A Baby's First Birthday Bash

I started planning Nathan's birthday when he was about 3 months old I think. K and I knew we didn't want a huge party, but something cute and fun. I started researching and everything led to these gigantic parties that cost as much as a Bar Mitzvah. Really? We aren't having any of that.

After talking it over, we decided to rent a lodge in one of our local parks. Not because we wanted to invite a million people, but I didn't want to try to fit people in our house. It's nicer to have an open space for people to mingle and there's a playground outside if it happens to be nicer out.

Then it came time to pick a "theme." I decided I wanted it to be blue, green and yellow somehow and went from there.
Here are some pictures I found on Google that helped me come up with all the crafts I did or am doing for his party.

I know the last few are girly but they're still good ideas. Now you'll have to wait and see how each thing turns out. I'll be posting the invitations and the how to within the next couple of days so stay tuned!

It's going to be a Sweet Celebration!! 

10 Months in Review....

I just want to quickly update everyone on Nathan. He's a handsome healthy boy who is off the charts in height and weight and quite the little monkey!
He just turned 11 months and is just starting to walk on his own. It's crazy to see the time flying by!
Here are some of his monthly pictures taken by Kracke Photography. I won't bore you with all the mundane details of his life, just know that he's an extremely happy healthy solid boy!

1 Month

2 Months

3 Months

4 Months

5 Months

6 Months ~ Happy Halloween!

7 Months ~ Happy Holidays!

8 Months

9 Months

10 Months

Giddy-up!

New Name, Better Blogging...

Well now that it has pretty much been a year since I've updated this, I figured it's time to get back into it. I am going to revamp it, change some things around and try to find more of a blogging style I guess versus just random postings of my kid though he's super cute and you know you love looking at him! That's all for now but I will start updating from where I left off last time and post a million pictures along the way!

He's Getting So Big

And he's starting to look like a little man. I look at him and see Kevin so much. A lot of people say he's really starting to look like me though. I don't see it much, I see Kevin!

Nate has really changed so much since we brought him home. He is generally not very fussy, occasionally sleeping through the night, eating a ton and growing like a weed.

His 2 month appointment is on Friday so it will be interesting to see how big he is. I weighed him 2 weeks ago and he was 12 pounds 4 ounces. Up from his 8 pound 11 ounce birth weight. He's definitely grown in inches too. He was 22.5 inches at his 10 day old doctor visit so my guess is he's somewhere around 13.5 pounds and 24.5 inches. We'll see if I'm right.

We've had to move him up to 3-6 month clothing for the most part. He's again in between it seems so he's either stuffed in them like a sausage or swimming in them (sounds familiar, I'm going through the same thing :-(    ) Oh well, soon he can be naked since it seems to be getting warmer and staying warmer (finally!) which by the way he LOVES!

He's starting to love bath time and no longer crying during it. He's a wiggler though so I'm still a little nervous to give him a bath by myself although I have done it once now very successfully.

He's also very alert. He focuses and sees a lot of things and is continuously wanting to see more. I just picked up a new chair and toy bar for him that he already loves. This chair is really cool. Also, it will strengthen his legs so he can be a power forward like his Grandpa is hoping for :) The toy bar I got is universal and will fit onto his Rock and Play, Stroller, or really anything I want it to fit on!

We have a very happy baby in general. He's always smiling and cooing.

Here are some pictures of our little guy. Enjoy!

Newborn Photoshoot

Our wonderful friends Julia and Kurtis (Kracke Photography) gave us the most wonderful gift for the arrival of our son. A years worth of photographs. To us, this gift is priceless. One, their pictures are amazing (they did our engagement pictures and our wedding!) and two, they're so creative. They just do such a great job!!
Anyways, here are some from our newborn shoot when Nate was only 6 days old!

38 weeks and counting....

So I am now 38 weeks along. Only a couple more to go and our whole lives will change. Our little family of 2 will become 3. We will no longer be able to just up and leave for the weekend, or just stay out all night. We will need sitters in order to see our friends, we will always need to put someone ahead of ourselves.

I don't think this will be a problem for us. Kevin and I have so much love for him already that we're ready to do all of those things. We're ready to miss the gatherings with our friends because Nate is sick. We're ready to do without for ourselves (truly, I don't need to purchase any more bedding and Kev could do without another car part) in order for Nate to have everything he needs (and money saving for College). And to be honest, we will give him lots of things he wants too. Whether he needs it or not. He will be spoiled. Hopefully just not spoiled rotten. He will be spoiled with love and affection from so many people involved in our lives. Kevin's parents, my parents, our grandparents, our siblings, our family, our friends and relatives of friends as well. This child will have so much love pouring at him he won't know what to do with it all. I'm perfectly OK with that. I just hope one day he'll recognize all of that love and be able to give it away just as easily and without restraint.

Anywho.... here's my bump pic for the week. Certainly unglamorous but I forget about taking my picture a lot!

He's still a Watermelon and shouldn't become any larger "fruit" wise.

I have my last week of work next week before taking my Maternity Leave until the end of April. I can't believe we're getting down to the wire!

All of my "checklist" is done and I feel very ready for him. Now it's just a waiting game.....