting Daddy for lunch and of course more playing in the new playhouse!

To celebrate her 1st birthday we decided to have a small party with a few close friends.  Me (being the Martha Stewart, super mom wanna be I am) decided that I would do the cake myself.  I am fairly crafty and despite what most of you think I really am a pretty good cook, especially when it comes to baking.  Clearly, a cake decorator I am not however, and my vision for her 1st birthday cake did not go as planned!  The original idea was to have a butterfly theme with individual butterfly shaped and decorated cakes for everyone.  Kylie's cake would consist of a round base with one of those butterflies sitting up on top of it.  Of course the week this is all suppose to take place my oven breaks, and the main setting used for cooking is not heating up.  I can still use the grill option though and I decided that it's probably best to do a trial run before the big day.  Thank goodness I did, because the oven is a piece of crap!  It didn't cook evenly and I had problems with the actual butterflies themselves.  Since the butterfly cakes turned out to be a mess, I decided to just do one for Kylie's cake and do cupcakes with butterfly chocolates for everyone else. 

In deciding this the week of the party I forgot that I was in Perth, Western Australia!  If you are looking for something last minute I can guarantee that they will not have it!  Something so simple to find back home like butterfly molds, is like finding a needle in a haystack here...impossible!  So, I had to adjust my plans once again.  The big idea was the same, Kylie's cake the way I planned and cupcakes for everyone else but instead of chocolate butterflies they would get sugar butterflies, no big deal.  Then Saturday came.  I was smart enough to make most of the food the day before.  I even made the butterfly cake for Kylie's cake the day before so going into the morning I was ahead of schedule.  I made my homemade butter cream icing and got the cupcakes done, no problems.  I made my 'grass' on the top of the cupcakes and placed the butterflies on them and they looked pretty good!  Next I started on Kylie's cake.  First I iced the round base, then started trying to ice the butterfly and it just look like s*%$!!  You couldn't even tell it was a butterfly!  It looked like a big blob of icing!  I was devastated!  It was an hour before everyone was suppose to show up, Kylie was due to get up from her nap any minute and I hadn't finished getting ready yet !  I had to scrap the entire idea and in the end Kylie ended up with a plain round cake with really bad writing that said "Kylie's 1st Birthday" on it.  I should have used butter cream for the writing as well, but tried to go the easy route and bought a tube of writing icing that was pretty much crap!  It was thin and gel like and just crap!  When I tried to scoop it off to redo it with butter cream it just smeared all over the place so I had to leave it since I just didn't have the time to mess with it.  Luckily Kylie didn't care what it looked like and had a good time eating it regardless!

The party was a success and a good time was had by all!  We were sad that all of our family and friends from home couldn't be here, but were thankful to the friends here in Perth that helped make it special!  That evening we opened gifts and that was about all Kylie could handle for the day! Below is Kylie at the start of opening the gifts and at the end!  It took her a while since she felt the need to play with everything as she opened it but I think she enjoyed it!

The following weekend was a long weekend for us.  Due to the holiday's we had Good Friday off followed by ANZAC day and Easter Monday (celebrated on Tuesday).  We spent the weekend relaxing, shopping, going to Kings Park and of course eating lots of chocolate!  Kylie received her first Easter Basket and I must say that I think the Easter Bunny did a pretty good job.  Here are a few photos of our weekend!

Hanging at Heathcote Reserve and testing out one of her gifts, the Smart Trike

 Lunch at Kings Park

 First Easter!!

My little bunny, such a cutie!

I swear this has been one of the fastest years of my life! I feel like it has been just a few weeks since we celebrating Christmas and now we're only a few days away from Mother's Day. Over a third of the year gone and I can't for the life of me recall where it went.

I'm sure that the upcoming month will go by just as fast. The afternoon of Mother's Day Jamie leaves for about a week to make his rounds around Australia. Once he gets back we've only got 2 and a half weeks until we leave for Bali. A trip that is much needed and both of us are equally excited about! The idea of taking Kylie to a country such as Indonesia worries me a little though and I've got my fingers crossed that she doesn't get sick while we're there. I'll try my best to post again before we leave!!

I'll leave you now to enjoy some of Kylie's 1st Birthday photos!!

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about our late night out!  So, there was a big convention here in Perth for the oil and gas industry and because the company that Jamie works for is in the oil and gas they had purchased 2 tables for the dinner on the last evening.  We went thinking that it would be a pretty boring evening and we would be desperate to get home but it actually ended up being a good time.  Evidently this event is kind of a big deal and all of the 'who's who' for these types of companies in the Asian Pacific region attends.  The dinner was good, the open bar was even better and the entertainment was well, entertaining.  The highlight of the entertainment portion of the evening was when Guy Sebastian did an hour long performance for our small crowd of 1,600.  Seeing as though we've been overseas for the last 3 years I don't know how popular he is in the US but over here he's kind of a big deal!  It was quite funny to be out on the dance floor with the CEO's and VP's of huge companies getting down to his music when clearly they had grandchildren who probably had his music in their IPods!  In the end it was a good time but we didn't get home until 11ish, which is why we were up so late putting the playhouse together.  Not because we are a little challenged in the toy putting together category!!

Pure Hell!!

So, I thought that 3 weeks without a blog was bad! I guess I just set a new record. Please see below for my excuses!

The last few weeks have been absurd! The title of the blog says it all, but I'll give you the details.  In my last post I told you all that Kylie was sick. Well, that lasted 2 weeks! It was a nightmare! High fever, runny nose, it was bad. When we finally got the fever under control the runny nose hung around for another week. It went on nonstop, all day and all night. Not to mention all of those teeth that were hanging around, well, all except for 1 were still 'hanging around'. I swear she has to be setting some sort of record for not only how long a tooth that is completely visible can go without breaking through the gums but also how close one can be without breaking through as well. 4 of them were so close I could actually feel the pointy little corners through the gums and yet only 1 managed to come out during that time. Aghhhhhhh!

Anyway, after all that we managed to have about a week that went well. During this time she became a little "daddy's girl" and started to follow him everywhere. Not to mention all the kisses he got from her without even asking for one. She would just crawl over to him, climb into his lap and lay one, or two and sometimes even more on him. When I would ask for one she would just turn her head. She even pushed me away one time and crawled after him crying. Can you believe it? She wanted him over me! I found the entire situation a little annoying; Jamie however loved every minute of it! So for the most part we were having a great week and then someone stole my baby! Not literally, but seriously that's how I felt.

For about a week Kylie was a different kid. There were a few days that I thought my child must be seriously advanced because the terrible 2's had arrived an entire year early!! I couldn't walk three steps, much less out of the room, without her breaking into a full blow screaming fit. It didn’t just happen when I walked away from her either. It happened if I took something away from her, gave her food she didn’t want, put her down after holding her, etc, etc, etc! Her eating was funny, her sleeping pattern turned into shit and frankly her overall attitude wasn't any better. This went on for AN - ENTIRE - WEEK - FOLKS! To make matters worse, when I say her sleeping pattern was shit I mean it. She would go to bed with no problems but would wake up screaming at least once a night. She would then wake up around 4:00 - 4:30 and would be up for the day. I wouldn't get up right away and instead tried to let her stay in her bed hoping she would go back to sleep. The longer she stayed in there the louder she got.What this meant for me was that I was up no later than 5 am for an entire week, even after waking up multiple times during the night. Trust me when I tell you that it wasn't even this bad when she was a newborn!

Then, on Monday (a week ago today) something just 'changed'. No more screaming fits and she was eating and sleeping much better. I don't know what did it, but all of this sudden my Kylie was back. As god as my witness, you would think you were dealing with a different kid! Jamie and I can only come to one conclusion. Even though she didn't have any signs of teething during the 'hell' week (as it is now referred to in this house) she did start showing signs of it during this last week so she must have been teething (as we now have another tooth). Along with the teething we think, or rather we know, she had a massive growth spurt during that week as well. Every weekend Jamie and I take the dogs and Kylie on a series of morning walks. This past weekend we put Kylie in the stroller and her feet could actually sit on the bottom of the foot rest with her knees slightly bent. They did not touch the foot rest the weekend before. During 'hell' week she also stopped standing up. When I would grab her hands and get her to pull herself up to standing she would scream and start to cry. I thought it was really strange at the time but chalked it up to her being in a bad mood. I had also mentioned to Jamie during this week that Kylie's waist looked really small. After weighing her she hadn't gained or lost any weight so I think it was just the extra length making her look so small. So, our conclusion is that she was teething and going through a growth spurt. Are we right? Who in the hell knows, but I have to think that there was a reason for the madness and these are the reasons I’m using! I am happy to report that the last week has been wonderful and my little girl is just as happy and silly as ever.

Things with Jamie and I are going good as well.  2 Friday's ago we had someone from the daycare come over to watch Kylie so we could have a "date" night, which was great.  When we were ready to leave Kylie went right to her and didn't even pretend to cry as we left.  That made the whole 'leaving her' for the night thing easy to do!  We went to a place called Halo, which is in downtown Perth right on the river.  It was great to go out for a nice, relaxing dinner, enjoy a bottle of wine and not be rushed.  Overall it wasn't as good as The Boatshed, but it was nice to get out and try something new.

I’m really enjoying being back at work and after tons of research I've finally booked our hotel for Bali. I am excited to report that the first week in June I, along with my beautiful little family, will be relaxing on a beach or at the pool in our villa with a cocktail in hand. Since we had to push the trip back from April to June because of a thing Jamie is working on at work, we will actually be in Bali on my 30th birthday due to the holiday weekend at that time. If I must turn 30 I guess that's as good a place as any to do it!

We have also made our reservations for the 2011 Clemson trip which will be taking place in September. The lake house has been reserved and everyone has confirmed their attendance!! It will be the first game we've been to since 2007 and everyone seems to be really excited about it. Beautiful scenery, great football and wonderful friends, we can hardly wait! The only thing left to do now is purchase our plane tickets and decide what we want to do with the rest of our time in the US. We're trying to decide if we want to do a beach house or a cruise, but aren't sure at this time what we will do. All I know is that I am totally ready for a US vacation, not just a visit for the holidays!! Hopefully the time will continue to go by as fast as it has up to this point.

I almost can't believe that Kylie will be 1 in less than a month. I'm not exactly sure where this past year has went, but somehow it's come and gone : ( As excited as I am about Kylie turning 1, I am equally just as sad. For starters my little girl is growing up! Before you know it she’ll be taking the credit card along with the car and telling me she would rather hang out with her friends than with me. I also hate that she will not have a big party with family and friends for her 1st birthday. She's got some really cool birthday gifts and the only way you guys will see her open them or see her face when she gets them will be from photos. The thought of it makes me really homesick even though I know she will never know the difference. Since I'm now getting really sad, I guess I’ll end the post here.

Hope you guys back home are enjoying the beautiful spring weather I keep hearing about!! It’s now fall here but we’ve still had a few high 90 – 100 degree days here so it doesn’t feel like fall. Not to mention there’s no football on so it can’t possibly be fall, right? Keeping with usual tradition, here are the latest and greatest!

Even with bedhead she is too freakin' cute!

The 2 loves of my life!  Could they be any better lookin'?

1st Valentines Day

Toddler fest, the only thing she was old enough to enjoy!

With friends at the park.

Playing in the backyard

1st swing ride!  She loved it!

Biggest Slacker!!

Yes, I know!  Three and a half weeks without a blog is just unacceptable!  I mean seriously, it's not like I have anything going on, right?!?  Well, actually; wrong!! 

As of my last blog Jamie was away, I was deciding between two different jobs and we were eagerly awaiting cyclone Bianca's arrival.  The cyclone drama was very short lived, as it literally dissolved once it hit the warm waters off the Perth coast.  In a matter of like 8 hours or something it went from a category 3 to a tropical low.  The night before there were some heavy thunder storms in the city (about 6 km north of where we are) and lots of people lost power but we didn't even get one rain drop!  The day it was suppose to make landfall it was a little windy, but that's it.  Not even one cloud in the sky. 

The contract on the other job I mentioned came in and everything was as we discussed in my interview so I accepted.  Yay!!  I am now officially working again.  I started my new job working in the Operating Suites at a nearby private hospital a few weeks ago and I LOVE it!  Kylie is doing really well in daycare and that makes the whole 'work thing' that much easier.  Not to mention I am only 5 minutes from her daycare and Jamie is only 10-15 minutes away if I can't get out.  It's been a little weird adjusting to the new routine but so far things are going well.

Jamie is back from Melbourne and even though the tennis finals weren't as exciting as they were last year he said that things went well.  Best of all, being the AWESOME husband that he is he brought back Krispy Kreme blueberry doughnuts!  I hate that he has to go on these trips, but I absolutely love it when he comes home!!

On the home front not too much has been going on.  Kylie and I have a pretty packed schedule now that I've started working and Monday through Friday is pretty non-stop.  Monday we have swimming, Tuesday mom's group, Wednesday and Thursday I work and Friday we have our workout with Ann the trainer.  Even though it's only 1 thing each day when you factor in Kylie's routine (breakfast, am and pm naps, lunch, chasing the dogs around, etc) it makes for a full day!  The kiddo is non stop! She has mastered the 'crawling' thing and has moved on to pulling up on everything she can get her chubby little hands to grip.  She also chases the dogs around, which is freakin' hilarious!  She thinks both of them are called Budder, and as she crawls after them she yells "eh bu, eh du bu", is so cute I can't stand it!  She'll even slap her hand on the floor and call them the same way.  I don't think they think it's a cute as I do, but they take it pretty well.  At the moment and for the past few days Kylie has been in rare form.  Not only is has she been sick since Saturday night with a cold and a temp of 101-101.8, the poor dear also has eight teeth that are trying to come in.  Yes, that's right I said eight!!  She has four on the top that have made their way to the bottom of her gums and are picometers away from breaking through and two more on the bottom that have been hanging around for the past two weeks.  If you ask me, she has good reason to be a little off.

As far as my vacation dilemma Jamie and I have decided to go ahead and plan for Bali.  Because of work we have had to push our trip back until June instead of April which actually helped in terms of the cost of the flights.  However, I completely underestimated the costs of the trip to begin with so it looks like even after factoring in the cheaper flights we are easily going to go over my original estimate.  On a good note, the Clemson schedule has finally come out and we are in the process of getting that trip planned as well.  It's looking like 2011 is going to be a vacation filled year and I can't wait!!

Of course I can't end a post without the updated photos!!

Afternoon nap with her tiger! (9 months)

(This is the one that Jamie got all on his own before she was born.She loves it and sleeps with it every day!)

An afternoon of swimming

First full day of daycare!  This is the before...

and the after! 

Just playing around!  Jamie used to put the colander on his head too! (9 1/2 months)

More Sydney

So, I was on our facebook account changing the profile photo to the one from our Christmas card and realized that I put additional photos from Sydney on there but not on here.  Since it's easier, and quicker to upload the photos to facebook I always seem to have more photos on there than I do on here (so feel free to 'friend' us if you like the photos without the reading!).  Not the point but anyway, just thought I'd put a few of my favorites up for everyone to see!!

Photos from the dinner cruise

 My two favorite people!!

See these crazy people, yeah that was Jamie and his dad the day before!  No thanks!

Beautiful photo of the Opera House



Since I'm on here I'll give you a quick update on our week.  Kylie did GREAT at daycare!  She watched me walk out the door and didn't even cry!!  Ah, I was so proud and relieved at the same time!  If she would have cried I wouldn't have been able to leave her.

I also possibly have a new job, or I guess since I haven't officially started the first one I have a 'different' job.  Should get the contract on Monday and if everything is good I will start the following week instead of next week.  The best part about it is that I won't have to do the month of full time, yesss!

Jamie's in Melbourne enjoying the men's and women's finals at the Australian Open and Kylie and I are here in Perth preparing for Tropical Cyclone Bianca, fun!  It's a 4 now but they are expecting it to only be a category 1 when it makes landfall.  Really I'm just preparing to lose power, since we lose power during a semi-heavy rain storm or a few awkward wind gusts!!  The most annoying thing about it is that we've had temps in the 36-38 (which is 96-101 degrees F) and on Sunday the high is expected to be around 36.  It is suppose to drop to a high on 29 on Monday (around 85) but that's still pretty hot when you have no aircon!  Will post again soon!!  Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

To Bali or not to Bali...

This shouldn't even be a question, I mean seriously; it's Bali!!  Of course the answer should always be TO BALI, right?  We have a five day weekend coming up in April and since it's in the same month as Kylie's 1st birthday and our 8 year anniversary I was thinking Bali would be a good choice.  The problem, I wasn't expecting to pay 3 grand for a 5 day weekend!  Normally I would say "Okay, since this is a bit more expensive than I thought let's just extend the trip and have it be our big vacation".  However, our big vacation for this year is going to be a trip back to the states to meet up with some friends at a Clemson game and then either a cruise or a beach house somewhere warm and tropical after that.  Since that trip is going to be a bit pricey (and in addition to our Christmas trip home) the question is "do I really want to spend this much money for a 5 day vacation?"  So, that's my dilemma.  My solution?  I will plan a vacation to 3 locations - Bali, Indonesia; Phuket, Thailand; and Margaret River, Western Australia.  Jamie and I will look at the trips and make a decision on where to go from that.  How that's a solution I don't really know.  It doesn't help at all with the fact that it's going to be an expensive "mini-cation" but I guess it will help me to be okay with paying that much for it! Here is my thinking right now. 

Of course Margaret River will be the cheapest (we can drive and the accommodation is cheaper) but we've already been there.  There is tons of stuff to do and lots of winery's to see so it's not like we wouldn't be doing/seeing new things not to mention it will be Summer/early Fall  instead of early Spring but... we've been there. 

Phuket is a place that we've wanted to visit and we actually had a trip planned last October but had to cancel it due to the move to Perth.  We've already been to Thailand, but it's such a beautiful place why not go again?  It's close to where we went last time (Krabi) so we can see the sites we were too lazy to go to last time, like the Phi Phi islands and the beach where The Beach was filmed.  Won't really save us any money to go here versus Bali but gives us a different option and Jamie really want's to go back to Thailand.

And last but not least, Bali.  1.  It's a place I've always wanted to go.  2.  Bali is very "family friendly" and lots of the big resorts (like the Four Seasons and the Westin) have babysitting services so we could enjoy a spa day, etc.  3. Did I mention that it's on my bucket list of places to visit?  When will we ever be a 3 hour flight away from there again?  Exactly, I don't know either.  I guess we may not be a 3 hour flight from there in April, (if I've learned anything with Jamie's company it's that they can call to offer a new position at any time!) but as of right now we are.

For the past week, in addition to trying to figure out our next vacation I have been gearing up to go back to work.  This week Kylie started play sessions at the daycare and next week she goes in for a half day and then a full day to help her adjust before I start work the following week.  I am extremely unsettled about leaving her in the care of someone else but I know it will be good, for both of us!  I need to feel like I'm more than just a "mom" and I know after seeing her this past week in the play sessions that she will enjoy the company of the other babies.  I feel comfortable with the center she's going to be attending so I know in the end everything will be okay.

So, what's the challenge for next week? Actually being able to drop her off when I don't have to work.  Tuesday (the half day) won't be too bad because I will have Jamie there to make me walk out the door!  As of now he is planning to take the day off and we are going to have a "date morning" and head out to the beach for a while and then grab some lunch.  Wednesday is Australia Day so no daycare.  Thursday however is supposed to be her full day and Jamie heads out to Melbourne for some meetings and then the Australian Open.  That means that I will be dropping her off all by myself!  I get nervous just thinking about it!!  When I think of the chance to have a full day to myself though I start to feel a little better : )  I'm thinking beach, shopping, massage and maybe a mani/pedi to end the day!  After all, I am going back to work so I deserve a day of fun first, right?

So, that's been our week.  Last week Kylie turned 9 months old.  Her weight was 18 lbs and she was 29 inches long.  She also started crawling this week which has been a blast (no sarcasm intended)!  It's so fun to watch her chase the dogs and I think that they like it as well!  Below I have included a few new photos as well as a video for the grandparents of her moving around.  I'll keep you posted on how next week goes, wish me luck!!

For a week straight this is how she would sit while eating in her chair, don't see how this is comfortable but what do I know?



Kylie in her "Christmas Outfit" made my Mama Connie.  Because we all got sick she wasn't actually able to wear it for Christmas.  We did make use of it on our visit to see Mama Ruth which was good, but I didn't have any photos of her wearing it.

Playing in the backyard with the girls, she LOVES them!!

And hangin' out!

Videos for the grandparents!!

Lookout people we've finally got a mover!!

(Sorry about the poor quality.  I don't know why it's so bad!  Only thing I can think of is that it was taken with an  HD recorder and the player obviously is not!)