St. Pete Bowl

Peyton, McK and I flew with the Rutgers football team to sunny Florida for the St. Petersburg Bowl. While in Florida Peyton got to experience the beach and loved the sand! We visited the Pier and Florida Acquariums, looked at Christmas lights, took several walks every day and even met Santa himself at the Farmer's market on Saturday. Santa gave Peyton her first candy cane and she gave it a thumbs up. As many of you know, we left the sand of Florida and arrived back in New Jersey to lots of snow. Oh well, the break from winter was good while it lasted.

Peyton is keeping us busy and laughing. She loves to tackle us and use mommy & daddy as jungle-gyms. Since turning 1 she now knows and can point to her eyes, ears, nose, mouth, toes, legs and knees. This weekend she picked up the sign (language) for "please". Peyton also had her first playdate with her friend Lucas (who is 2 weeks younger than her) and stayed with a babysitter while mommy & daddy went on a date in NY. Ms. Samantha said she was super easy and would babysit Peyton anytime again in the future so that is good news.

Thanks to a musical birthday card she received from Aunt Rita, Peyton's favorite song is now the theme song to the tv show Little Einstein. She also loves Elmo, the Wiggles and Barney (unfortunately) :D Her favorite past time is stacking and reorganizing everything (including Q-tips). She helps mommy with the dishwasher by handing me the clean dishes one by one. She loves to find any way she can be a contributing part of what we are doing and becomes very proud of herself when we thank her for her help. She is off all of her bottles except her nighttime bottle. However, the last 2 nights Peyton has drank very little from it. Once we are done traveling we will replace this with a cup also. Peyton still does not like milk to drink throughout the day but we are finding ways to make sure she gets her calcium (yogurt, yogurt drink, American cheese and one of her favorties - homemade brocolli and cheese.

In the next 2 weeks Peyton will get to discover firsthand the beaches of Florida and will get to revisit all her loved ones in Oklahoma. In between these 2 events, Santa is expected to visit.

Merry Christmas!