Top Ten Tuesday: Birthday Presents for (Little) Kids

We went to our first birthday party in a long time on Saturday--for one of Libbie's friends. Miss Emma turned 2 and had a grand affair at a nearby park.

Libbie drank two juice boxes and ate one pink-frosted cupcake and oodles of Goldfish and pretzels ... and then crashed before we even got home.

I like to pick out toys for other kiddos, mainly because it means they won't be populating my house. But I don't want to get kids something they probably already have or will really be a nuisance to the parents (involving batteries, which equal loud noise...). So I'm collecting ideas for the future parties I'm sure we'll be attending!

Top Ten Birthday Presents for Little Kids

1. Melissa and Doug sandwich-making set

This is what "Libbie" got for Emma, since we know Emma really likes playing in her kitchen (as Libbie does). I just love Melissa and Doug's old-fashioned, wooden products.

2. Felt food from BeckyM on Etsy

I am soooo in love with this seller's felt food. It is so realistic and funny and adorable.

3. Sweet, homemade hair clips from Mimi's Babies on Etsy

4. Sun Stacker from Imagination Kids on Etsy

Oh. Oh, love. So cute. So bright.

5. Cute, unique clothes, like this Minnie dress from Sweet Sassy Boutique

I probably wouldn't give clothes to someone I wasn't close to; but if I did, I love something a little unique! I am in love with this seller's dresses!

6. Learn to Dress Monkey

 

One of Libbie's great joys in life is unzipping things (my purse) and trying to undo buttons. I think she'd love one of these!

7. Little People Farm

I love all the Little People sets, and so does Libbie. She's forever carrying around the animals from her ark and loading and unloading them.

8. Art supplies - chalk, pipe cleaners, markers, stamps.

9. Good kid's Bible, like the Jesus Storybook Bible. It's a gift that will grow with the kid as he/she learns to read and can tell the stories by his/herself.

10. Special baby. I'm still a huge fan of Cabbage Patch dolls, although I feel like Libbie's a little small yet for them. She does adore her Baby Peanut doll, and it's just the right size for her!

Do you have any other ingenious gift ideas for kiddos?

Added to Top Ten Tuesday at OhAmanda.

This post includes Amazon affiliate links. Read more in my disclosure policy.

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12 Days of Libbie: Day 12

10-26-09

Dear Libbie,

Last year at this time, I was in labor, probably being sent home from the hospital because I wasn't quite ready yet. It's hard to comprehend that it's been a year already.

You are still a baby and yet a little girl as well. You're fearless--climbing (and falling down) stairs, opening and closing everything, discovering every nook and cranny wherever we go.

At 12 months, you:
- stand on your own, take a few steps here and there, and move constantly
- eat a lot of fruit, bread, and cheese, despite my constant attempts to get you interested in other foods
- laugh constantly and love being tickled
- have 6 teeth (5 and 1 coming in)
- have huge blue eyes that people always comment on
- have a little mop of curly, dark blonde hair
- are a total Mama's girl
- are very easygoing and sweet, but also demanding and quite forceful!



All my life, I've wanted to be a mother. I don't have a huge career drive, although I love to write. A year ago, you fulfilled my dream. I never imagined how it would feel to have you look at me, grin, and tackle me for a hug. How your laugh would make me do wild things. How your true, heartbroken wail would shatter my heart. Being a mother--YOUR mother--is both difficult and wonderful, heartbreaking and joyful. I love you in a way so different than I have ever loved another human. It is awe-inspiring.

I prayed with you tonight and told God that now I understand a little more how much it must have hurt to send His Son to die. I can't imagine giving you up to any pain voluntarily, not for anyone. He loves us so much, Libbie. I pray you will know the amazing love of God more than anything else I wish or pray for you.

Love you always, Peanut.

Your Mama



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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.

12 Days of Libbie: Day 11

Please don't berate me for putting this picture on here.

It's just SO stinking cute. I LOVE baby booties. Why are they so cute? Mine, for example, is definitely not so cute.

Libbie learned to make quick work of taking her diaper off. Usually I'm pretty good at keeping at least bloomers or pants of some sort on her to avoid any poop-on-the-floor accidents.

I'm going to blame this one on Daddy leaving her in just her diaper, because, well, he's not here to tell otherwise.

I believe I was in the kitchen washing dishes after dinner when Little Miss crawls in, casually trailing her pink BumGenius behind her. It struck her daddy and me as really funny, especially when she pulled up and starting wiggling the booty up and down, dancing and laughing.

Girl, I'm not sure how I feel about you liking being naked so much.

But this was definitely better than the night she only half took off her diaper so that I couldn't tell it was undone and then PEED ON MY FLOOR.

She's a squirrely girl.

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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.

12 Days of Libbie: Day 10

I've been waiting for the right time to share this story, and this is it!

In the end of August, at the very end of Libbie's 10th month, we rented a UHaul and moved all of the furniture from our storage unit into our rental house in Chattanooga. One of my friends at work offered to drive the UHaul down for us since neither Mr. V nor I was comfortable doing it. So he and his wife were in the UHaul and we caravanned across the mountains.

We stopped at Cracker Barrel for lunch and Libbie was seated in her high chair at the end of the table next to me and my coworker's wife, Cheryl.

After we got our food, we bowed our heads to pray. When we looked up, my child was gnawing on the piece of toast that had previously topped Cheryl's BLT. She snatched that thing right off while we were IN PRAYER.

Can't close your eyes for a second around Miss Libbie. She's a ravenous beast.



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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.

12 Days of Libbie: Day 9

Dear Libbie,

I wish I could come up with a reason why I have very few pictures of your ninth month.

I think I will attribute it to the fact that you started crawling, and I was busy fetching you from various and sundry places.

The crawling, it's extraordinary! At first, so slow. And now you can get to the cupboard where our pots and pan are and have them all on the floor before I even realize you've moved.



It seems like we waited a long time for you to crawl. And, of course, now I miss the days of you being stuck in one place, unable to scare me by nearly falling down the stairs or pulling a coffee table book off the shelf and onto your head.

But there's something sweet about crawling and pulling up. You're so proud of yourself each time you pull yourself to a standing position, waving back and forth. You like to do a little dance sometimes, shaking your booty up and down while clinging to a chair. It's precious.

Have I distracted you from the no pictures thing? Please forgive your silly Mom. Just remember that we probably won't take any picture at all of your younger siblings!


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I'm feeling lazy today. MckLinky will return tomorrow if you'd like to link up a post!

12 Days of Libbie: Day 8

Sweet Libbie,

Month 7 wedding, month 8 funeral.

But also a vacation.

On the trip over to Pigeon Forge, we learned the trick of feeding you snacks from the front seat to the back in order to keep you quiet those 15 extra minutes 'til we get there.

(Now when we do that, you sassily stretch your little arm out toward me for the next piece and get angry if it doesn't appear in your hand quickly.)



First pool experience. You loved it, obviously!



You continued (and still continue) to be a healthy, happy, hungry baby. I'll never forget the look on your face when you rode the pig ride at Dollywood. It was the first "big girl" moment: you, sitting alone in the seat (with Daddy behind you for safety, of course). Hanging on for dear life as the ride whipped around at the speed of Turtle Taking Its Time. A glimpse of those years ahead where you'll tell me "My do it, Mama!" (Only...I will try to teach you proper grammar, of course.)

At eight months you started to seem more little girl than baby. Assured of yourself. Full of sassy personality. It tears Mama's heart into pieces and yet is very satisfying, that my baby is a person.

It's all very perplexing, this motherhood thing.

I love you.



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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.

The 12 Days of Libbie: Day 6

Sometimes I feel like I barely recognize this little not-even-six-month version of my daughter.

I went in and peeked at her in her crib this morning. She looked so grow up in her two-piece pajamas, laying on her back, blanket thrown halfway over her stomach. Her pacifier had been long-forgotten in the night.

At six months, she was just starting to eat solids. Starting to sleep longer stretches again. Learning to love singing and playing with toys. Starting to sit up on her own.

It's amazing how fast the time flies, how quickly she advances in skills, how blurry everything in the last six months seems as we've encountered change after change after change.

That little baby who was trying to sit up is now attempting to walk, has an attitude the size of California, and will happily eat a whole grilled cheese sandwich.

It's wild, and I know it will only continue in this blurry fashion. I hold her tight, trying not to let the time go too quickly.



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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.

The 12 Days of Libbie: Day 5

My sweet girl was not even five months old when she went on her first plane trip.

I was 16 when I was on a plane for the first time!

I guess in "this day and age" it's not that rare. Flights are less expensive, especially with airlines like Southwest.

By the time she was 5 months old she'd been to Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and West Virginia, mostly as part of our Great American Christmas Roadtrip.

I hope, like her mom, Libbie will love to travel. There's so much out there to see. So much to experience in other cultures. I hope she will appreciate the accessibility we have to the rest of the world that many generations have not had. I also hope she recognizes the work of God's hands in the mountains of Montana, the waterfalls of Brazil, and the oceans of Thailand.

Like any parent, I want her to have everything I've had and more.

How far has your child traveled?


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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.

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Day 4

The 12 Days of Libbie: Day 4

Dear Libbie,

So much happened in your fourth month! Looking back through the pictures, I can tell you were a very busy baby.

You:

--had a week-long visit from Nana (AKA The Grand Spoiling)
--went to our triplet friends' first birthday party
--went with Mommy to BlissDom
--started wearing cloth diapers
--enjoyed visits from Mommy's work friends and supper club friends at our house

One thing I remember very vividly about that month, though, is that it's when we gave our dog, Chester, away.

I hope you'll understand this when you're older and begging us for a pet: we loved you more than we loved that dog. A lot more! {What my parents told me a lot when recalling the story of how Buttons the Dog tried to rip my ear off.} And there IS a reason we might never want a dog again.

Libbie, that dog woke up more than you did. And while he was very, very sweet with you, he did not care for the lack of attention from your Mom and Dad.



Honestly, sometimes I still wish for a pooch to cuddle--you don't enjoy cuddling much these days except before bed. But I think it was a wise decision for us. I'm guessing he is much happier with people who have a backyard and time to walk him and enjoy him.

So try to understand, honey, when you ask us about having a dog and we say NO. It's not because we don't love you. I promise. It's because we had one too many nights of getting up not only two or three times with you, but also four or five times with the dog; too many mornings of waking up to pee and poop on our nice kitchen floor; too much worrying about you stuffing dog hair in your mouth.

How about a nice goldfish?

Love,
Mommy

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If you'd like to help celebrate Libbie's birthday, please write a post loving on your kid(s) and link to it here. You're welcome to use something you've already written, I just ask that you link back to my site. We all get so wrapped up in the everyday of parenting that I think it's important to remember the special moments. I'm excited to share these moments with you and to read yours! Code for the button is in the sidebar.