A portrait of my child, once a week, every week in 2013

This week she turned 1. She turned 1 and grew up right before our eyes. It was as if she knew, she knew, that she was no longer a baby and it was time to start becoming a toddler. She stood up on her own on the night of her birthday, with her grandma watching. And then she did it again, as if to prove that it wasn’t just a fluke. She’s kept it up too. I’m sure she will be walking far sooner then I want to think about. We celebrated her birth today, with her closest family and she had a blast. When she was smaller family parties seemed to stress her out, and she only wanted her mama. Today she barely noticed I was there. Roaming from person to person, from toy to toy. Her independent streak is starting to show through, and I fear all too soon she will remind me more and more of myself in that regard.

After her party(and a nice long nap for the both of us) we took her down to a lake front park with her Uncle and played on the swings, went down the slide and watched the ducks. The light was something to make Terrence Malick jealous. Watching her giggle and squeal in the swing may have been the highlight of my day. I had far too many photos to choose from this week, which is a wonderful feeling.

Last week this was my favorite photo. It is simply stunning.

By the way, I am now also blogging over at The Boob Group, about one of my favorite subjects, breastfeeding! You can check out my first post, about my experience with oversupply here.