Happy birthday to my little punk!

Saturday was Grey's first birthday, and true to form, it has seriously been the fastest year of my life. I'm sure I will say that from here on out, but I still can't believe that he is already one. Maybe its because he still isn't walking yet? Who knows, but he really seems to be so little to be one already.

We had a Winter "One"derland theme for his birthday party and invited some family and friends over for brunch. I borrorwed a Cricut machine from a friend at work to do his decorations with and now I really want one of my own: I loved this thing! It was so fun and so easy to make these birthday banners and tags for everything! I might have gotten a little carried away...

Some friends from work helped me make these cake balls for all of the guests. They were delish and really easy to make!

And, I made Grey's birthday cake. It was my first time working with fondant, so it is a little plain, but I think it came out cute! And the marshmallow fondant was super easy to make and Grey thought it was delicious!

Grey had some extra help opening his presents, but as you can see, he was flirting away the whole time. Little charmer. Instead of presents, we asked for art supplies to donate to our local children's hospital where there is an Arts for Life volunteer art desk where a volunteer is there everyday to do arts and crafts with the cancer patients. I'll post some more about when we deliver all of the amazing supplies we received! Skylar is going crazy trying to get into all of them, but we are trying to teach her about the importance of giving away, especially when you want to keep for yourself.

The birthday boy! The few of you who have been reading this blog for awhile will remember that I tye-died a shirt for Skylar with her name on it when she turned one, and we didn't want to leave Grey out. So here is his first birthday shirt!

More flirting, what am I going to do with this one!

His first girl, Mackenzy, waving bye-bye to him.

Our friend Liam, who turned one back in November.

And time for cake! Grey dove right on in and needed no encouragement. I wonder how this child is still in the 30% for weight... He ate two of the snowman's "buttons" off while we were still singing.

I'd say he enjoyed it!

And now its time to flirt some more with Grandma... "Aww, you think I'm so cute when I lay my head down like this. Works everytime."

Little punk, he knows just what to do. Sigh.

Almost a year ago...

It's hard to believe that a year ago you were getting ready to make your way into the world. And how, thinking back on it, my labor and delivery has been so much like this past year. You decided when you you were ready, but it took you a long time to get there. After a very easy 20 hours of labor after my water broke, you were still taking your sweet time. After giving you a little push (pitocin), you decided to come super fast. After a brief period of intense pain, you were born. Perfect. In every way.

That has been the course of this past year as well. You decided to take your sweet time, studying your world, before taking the big plunge of motion. I think we are currently in that brief time of intense pain as we chase you around everywhere, but soon it will all be perfect. Not that it isn't really perfect now, because it is. Truly, it is.

I love your sweet personality. And that you are totally "Mama's boy". And I love that you are showing some sparks in your temperament lately as well. We'll deal with those, but it makes me happy to see that you are showing your opinion and defiance at this point. Especially when you snuggle close to my neck whenever I tell you "no biting!" Cause that really hurts. Truly.

So, you just snuggle on away sweet little stink, and you will have me wrapped around your little finger. Oh wait, you already do.

Maybe daddy can stand firm. ...

Super-steep driveway = awesome sledding!

Yay, snow! We've been waiting for snow since we moved it, thinking our really steep driveway would provide the perfect place to sled. Last time it snowed, we were out of town for Christmas and missed it. So, when we woke up to a snow day this morning, we bundled up (extremely hard to bundle up a squirmy baby who hates to put clothes on, btw) and headed out!

Grey wasn't entirely sure about all of this at first. This was his first time actually getting out in the snow. But he quickly warmed up to the idea.

Ken and Skylar went for the first ride together. At first she was really excited. And then when the got halfway down the street I heard some shrieking.

She decided that she wanted to walk back up the driveway instead of the grass and she wanted to do it by herself. Think trying to go up a slippery, steep slide wearing slick clothing. Needless to say, it took a while!

This almost makes up for the fact that I have to make up this day at work during spring break. ..

Christmas in Oak Ridge, TN!

After spending Christmas Eve with my family, we bathed the kids, put on their pjs and threw them in the car hoping that they would sleep for the 5 hour drive to Oak Ridge, TN where we spent the next week with Ken's family at his grandparents house. No such luck as I believe Skylar's favorite phrase of the night was, "I'm gonna stay awake the whole time and Grey's gonna stay awake too!" There was also a lot of "Grey! Wake up! No Sleeping!" Thankfully she passed out about 10 o'clock.

We woke up Christmas morning and waited for everyone else to get up before heading in to open our stockings! Here are our four, the two in the middle are the ones that I made for the kids this year.

My little elf!

After the stockings, we showered and headed downstairs to spend the rest of the day opening presents. These kids are totally spoiled! If you look closely, you can find the baby in there.

Here is the gang, minus a few people.

Here's Gigi playing the piano. Ken's family has a lot of musical talent, its easy to see where he got it from.

I love how everyone comes for the week and we get to play lots of board games, video games, or in this case: Just Dance 2.

I do think he was getting into the game here.

Gigi and G-pa were showing everyone how to waltz. I seriously hope that Ken and I are just like them when we grow up.

Nana with some of the girls doing the robot.

Skylar and her favorite great-uncle, Mickey!

A little football in the freezing weather.

And a little fun with the tire swing!

Notice the lack of snow on the ground? We left NC just in time for the first white Christmas in oh, 50 years.