My submission for FailBlog

I shot this great picture the other day. Think it would work for the Fail Blog?

Clara is One! Oh What Fun!

Clara's 1st birthday was yesterday, and oh what a day it was! Since we just got back on Wednesday (really Thursday, since it was so late!) we didn't do a party. We just had some family over for the fun and had dinner, presents and cake. I think the pictures and videos can do all the talking!

While I was finishing making dinner, Jordan took Clara outside for a little photo shoot. Here are a couple shots from it:
After the pictures, we had dinner. Fajitas! Yummy!
This mess is just a preview of Clara and her cake.
After dinner, we cleaned up and Harry decided to give Clara a birthday kiss (with a little coaxing!)
Then Clara got to open her presents!

My parents have a ton of Little People toys at their house and Clara LOVED playing with them, so we got her the farm for her birthday.
This is how Harry felt about Clara getting presents. In 3 weeks, Clara will get to feel the same way for Harry's birthday!
While trying to get all the Little People out of their packaging, the box was more fun for Clara and Harry.What if you could actually buy little people like that?
Once the presents were done, we moved onto the cake. I made a double layer cake, then cut out the middle for Clara's cake and frosted them both so there was her little cake and a doughnut cake for the rest of us.

Clara wasn't quite sure what was going on, but she was excited!
And then it was time to dig in! The video is a little long, but really funny. If you don't want to watch it all, please skip to the end, it is worth it! But really, the whole thing is great!

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

At one point, Clara started picking up the plate and licking it.
Then she wanted to share it.

Disneyland Fun

So I am home now, but Clara and I did get to go to Disneyland one day with a bunch of my family. It was super fun, but so crowded-the park was sold out! Here are the two pictures we took.
The park was so crowded, it was hard to take pictures.

While at Disneyland, one of my very best friends, Kelsey, who lives in the LA area, came to visit with me! That alone made the trip worth while! Thanks for coming to see me Kels! Clara loves her honorary aunt!

More Fresno Fun

Clara has been having a great time with so many new toys at Grandma's house. And she always has a toy in her mouth.


Again, I don't know how to rotate video, and I forget when I am taking video, so just turn your head for a minute! This is Clara and my mom playing with a fabric ball my mom made. Clara is learning to throw the ball back.



This was just a cute video. She is always so interested in the camera, so it was funny how she kept trying to touch it. Then when she got the paper, and I asked her what she had, she showed me! I love seeing her do things like that and know that she is learning and understanding me.



Another sideways video. My parents have this huge, amazing lemon tree, and they never picked all the lemons back in January, so there were still tons on the tree that hadn't fallen off yet. We have been having fresh lemonade every day. Yum! While we had a few tall boys around (my cousins), we went out to pick all the lemons. My nephew, Tyler was having so much fun. One of the boys would lift him up so he could reach a lemon to pick, or if they were too high, he would point out which lemon to pick. Then my cousin started shaking the tree so they would fall out and he would run around under the tree to pick them all up. It was very cute!




Lemon picking spectators


Here is one of Tyler being the boss, pointing out which lemons to pick.
My parents also have TONS of boysenberry plants, and lucky me, they are on right now! Every day I have gone out and picked bowls full of berries. We have made pies, cobblers, jam, and a cheesecake with them.

Playful Clara

Clara is very playful and happy in the mornings and after her naps. She loves to play games, and right now, this is one of her favorites. She thinks peekaboo is so funny!

Grandma has buckets of toys for the grandkids to play with, and Clara is LOVING having new toys to play with. Can you see her new tooth?

Clara got to play with some cousins today. She and her cousin Sydney played very nicely together. When Sydney first came over to play, Clara handed her the toy she was playing with, then grabbed another one to play with. She is already learning to share (hopefully that will last!).

My cousins got their wisdom teeth out today. My dad and brother each did one, and they were pretty funny afterwards. They were out most of the day, and Clara thought they were a great jungle gym for her to climb over.

I found Clara by herself playing with all the toys, and I thought what she was doing was really funny:

I don't know how to turn the video, so I didn't even try, just turn your head side ways for a minute and it will be just fine! Clara and Sydney had so much fun playing together with Grandma and cooperated to play with this toy. It was so much fun to watch!

Clara's First Day Swimming

This was Clara's first time in the pool. The crying in the backround is her cousin, Jacob, not her. She LOVES the pool!

Just in the past couple of days, Clara is starting to smile for the camera. The flash still gets her, hence the closed eyes. This is her cheesey smile. Can you see her new tooth on the top? The other one is following right behind it!

Here is another picture of her cheesey smile. She plays so happily on the floor! Clara loves grandma and grandpa's house!

This picture is mostly for Jordan. This is Clara's cousin, Jacob. He is such a happy kid, and such a little guy compared to Clara. They are 5 months apart in age, and about 10lbs apart in weight!

Here is one more video of Clara. In the last month, she has started waving to people. She started waving to grandma while we were in the pool, so we caught that on video. You can hear Jacob blowing raspberries in the backround.

We Made It!

After a long day of airports and flying, Clara and I made it to California for a visit with the family! We had an extra 2 hour layover we weren't planning on, due to some maintenance issues, but we made it here safe and sound and Clara did great. She even made new friends on both flights! I told Jordan I would try and post pictures and videos on our blog while we are gone so he can see what we are up to, so if everyone else gets sick of reading/seeing what we are doing, just tune out for the next 10 days!

I also wanted to share a realaly cool story that happened on our flight. There were a couple of soldiers returning from Iraq who were flying home to Fresno on our flight. Once we were all seated on the plane, preparing for take off, the flight attendant came up to one of them (the one sitting near me) and said "Are you Burke?" and he said yes, then she said "A man in first class would like to switch you seats." The man came back and said that he really appreciated what this soldier did for our country and that he would really like to switch him seats and give him a more comfortable ride home. Another guy in first class did it for the other soldier too. I thought that was so cool! The soldier was so modest about it, and the guy who gave up his seat sounded so grateful. Anyways, it was a cool story! Stay tuned (or not!) to see what me and Clara are up to!

Food and Fun and Food (and Crystal kisses an Indian)

For Clara (and, let's be honest, for her parents, as well) food and fun frequently go together. Today, after I spent my day doing research for my professor, Crystal and Clara came and picked me up and we drove to Krispy Kreme to celebrate National Doughnut Day (which has to be in the Top 20 holidays, easily - somewhere between Bacon Day and International Talk Like A Pirate Day.* We got a delicious dozen at Krispy Kreme and then headed to the nearby Scioto Park for some fun. We had several bites of about four of the delicious flavors and styles of doughnuts we bought, and Clara had one all to herself.
She loved it, of course.
The park was right next to the Scioto River, so we walked down to the water and I skipped some rocks to impress the girls, and then went to the playground were Clara went on the slide (with her parents) and sat in the swing. She didn't love the swing, but she didn't hate it as much as last time, either, so we're making progress. We found a kiddie swing big enough for the both of us! I've never seen one that big, but it was pretty cool.

Then, we walked back up to the car, and checked out the big statute of Leatherlips, an Indian chief who made a treaty with settlers in Ohio allowing them to farm on land that was once claimed by his tribe. The settlers were glad, but the other Indians were mad and sentenced wise old Leatherlips to death by tomahawk. His sentence was carried out a little ways north of the park (and we've seen that monument before), but a while ago this big statue was made to honor the man. Crystal honored Leatherlips with a kiss from her not-so-leather lips.

Finally, a fun random picture from this week. Clara loves spaghetti and meatballs!
*Which reminds me, I still want to see this movie.

Mischief

This is what happens when you think your kid is playing quietly:

Yup, an entire box of Cheerios dumped out. She was so proud of herself!