Atlanta Visit for Father's Day

Ryan had business meetings in Atlanta, conveniently enough, right after Father's Day so we drove up for the weekend to spend time with the family. We enjoyed a lovely dinner at St. Ives on Friday night and Nathan worked his meal off crawling up the stairs over and over again while the men chatted and finished their wine. He is such a busy boy!

We got to watch Kel and Linc play tennis on Saturday morning while hanging out on the playground. The weather was heavenly compared to sticky, hot Orlando and it was nice just to be out in the sun without sweating to death.

The boys hit the golf course on Sunday for Father's Day and my dear friend Stef and her daughter, Nora, came to swim with us at my parents' pool. It was chilly but we still had fun! The Trottas joined us for dinner that night and we had a great evening celebrating the wonderful dads in our lives.

On our final day, we joined Kelly and Carter at their playdate and got to swim at the coolest neighborhood pool/water park! It had an entire area of shallow water with slides, fountains and water features in addition to a ginormous pool.

The drive home was rough and we didn't arrive until late but the trip was worth it and I'm so glad we went! I can't wait for the next visit already!

Science Center

Between rainy days and extreme heat, it's been hard to play outside this summer. With Tropical Storm Debbie bearing down on us, we went through a pretty rough couple of weeks that were driving us stir crazy. What better way to get out of the house than to explore the Orlando Science Center?

We made our first visit with our buddies, Lindsay and Parker. I wasn't sure there would be enough for the boys at such a young age but they were very entertained and seemed to have a blast checking out the interactive exhibits.

We went back again with Alicia and Ben on another rainy day. This time we found a new exhibit that let us do a mock weather forecast. Perfect given the current conditions! It was a lot of fun!

I ended up buying an annual pass so we could go back again and again. I think it was worth it already!

Happy Father's Day! (a little belated)

I am blessed to have been raised by a wonderful father who taught me so much and has been a personal adviser on so many levels. He works so hard for our family and makes me feel loved and important.

I am also blessed to be married to a man developing into an outstanding father. I've been watching Ryan grow and change since Nathan was born and I am so proud of the man he is and the role model he plays for his son. He, too, works tirelessly for our family and I can see how Nathan already looks up to him.

To all the dads out there, Happy Father's Day! You mean so much to us!

Thirteen Months

Nathan, you are thirteen months old!

You are a busy, busy boy! Always on the go, I often find you in a different place than where I left you if I happen to turn my head. You crawl so fast and climb up on everything! Such a little monkey. You love to walk holding our hands but are pretty timid to try just one and heaven forbid we force you to try it you immediately sit and throw a fit. We've caught you standing on your own a few times and I cheer each time so you know it's encouraged but for now you are pretty content crawling or cruising with a firm grip on something steady.

You light up when your Daddy comes home from work and the two of you are becoming even closer. You like to wrestle and spend silly time on the couch, rolling around and flopping on the pillows. I know you love me but you definitely need your Daddy time and often prefer him to me.

You LOVE books and we spend so much of our day reading. You pull all the books off your shelves and find the perfect one before crawling over and climbing into my lap. It's pretty adorable and I am so glad you have such a fondness for reading (and that you like to snuggle up).

You point at everything and say a few things that probably only I understand. "Mama" can mean me or more, "baba" can be your pacifier or a bottle, "dada" is basically anything fun, especially electronics, and your dad, of course. You also say "book", "fish", "up" and "keys" (sometimes). You also point and raise your voice really high when you see balloons - it's pretty cute!

You're such a little helper and are so proud when you hand me things or can partake in what I'm doing. You like to push the vacuum around from behind and your latest obsession is crawling up into the dishwasher while we're loading or unloading.

We had a rough health month, which led to many days stuck at home trying to find creative ways to play. We took a break from swim lessons because of it and I think you were happy about that! You got a bad cold with high fevers and the worst diaper rash I hope to ever see. I've never seen you in such pain and it completely broke my heart! The upside, I suppose, was that you really enjoyed the nakie play time the few times we tried to air you out.

We're still working on transitioning from a bottle to all sippy cups and we're pretty much just off of formula as of this week. We spent three weeks with you waking in the 5 or 6 o'clock hours, crying hysterically, much to the dismay of your tired parents, but suddenly you are back to 7-7:30 and your mom is very thankful. It's still a mystery why that was happening! You take two solid naps and go to bed around 8:30.

You seem like such a little boy to me now and I just want time to stop so we can remember this fun age. You keep me busy and I just love being your mama so much!

xoxo

Thirteen Month Stats:

Weight: probably 24 pounds

Diapers: size 4

Clothes: mostly 18-24 months, but you still fit in some 12m

Bikes!

For our past anniversary, my birthday and Mother's Day combined, we finally went shopping and picked out bikes for the family! I was so excited and couldn't have asked for a better gift. We went and picked them up while my family was in town and rode them the two miles back home. I was hoping our little daredevil would enjoy the ride and he did not disappoint. He loved it!

My bike is complete with a basket for any excursion and the baby seat easily moves between our two so I can take Nathan out by myself or Ryan can take him for a solo ride.

N loves it and knows exactly what we mean when we ask if he wants to go for a bike ride. He even likes wearing his helmet and points to it the minute we go out in the garage. I'm looking forward to many fun adventures!

First Birthday Party

With the perfect party house and a refreshing pool, I knew I wanted Nathan's birthday party to be at our home with a fish or water theme. Thanks to Pinterest, Photoshop and Joanne's, I started planning and formulating the perfect way to celebrate our little buddy. Ryan may have thought I went overboard at times, but I had a lot of fun and it gave me a fun project for nap times!

The details were months in the making but they all came together in the last days and hours thanks to the many hands on deck that stayed with us. The party prep began on Friday with all the baking that my amazing sister, Alex, did for the 60+ cupcakes she made. Brother in law Lincoln carved up a watermelon to be a shark head and everyone else helped get the house ready.

Saturday morning was busy putting all the final touches together. Setting up food, hanging up banners, blowing up pool toys, arranging party favors...I would never have been able to pull it all together without my family being in town!

Since the party was at lunchtime I wanted to make sure we had enough food for our guests. We served Peanut Butter and Jelly"fish" Sandwiches, Shark Bait (fruit salad), Seaweed (spinach) Dip, Hermit Dogs (pigs in a blanket), Submarine Sandwiches, and Goldfish of course!

There are many, many special people in our lives that have seen us through Nathan's first year and we were so blessed to be able to celebrate with so many of them that day! It warmed my heart to look over the backyard and see all the family members, babies and friends together.

Nathan had a blast playing in the splash fountain his Lolly bought for the party and swimming in the pool with  Ryan. His smile just lights up my life! He had his cousin and music buddies to play with and everyone seemed to enjoy the beautiful day.

Alex decorated the smash cake like a beach with a cute little crab on top. Our little eater loved gobbling up the sugar and really dug his hands into the tasty icing. He was so funny crunching his fists together and licking his fingers. Yum!

We couldn't have asked for more gorgeous weather - sunny skies and cool breezes. It was a perfect day and so special to celebrate our little monkey turning one. All that party prep was worth it and I am so thankful we had the help and the company for such a momentous occasion!

One Year Well Visit

Well, we made it a year and overall, Nathan was a pretty healthy kid! A few bad colds, three total ear infections and one episode of pink eye were the major ailments but otherwise he had an uneventful year, medically speaking.

At his one year well visit he finally broke into the 50th percentile in weight at 23.2 pounds. It only took a year for our lean little boy to make it to an average weight!

His head continued to grow and entered the 75th percentile at 18.5 inches round. We have a smart boy with a growing brain on our hands!

The biggest surprise at the checkup was his height - 31 3/4 inches long, or the 90th percentile! I knew he was tall but I had no idea he had sprouted up that much!

He didn't mind the toe prick to test his blood levels and I'm happy to say his iron count was higher than the last two visits. However, the poor bubs cried so hard for his two shots! So sad to see your baby in distress like that. He ended up having a red welt and then bad bruising around the shot spots, worse than any other time he's been. Poor baby!

I'm so proud that our monkey has grown so big in the past twelve months and I'm relieved he is doing so well! It will be interesting to see how his stats continue to change into his second year.