A Baby Turns One

Happy 1st Birthday, Lucas!

We celebrated Lucas' first birthday by having a party at our house the weekend after his birthday. I decided to just invite the neighborhood kids and my friend Liz's kids and not my extended group of friends. I also thought about inviting Lucas' daycare friends since there are only a few, but then decided against that. We did invite Leda, his daycare provider, and she came. And also Grammy and Papa Bob of course. Anyway, silly me, this did not turn out to be a small party. Of course the whole neighborhood came and all the parents came with their kids, and our little shindig turned into about 40 people here in our house. It's April so we were all inside and it was a little chaotic.

The week of the birthday Lucas was feeling a bit under the weather and on the day of his party he was really in bad shape. Just all congested and coughing and stuffed up. If it wasn't his own party we would have stayed home. But he took a morning nap and rallied and did the best he could during his party. I have to say, I wish I acted that good when I feel terrible! He seemed to really like having a bunch of people in the house and I think he really liked the decorations (streamers) as well.

For some reason, despite the fact that I never once in Zach's 3 years planned an actual activity during his birthday party, I decided to plan not one, but three activities during Lucas' first birthday party. Since Easter was the week after the party we went with a loose Easter theme. We had pin the tail on the bunny, decorating of foam-y Easter shaped eggs, and then an actual big egg hunt outside on the lawn. The egg hunt was really the only thing the kids were interested in. They were all 4 or under and preferred to play with the boys' toys instead. During the party Zachary played host. He was absolutely adorable, carrying around a bowl of little chocolate cookies and asking everyone if they wanted one. He LOVES having friends over and entertaining. I think we need to host things more often at our house.

I made Lucas' birthday cake which was a coconut bunny sitting on edible grass. I also made a bunch of cupcakes since the bunny cake was actually kind of small. All the kids for some reason ended up sitting in the dining room at the "table" rather than at the kid tables I had set up in the foyer. They blew out the happy birthday candles on the cupcakes and I think they loved that. They were so cute and really well behaved. All the kids pretty much just wanted cupcakes and I cut up the bunny cake which the adults mainly had. One nice thing about having a mid-afternoon kid party -- you don't have to get a lot of food! We had snacky food but didn't worry about providing a meal.

After cake we went into the family room to open gifts. Not everyone came -- we wouldn't all fit and most of the kids were interested in still playing, so a smaller group came to watch Lucas unwrap the gifts. Lucas had different ideas, however. After a short time he decided he'd had enough so he and Kevin went into the other room and Zach helped me with the rest of the presents. What is so funny is that ever since this party, Zach has been super interested in the toys that Lucas got and will play with them whenever he's in the family room. I think he kind of thinks of them as his. Anyway, Lucas got some great presents and we are now completely overwhelmed with toys! I think it's time to start reorganizing!

The egg hunt was the final event of the party and we timed it so that we had it towards the end time of the party and people could just leave afterwards if they wanted to (it was outdoors and they already had their coats on -- so it worked well). Emily and I (but mostly her) had stuffed a ton of eggs the night before the party. And when I say stuffed, I mean it wasn't like she had one jelly bean in each egg. She had them filled with as many candies as would fit in the eggs. I mainly got candy that Zach liked, but then realized that like me (but unlike him) some kids do actually like things like peanut butter, so I ended up getting some wrapped peanut butter candies too. We had something like 120 (guesstimate -- we also may have had 200) eggs and Em hid them all over the front lawn during the party. When the kids went outside, I think they were psyched. Our front yard was awesome -- piles of eggs in the bushes, hanging on plants, in the mailbox, on the back of Grammy's car, etc. We had some shaped bunny eggs, some eggs with faces, some golden eggs -- and all had different things inside them. Some had money in them (just some change) because I always think it's fun to mix it up. :) I think everyone got eggs, including the little kids. Lucas got some eggs with Kevin's help but of course he donated the contents to Zach.

The hunt begins!

Check out my loot

It was really nice to have friends and family over to celebrate Lucas' birthday. I know that the first birthday is really just for the parents, but I know that everyone who came over truly cares about Lucas and I think they are lifelong friends. It meant a lot to us to have everyone here and to spend time with them. Thankfully our house was mostly back in order (home repairs will be another post)!

Helping Lucas find eggs too

Eggs on the steps!

Blog Slacking

I have a lot to catch up on! So much has been happening in the past few weeks. We've had 1) Lucas' first birthday party, 2) a visit from Grammy and Papa Bob, 3) a neighborhood Easter egg hunt, 4) Easter (Lucas' first!), 5) multiple home repairs/yard work updates, 6) and various other cute little boy things to report. But finding time to sit down and write is always a challenge, compounded by my home computer still having a virus that continues to come back so getting my pictures to the home computer and up on the blog is problematic. Anyway, this is just a short note to say that maybe tonight I'll be able to do some of this. Kevin is out of town (2nd trip this week, definitely a challenge for me!) so maybe once the kiddos get to bed I'll try to post some more. And the home computer "might" have been scanned and cleaned so until I somehow give it a virus again, it should be clear for me to at least upload some photos.

Happy Birthday to my Baby!

Happy 1st birthday, Lucas! xoxo

It's hard to believe a whole year has gone by since Lucas was born! What a whirlwind it has been, and such a fantastic year with him. He has grown into such a handsome and happy baby and I am head over heels in love with him. Lucas is smart and funny and working hard on achieving all of his milestones and getting out of babyhood as fast as he can. He's walking, "talking", and eating solid foods (real stuff, not baby food). He loves to clap and is working on waving and is the biggest smiler ever! One whole year is over in a blink of an eye, but with it we have this wonderful baby boy who fills our lives with joy and happiness and makes life complete.

I love you, sweet baby Lucas! Happy birthday today! xoxoxo

5 Years

5 years ago today Kevin and I were in Istanbul on our honeymoon. It was an amazing vacation and I feel very lucky that we were able to take that trip and see such an ancient and beautiful city. I remember when we were planning our honeymoon and trying to narrow down our choices. We had it narrowed to Brazil (my choice), Croatia (Kevin's choice), Prague (my choice), Hawaii (again my choice -- but Kevin never wanted to go there so I guess it never made the list), and then I read a book that was set in Turkey and we hit upon there as our honeymoon destination. It was exotic, far away (but not so far as to be totally unaffordable), and neither of us had ever been there. Plus it had beaches (my preference) and archaeological sites (Kevin's choices). Going in April though -- kind of meant that the beaches weren't going to be that warm, despite it being on the southern side of the Mediterranean.

Regardless, Istanbul and the rest of the areas of Turkey that we visited were absolutely breathtaking! Kevin and I loved every minute of it, but what I remember most was the feeling of relaxation I had and just enjoying the time with him after the hecticness of planning our wedding.

Fast forward 5 years. Our lives have expanded to include 2 more beautiful children, a house in the 'burbs, 2 cars, and a lot of trees. Vacations in Europe sans children are a thing of the past. But I have to say -- that I am EXACTLY where I want to be in my life right now. I don't know that I've ever felt so comfortable in my life before. My family means everything to me and while things are faaaaaaaaar from perfect, I love Kevin as much as I ever did in the 14 years that I've known him, and I think probably even more than before because now I see him as a father and that is the most attractive thing he has shown to me before. The way he is with these little boys...he is amazing and I just love him even more when I see him with those little guys.

Happy 5th anniversary to my handsome hubby -- looking forward to 50 more years! xoxo

Helping out Mother Nature

My home computer still has a virus -- so thus continues my blogging without attached photos. Sorry. I like seeing pictures on other peoples blogs too. :)



Anyway, following Friday's April Fool's Day snowstorm (worst joke EVER Mother Nature!), this weekend has been in the 50's and sunny. Our tree guys couldn't make it on Friday since it was really coming down and we got a few inches here. Most of that has now melted, but the giant piles of snow surrounding the house from where it all fell after the roof was shoveled still remains. Since I really really want to see my spring flowers and since I really really want to have an actual egg hunt for Lucas' birthday party in 2 weeks, I decided to help Mother Nature out.





It's actually a continuous process that I've been doing every weekend for the past several weeks -- I get out the shovel and shovel off the bushes and garden beds. It's not as easy as it sounds since you can't shovel ice. Our poor bushes have been flattened by the glaciers sitting on top of them. I'm not kidding when I say that in some instances there have been 1-2 FEET of ice on the bushes! I would climb up onto the snow pile, insert the blade of the shovel and push down. In some cases I could cleave the snow/ice off and then pick up the big chunks and throw them in the yard or onto the driveway where they would melt. We still have a couple of strands of Christmas lights on the bushes where we can't get to them yet. The bushes are literally horizontal to the ground. Poor things -- I'm not sure if they'll be able to bounce back. My poor hydrangeas really got it bad too. Lots of breakage and I'm going to have to do some serious pruning so it doesn't look quite so sad.



Standing on one of the felled trees in the back yard!



The good news though is that once we clear an area, it's looking much better and the ice we shovel off is melting quickly. It's much warmer/sunnier around the house now considering that the back yard has been clear cut! It is looking great although at this point still covered with giant logs and there are at least 3 more trees that they need to finish cutting. Following that they will finish trimming the trees in the front, and then will go grind out the stumps in the back yard. We will have a landscaper come in and level and grade the yard, followed by grass seeding. I'm so excited!

Zach has been in his sandbox the past couple of days. He can't help himself and he loves it so much! I imagine that sand must be cold, but he hasn't complained. Lucas has been out a bit as well, just for walks with us in either the wagon or the stroller. He also loves being outside and just looks all around and doesn't complain at all. He kicks his little feet and legs and takes it all in. I'm definitely looking forward to this summer when I can get both of the boys outside in the warm sun to play and enjoy our yard.