Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Grayson's 1st Birthday Party

Grayson's 1st birthday party was celebrated with family on his birthday, August 12th. We had a great time celebrating together & even though Grayson was getting a little sleepy he managed to get in all of his party before his nap.

We were scheduled to get photos taken of the boys with a local photographer but they got cancelled because of the weather :( Sunday morning we dressed the boys up in their new cute clothes & tried to get some cute photos of them. Below is a cute pic of my little 1 year old! oh how I hope he stays so sweet!


Grayson's first birthday was a sesame street theme. I made these cupcakes saturday afternoon & by Sunday the eyes had all melted together, I'm not sure what happened :( oh well - despite big bird not turning out the way I pictured, they all resemble sesame street characters & they tasted yummy too!

Grayson started to get tired just after lunch, so we quickly decided we should give him his first taste of sugar & sing Happy Birthday to him.


He really wasn't sure what the fuss was about & my normally very smiley baby was a tad grumpy!



He'd rather have the sesame street plate - he quickly tried to discard his cupcake. Grayson didn't want to even taste it!


After mommy put the cupcake back on the plate he decided to try & pick off the icing. Surely if something is green, it must not taste very good.


Eventually Papa snuck him a taste of the icing and his cupcake view was changed!


Grayson ended up eating almost an entire cupcake - some of the cake was left behind under his chin & inside his shirt!


Yummy! 


After cake we opened his presents,  Grayson received many great gifts from his family!





Happy 1st Birthday Baby!



Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Around Here

Here are a couple of videos taken over the last couple of days. These kids sure do make me smile :) I love them so!




I love that Noah 'sings' along to the song even though he doesn't know the words & how they always watch their reflection in the t.v when dancing :)

Oh Grayson was so sleepy that evening! Such a cute moment to capture.


Tuesday, August 14, 2012

1 Year Old!


Grayson turned 1 year old on August 12th! I can't believe it. The year has just flown by, and while there were times I wasn't sure how we'd make it through, we did :) I'm looking at these adorable photos of my youngest on his birthday and I can suddenly see why so many people are saying he looks less babyish & more like a big boy...sniff :( he'll still be my baby forever, but I am seeing him transform into a super cute, super sweet little boy. I know how fun this age is but I'm having the hardest time with letting him grow up. It was much easier with the other two boys, I wonder if it's because I'm expecting Grayson to be our last baby? who knows, it's hard though!


At twelve months old Grayson still has no teeth, he's got a big gummy grin but it looks like maybe those swollen gums will cut some teeth soon. He's still a tiny little guy, he often looks much younger than some of his friends the same age. On wednesday he has a Doctor's appointment so I'll update his stats then. I'm guessing he's 19lbs or so. He still fits into his infant car seat but we just recently switched him to his big boy seat. Even though he fit, it's still heavy to lug that thing around. Plus when we go out it's easier to put him in the ergo or stroller, he likes to look around at things. 

Updated With Current Stats: Grayson is 17lbs.11oz (3rd percentile), his height is 76cm (50th percentile) & his head circumference is 43.5 cm (not even on the growth chart). My little one is smaller than I realized :) he's still following the same growth curve he has been since birth, growing consistently. People always comment on how tall Grayson is, but based on his stats he must appear tall because he is so thin.


Grayson sure is a happy baby! rarely cries and if he does it isn't for very long. He's a mommy's boy and   most of his whining takes place when he's lost sight of me. He thinks his big brothers are hilarious and his new game is to crawl after them and chase them around. He's got quite a screech while playing, I often think it's one of the big kids making noise & when I look it's him :) he'll fit right in with the rest of these guys! His favourite toys are cars, trucks and balls - I'm not sure how that happens so quickly. He's been making car noises like "vroom" when he plays with them, it's so cute.


Grayson has been standing well on his own & started taking his very first steps on his big bro's birthday (July 31st). He's not quite a 'walker' yet, still crawls around as his main method of transportation but he is well on his way! he generally will take a few steps then get down & crawl, get up take a few more etc. If he's distracted with something in his hands he'll walk much further than when he's concentrating on walking :) he's actually taken about 20 steps from the coffee table to the kitchen, but mostly it's only a few at a time.

My baby is quite the dancer (video soon) any music he hears he starts to dance to it :) he's recently learned how to put the stereo on and dance :) Even if he hears music while sleeping his body automatically starts moving to the music! 


Grayson loves to chatter and babble. He's just started using dada for daddy & I caught him saying "dada" over and over while watching Gavin from the window while he was coming in from the car :) I've heard him say "bye" while waving but that's only been a 1 time thing. He does get his point across & will shake his head no if he doesn't like something. He has started to mimic a few sounds so maybe he'll start saying some words soon.

Food wise he's not a big eater & is still mostly eating baby food. I've got to start having him try more regular textured foods & see what he can handle. We've sort of fallen into feeding him foods that are easy and convenient, must get out of that habit soon! He still nurses regularly during the day, and a couple of times throughout the night. I'm expecting to start weaning him by offering him some homogenized milk at lunch, hopefully he'll transition easy to that. I'm just trying to decide if I want to keep him using a sippy cup or try a bottle - I'm undecided on that. I'll let him wean himself completely when he's ready, but will be starting him on milk very soon.

Sleep is another area we are going to work on, we probably are going to try him in his own room & crib soon - wish us luck with all of these changes!


Happy Birthday Baby! 

Sunday, August 12, 2012

Owen's 5th Birthday!




My little boy is now 5 years old! Wow. What a sweet & handsome boy he is :) this year he really wanted a pirate birthday party, he'd been talking about it since last year. Another birthday wish was to invite some kids from his class to his party. We ended up inviting the junior kindergarten kids from his class and sent the invitations out in June. I was so worried that many kids wouldn't be able to attend being the summer, but he ended up having 6 friends from his class, plus family & friends. I think there were about 17 kids in total. 

We rented a private birthday party place & it was so much fun! even the adults had a blast & didn't want the evening to end. There was a giant enclosed play structure & the kids really had fun running all over the place. They especially loved the foam canons & ball pit!

Owen hiding in the ball pit

pirate party theme!

yummy pizza! 

cupcake time!


What a fun party! the play place had just opened up in our area so it was a first time playing there for the kids! 










treasure island cupcake - yummy with graham crackers & brown sugar crushed on top  :)





pirate cupcakes! I loved how these turned out - they were so cute.



I'm so glad he had a great day with family & friends, here's hoping he doesn't expect big parties like this every year...yikes!

Happy Birthday Owen! you'll always be my baby :)

Thursday, August 09, 2012


Owen started playing T-Ball this year and he really enjoys it! We almost missed his first game though,  I had no idea it was an indoor league and we kept driving around the place looking for the field - oops! Next year we will likely put him in the city league, hopefully it will be run better. We're not really happy with how the community center runs their T-Ball program but Owen is having fun and that's all that really matters :)

Way to go Owen!

Wednesday, August 08, 2012

Elephant Ride!

A friend of mine had some extra tickets for the circus and we quickly took them off her hands! I don't have any photos of the event, but we made sure to take some video of Owen and Noah on the elephant.


Party Party Party!

We've been lucky enough to have been invited to a number of birthdays over the last couple of months!  The kids have had such fun at these parties & are already putting in requests for future birthdays :)


The original plan for our niece's birthday was to have her party at the zoo, but the weather forecast wasn't looking very good for that. The back up plan was a party at Chuck E Cheese & it was so fun! the boys had been to a party there before so they knew what to expect, but poor Lexi sure wasn't a fan of the mouse! Oh well, she had a great time when the mouse wasn't around ;) The boys scored a chance at the ticket blaster because Lexi was a little young to try it out. Such fun they had!





Noah was supposed to let Owen "catch" the tickets as only 1 person is allowed, but he managed to grab a few :)


even Grayson tried out this bowling game! he may have needed just a bit of help.

I don't think the crown fits!

sweet Lexi after the mouse scared her :(

We had so much fun celebrating Lexi's 2nd birthday! Happy Birthday Lexi!






Another party we attended was for our friend Ben! he turned 4 this year and is growing up far too quickly! the kids loved his pirate party complete with treasure hunt and the added bonus of fun on the farm!
I love this photo of Noah! such a cute little pirate.
my other cute pirate!



treasure hunt! Owen found the last of the treasure :) it was a fun way for them to gather the items for their goodie bag. 

Pirate ice cream cake - yummy
 Happy 4th birthday Ben! Thanks for inviting us :)


Our next party was a reptile party! I knew the boys would LOVE it, but I was nervous about it, I don't share the same love for reptiles as they do. I did however get brave enough & touch my first and probably last snake :) I saw Owen watching me as they brought the snake around & could tell he was wondering if I'd be brave enough to touch it, so for him I did! Someone really should've captured that on camera, I'm not sure that it will happen any time again soon!
Owen petting a snake

Noah's turn with the snake


petting the belly of a tarantula! I couldn't believe how brave they were - there was no was I was doing that!



Happy Birthday Zack! thanks for inviting us to your cool reptile party! considering this theme for a future party for Noah :)


Thursday, August 02, 2012

Grayson's Baptism

This past Sunday we celebrated Grayson's baptism! YAY for us actually getting it done while he is still a baby ;) he was so cute in his baptism outfit, he looked like such a little angel. Family joined us at the church and afterwards came back to our house for lunch and cake. 



My sweetie in his baptism outfit. He was so good during the church service, he slept during most of it & woke up in a happy mood :)

Grayson & Mommy

Gavin's side of the family

my side of the family

Add caption

With the Catholic Godparents, Maegan & Bill

Grayson didn't cry during the baptism, he just scrunched up his face :)

handsome boy



Wednesday, August 01, 2012

Camping

Camping with the kids just gets better each year! they LOVE it & enjoy spending time with their cousins. As they get older they play together so much better and can entertain themselves quite easily. Dare I say that it actually felt like a mini vacation, with some down time to sit & relax? I see more of that in future camping trips & oh I can not wait! of course it helped that Gavin's family was there and there were many extra eyes and hands to help out with the kids.

Grayson enjoyed his first camping experience and I don't think he even cried once while we were there! I was worried about keeping him entertained and trying to keep him out of trouble but everything went well and he had fun. 

I'm wishing I'd taken a photo of our van all packed up! seriously it was packed to the rough & then more on top of the roof! not an ounce of space left for anything else. I'm not really sure how it all fit, but somehow Gavin managed to get everything in, it was like putting together a giant puzzle!




Grayson enjoyed a nice long nap on the beach towel! I have a similar photo of Noah & I love these 'repeat baby' experiences. I'm really trying to savor these sweet moments as I don't expect them to repeat again. If only I could keep him small forever!

first time swimming - he wasn't a fan immediately but warmed up quickly. 

enjoying some cousin quiet time. I don't think we hear the words quiet & cousins in the same sentence often!

Noah enjoying his supper!

I LOVE how messy he gets while camping. dirt smeared all over his face doesn't bother him one bit.

mmmm roasting marshmallows, probably owen's favourite thing about camping. he and I share a deep love for smore's! I was happy that there were so many kids willing to make them for the adults, all we had to do was sit & watch!

silly boys thought that cool boys don't wear shirts! check out how Noah has his .


Kian enjoying some time at the play structure. 

Noah playing with one of the only toys that was brought camping!

I think Kian actually beat out Noah as the messiest kid this year!

lounging in the hammock. 

Grayson liked sitting in the big boy chair.

Aunt Meggie was on kid duty much of the time! thanks Meggie!


Carson & Owen - these two are good buddies and Owen  enjoys playing with his older cousin , they really get along so well. 

family photo just before leaving!

We had such a great time this year & look forward to next year's trip already.