Our Hungry Caterpillar Turns One!

Yes, it's already here... and no, I simply can't believe it's been a year already! Caleb Nicholas has grown so quickly, and he has added such a fun new dimension to our family. He keeps us on our toes and always laughing. We gathered this weekend to celebrate his first year of life. With much help from my friend Melissa and thieving ideas from the internet, his Very Hungry Caterpillar party was a huge success!

I'll take you on a brief tour of some of the decor:

Caleb's birthday shirt, ordered from etsy.

Birthday banner, in the same style as his invitations.

Very Hungry Caterpillar onesies our guy has outgrown...

Brother & sister handprint caterpillars:

We gave out vintage Eric Carle books & "caterpillar food" as party favors.

The kids (and some adults!) wore the caterpillar antennae.

The cake:

The fruit display consisted of the first five fruits the caterpillar ate through in the book.

We used these cute food cards to tell the story through the food display.

Aunt Melissa had the great idea to make pinwheel sandwich lollipops as a healthier alternative to actual lollipops. They were great!

I also made a video montage of Caleb's first year in photos, including the video of when he & Shiloh met for the first time, set to music. I'll admit I shed a tear or two in the process of reliving his first year.

And now a brief tour of the festivities, including the handsome birthday boy himself.

He had such a great time at the party!! He loved having so many family & friends come to the house.

He looked pretty cute in the antennae as well.

His favorite toy of the day, a Thomas the Train ride-on.

Caleb with Aunt Melissa, who is super awesome...

She made this incredible caterpillar cutout which we had fun making everyone stick their faces through...

And, of course, what's a kid's birthday party without the cupcake action??

SMASH!

I love this messy, cupcake-covered boy! (Thanks, Leslie, for the great shot!)

For a more full experience of the party in photos, visit here.

Happy birthday to my sweet & crazy boy! You are such a blessing to us. We love you!!

Hair Gel (aka Cute Mohawk Fail)

Gosh, he's so stinkin' cute.

Hangin' with Uncle TJ

A few weekends ago, my brother TJ came to Louisville to stay with us for a couple of days. He recently left his job with NOAA in Seattle so he could begin a professional pilot program at SIU-Carbondale, which he'll begin next week. This summer he came back to the east coast and spent some time with family before starting school. We were very excited to have him come visit, even briefly. Most of our festivities centered around eating (hey, that's what we Kiefers do best!). We took him to Mark's Feed Store (had tried Lynn's Paradise Cafe but at 2pm on a Saturday there was a crazy long wait, especially the week of the Man vs. Food episode airing)...

You'll notice this "thumbs up" pose in almost every picture of TJ. Shiloh adopted it as well.

Caleb was NOT thrilled about having to wait for our food. I mean, how sad is this face??

Shiloh, on the other hand, WAS thrilled to wait, because she had Uncle TJ's undivided attention and a game of tic-tac-toe.

We drove through Cave Hill Cemetery to see Col. Sanders memorial (my idea--I'm weird and think cemeteries are beautiful, especially this one)...grilled rib eyes and veggie kabobs... and then on Sunday we went to the Louisville Slugger Museum.

Shi NEEDED to sit on top of the huge ball/glove.

Baby dolls and baseball bats...

The Kiefers, July 2011:

We posed with Uncle TJ in front of the giant bat as well.

Then we introduced Uncle TJ to Indian food at the best Indian restaurant in Louisville, Kashmir.

Here's Shi chowing down on some naan.

Chutneys, chicken tikka, lamb korma, chicken makhni and tikka masala, naan, OH MY! We tore up this meal.

TJ's verdict: thumbs up!

We enjoyed our brief visit and wish him the best of luck as he begins his flight training program! Love you, Uncle TJ! :)

First Day of School 2011-2012

Hello, fellow bloggers & readers! I have been MIA for quite a while and really have no good excuse. Well, I guess technically I could use the whole our-computer-got-fried-by-lightning excuse, but really, I wasn't blogging much before that either. But, as you saw from my last [sad excuse for a] post, my awesome husband bought me a macbook which I've been trying to learn to use, and am bringing you this first post from it. I'm REALLY going to try to be better about posting, and I may bombard you with several here in the next week which will likely be in reverse chronological order -- call it a backward glance at our summer, if you will. :) [I've also been neglecting reading all of your blogs, friends! LAME, I know...]

Miss Shiloh Ainslie missed her first true day of school this year because she was sick, but she started yesterday instead and of course Mom insisted on the obligatory first day of school pics in the morning. The weather was dreary (it began raining an hour or so later) but the subject was still pretty cute.

Shiloh's teacher this year at Whitefield is Mrs. Malone. We really like her! So far, Mrs. Malone has reported that Shiloh is "very sweet," "very talkative," and "mature." On the first day of school, Shiloh apparently worked very diligently trying to befriend a little girl in her class who missed her Mommy very much and was sad/clingy to the teacher. She said Shi did everything she could think of to make this little girl feel better, and Mrs. Malone even emailed the girl's mom to let her know about Shiloh trying to comfort her. I was very proud of my little girl with a big heart.

We're looking forward to seeing what the remainder of this school year will bring! YEAH!

Have I told you lately...

...how absolutely wonderful my husband is? There are many reasons... the latest of which is that he bought me one of these.

He surprised me with it as an early anniversary present and made me one extremely happy girl.

Now.... I just have to learn how to use it. :)

Caleb = 9 months

Nevermind the fact that he's actually closer to 10 months now... this busy, tired momma thinks she's doing well just to get it posted in the same month at all! Let me share a little bit with you about our sweet and WILD boy:

He's precious.



And really stinkin' cute.



And he's a BIG boy. 22 lbs 5 oz (75th percentile) and 29.5 inches (90th percentile). He's also as strong as an ox, and we call him DestructiCon.



His sister is still his favorite person in the world, and she always keeps him laughing. Here he is playing at his favorite indoor play place, her kitchen.



He's going to a be a guitar player one day... see?



He can stand on his own for several seconds, cruises around all of the furniture, and has taken 2 steps on his own to date. He pushes a shopping cart all around the living room. Walking probably isn't terribly far away!



He is 110% boy. Exhibit A: His innate boyness teaches him that grabbing his crotch is really, really funny.



He crawls with one hand in a "fistbump," as Shiloh calls it. Always.



See? There he is at it again.
Oh, and yes -- his hair is still auburn.



This boy loves being outdoors -- going for a walk, swinging, and swimming are some of his favorite things to do.



His laugh is one of the most wonderful sounds in the world. We also enjoy hearing him say "Dada", "Mama", and something resembling "Hi" while waving. He's VERY good at shaking his head no appropriately and swatting things out of his face that he doesn't want. He can sign "more" (used most often outside when his swing begins to slow down and he wants more pushing) and kind of signs "finished/all done."


His hair is always wild and crazy. I refuse to cut it. It matches his personality.



He has 4 teeth so far, 2 on bottom and 2 on top. He also has big, beautiful dark eyes -- right now a sort of hazel color.



He is such a joy! We couldn't be more thankful for this little dude.