Water, Water All around!

Last weekend we took Ethan on his first trip to the aquarium with our friends, The Reeds.  We opted to stay a little closer to town and go the Sealife Aquarium in Grapevine.  Man was it busy.  Ethan had a great time anyway.  While he enjoyed looking at the fish, I think it was the colors and the water that intrigued him the most.  Anytime there was on open tank, his hand went straight for it.  Ethan and Robert had lots of fun putting themselves on display in these tanks.

Ready to see some fish!

  

Pretending we are fish!



Mom, Ethan, Abigail, and Sarah

Let's play in the tank!

Please let me touch the water

After looking at tons and tons of fish we got a little bit of playtime in.  Ethan and Abigail had just as much fun climbing up the slide and sliding down. 

This past weekend we took advantage of the sunny days and headed out to the lake with Grandma and Grandpa.  We have been a few times this summer, but this is the first time we have taken our little fish out on the boat.  He was very quiet when we put his lift vest on.  But, it didn't take long for him to get a little more comfortable once that wind was blowing in his face.  He really enjoyed the ride, especially once Grandpa took over and let him take the wheel. 

Maybe this will be fun

I am still not sure

Time to relax!

We rode out to a little beach area that we could park the boat and cool off a little in the water.  It was perfect for a little one.  The water was no more than 2-3 feet deep.  Ethan was able to move around the beach area and splash to his heart's content.  Since he isn't walking yet, even though we get a little closer everyday, he crawled through the water as far as he could to try to keep up with Dad.  His excitement in the water got me really excited for our upcoming trip to Florida. 

Please let me take this jacket off!

Splash time fun!

Going for a swim with Grandma

After an hour or so in the water we decided to head back to the house.  Someone was pretty worn out that he decided to take a pre-nap snooze on the ride back home.  Thank goodness he still slept the entire two hour drive back home! 

One sleepy boy

Ethan is 13 months!

Is it really mid July???? Has it really been a month since his birthday?  Where did the summer go?

I know he is a one year old now, but we are going to continue to do the montly recap for a little bit longer.  While the gorilla is not in the monthly picture anymore, we did add a cute little bear.  This was a present from Great Grandma Flynn for his birthday.  His name is Hammy, after Josh Hamilton. 

He changes so much all the time.  This month has become the month of chatter.  His vocabulary consists of mama, dada, "dog", hi, bye, and Gra.  Then, of course, there is 'gob'.  We are not sure what it means, but he says it frequently so it must be important.  All of this chatter includes his arms spread wide and raising them up.  Some of his favorite things right now are clapping, hugging, playing in the new playroom on his big slide, veggie straws, balls, cars, and throwing a ball for Turk.  He is also really showing his love for Mom right now.  He can't get enough of me -- can you blame him, I am pretty awesome.  It is a little exhausting some days to be so loved.  This being because this extra love comes with wanting to be held more often than normal.  I am trying to just enjoy the extra attention and snuggles as long as I can get them.

Giving Turk hugs.  The things that Turk will endure from this kid

Both waiting patiently for a veggie straw

They are BFF.....

Sliding down the big kid slide at McDonald's

His first ice cream cone with Pop...and demonstrating the clapping skills.

Teeth: We are working on our 5th tooth, lateral incisor, top right .
Bottles: I know my days of snuggles while he is drinking his milk in the morning and before bed are numbered.  He is down to only those two bottles a day.  I am giving us until early September to quit all together.  I am just going to have to start a new nightly routine that involves snuggling before going to bed, maybe we will start reading a little later at night.

I still can't believe this lovable little guy is growing so fast.   Everyday I look forward to listening to him babble through the monitor when he wakes up in the morning.  And I love watching him play with whatever stuffed animal I left in his bed when he wakes up from a nap.  He really enjoys a good body slam with giant giraffe or elephant.  He is truly too smart for his own good.  One afternoon I found him after a nap with the battery pack of his glowworm, well Robert's glowworm, pulled and he was trying to figure out how to put it back in.  He has also mastered the art of putting caps back onto his food pouches and twisting them to stay on.  Smarty pants.

We are all really enjoying his fun little personality and hoping this sweet guy doesn't turn into that "terrible" toddler we hear so much about anytime soon!

Ethan's 1st Birthday Party: Presents and more

With all of the work that went into a birthday party for a special one year old, I was glad to see that, while he didn't understand what was going on, he enjoyed the day.  Lots of Ethan's favorite people showed up to celebrate his big day.  He had all of his grandparents, his Aunt Carissa, Uncle Chris, his Aunts and Uncle by association, Chris, Kristin, and Cici (Sherri), Nanny and Grandpa (great grandparents), Martin, and his girlfriend, Abigail and mom, Sarah in attendance to show their love.  I wish we had gotten some pictures of everyone else too...something to add to the list next year!



I am ONE!


Hanging with Gram

After having some lunch we started with some presents.  There were a lot of toys for the little one.  We were able to keep Ethan's attention while opening his presents much longer than expected.  Our trick: putting him in the super cute chair that Aunt Carissa gave him.  It is precious.  There were some many fun items to discover.  There are things to climb, things to push, things to pull, balls to throw, and cars to make vroom noises. 



Dad, why is there tissue paper on my head?

Look at all of these new toys



I love my new helicopter

Once these were open we lost his attention and had to finish for him.  He loves these cars!

After we opened and played with all of the gifts, we had some cake.  This is, of course, my favorite part.  Have I mentioned my love for cake?  I think Ethan enjoyed it too.  We let him play with it for awhile.  At one point he showed his generosity and gave some of it to Abigail, who was standing below him.  A true gentleman we have here.

Blowing out his candles.

Cake is delicious!

Grabbing another bite

Lovin' some Grandma Flynn

The only family photo.  He is taking claim to us.

Showing some love to his girlfriend

Thank you to everyone who came to join us for the festivities.  It means a lot to us that you shared such a great milestone with us.

Bonus:  Here are some of the spectacular pictures of our little man that were hanging in the middle of all of his monthly photos.  Martin, thanks again for taking the time to capture such a big milestone in his life and ours.  They are beautiful!



Ethan's 1st Birthday Party: The Setup

A little over a week later I am finally getting around to this.  Ethan's birthday party was a big hit.  Due to the heavy photo content and my desire to make those that couldn't make it feel like they were there, this will be broken into two posts.  One for the setup and decor; one for the present opening and good times had. 

Thanks everyone!!

I would first like to give a big thanks to my sister, Carissa and Mom for helping me make some of the decor and get everything setup.  And thank you to Martin for capturing Ethan's big day (the good photos are his, the others are mine).  I started thinking about this day months ago, pinning and planning.  Ultimately, I am so glad that I decided to go with the Goldfish theme for the special day.  The kid loves those things.  Few things make him as happy as opening a bowl with Goldfish crackers inside. 

Let's start with the invitation that Ethan's Aunt Carissa made for us.  They were perfect to set the mood for Ethan's big day.  The invitation was covered with a vellum sheet stating "Ethan is O-Fish-ally ONE!"  The inside included "Calling all friends from the depths of the sea.  This is the one place you will want to be.  Swim over to help us celebrate Ethan's first birthday!

Outside of the invitation



Inside of the invitation

 Guests were welcomed with this greeting on the door and couple of pictures of the guest of honor on the day he was born and a shot from his smash cake session!

We transformed the dining room with a background of streamers to look like waves.  The adjacent wall was adorned with Ethan's monthly picture and a few shots from his one year photo shoot just above the gift/drink table.  The gift table was a conjoined with the beverage table.  The beverages included bottled water that had personalized bottle wrappers stating "Ethan is One".  We stowed the water bottles in an orange bucket to keep them cool.  To help keep them cool and prevent the wrappers from tearing when getting wet, we used frozen water ballons as ice.  We also had "Ocean Potion", which was blue raspberry lemonade.  Some of Ethan's water toy presents also doubled as extra flair on the tables.  Fish lanterns were also hung around house that I made out of chinese lanterns and a little bit of felt.  Unfortunately, we didn't get a picture of that.  One did make an appearance in one of the photos below in the top corner. 

Happy Birthday banner that Aunt Carissa made

Gift/Beverage Table

Gifts along with some floating toys

Ocean Potion

Ethan is One water bottles



We found some personalized balloons at Party City



There was lots and lots and lots of food.  There were sandcastle sandwiches, saltwater seaweed (spinach dip), sushi (cucumber/avocado pinwheels), seashell surprise (pasta salad), fruit skewers, chicken salad sandwiches, and of course, Goldfish crackers.

The full view of the food table

Goldfish and Sandcastle Sandwiches

Sushi, Fruit skewers

Saltwater Seaweed

     

We love cake!  Ethan got his own cake while the rest of us had cupcakes.  This is the first cake I have made in awhile.  I really enjoyed decorating it.  For the cuppies, guests had a choice of white or strawberry.  I decorated them with homemade white buttercream icing.  They were placed in the cupcake liners that I made myself.  Finally, they were topped with an "Ethan is One" pick and a Goldfish Cracker. 



Side view

Cupcake stand

Food Display

 

Cuppies on display


 I will have second post up soon.  So check back!