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No more walkers and no more help, this time Maddy walks all by herself! A day after her first birthday, Maddy shocked Meg and I by taking her first few steps on her own! She was standing at the couch, trying to climb up, when she decided to turn around, and with a sly grin on her face, she took a few steps away from the couch before plopping to the floor. The first video below captures the subsequent attempts by Maddy to walk again, and the second video shows more attempts by Maddy before she takes a rough tumble and bumps her head (the video stops before the *bonk*). Way to go, Maddy!

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We had Maddy’s 1st birthday party at our house this weekend, and a large group of family and friends were in attendance. In the first video, you’ll see an excerpt from the group singing “Happy Birthday” to Maddy, with Paco providing a lovely rendition on a comb. The second video shows Maddy truly enjoying her first (birthday and ever) cupcake. Meg and I also truly enjoyed the clean-up effort!

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Only five days after getting her first exposure to walking with her “walker”, Maddy is now moving around with it like she’s been doing it for weeks! Check it out in the video below…

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Court and Bryan were in town for a Creative Memories party that Meg held Saturday night and they were able to witness a “Maddy first”! We decided to pull out the walker that was given to us by a friend to see if Maddy could do anything with it. It turns out that Maddy (after some practice runs ) had no problem walking around the family room with the aid of her walker. In fact, she enjoyed it so much that she was throwing a fit anytime someone tried to help turn her around so that she could keep walking. Check it out in the videos below…

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Another Christmas present that Maddy received this year was Perry the Penguin, a toy that sings a fun Christmas tune while “dancing”. Unfortunately, our Perry doesn’t have the same moves as he used to (only his beak moves now), but Maddy certainly doesn’t mind. In this video she shows off her ability to turn Perry on and off, and does a little singing and dancing of her own…

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Maddy did this once earlier in the evening (before the “great adventure“), and it was cracking me up! Luckily I had the camera with me in case she decided to do it again, and caught this on video…

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Ever since we let Maddy get on the stairs to practice her climbing abilities (with us right behind her for support), she loves taking any chance she can to crawl right over and see how far up she can get. She’s now starting a new routine with Meg where she’ll crawl up the stairs at night when it’s time for a bath! On this evening, though, Meg was at work and it was just Maddy and me hanging out at the house. She started at the couch, but when the adventure was over, she was upstairs in the bathroom. And it was all caught on tape…

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Here’s to wishing everyone a very happy new year in 2007!