The Big number TWO birthday.

So I wrote a post all about Grant and that's really all this blog is meant for, until another child comes along, and the last post about his birthday was for journaling's sake and remembering him at age 2. So this post is about the day of his birthday. HE is 2. It is a weird feeling. This morning he woke up around 8:15am and I made sure everyone else was up too we all went in to sing Happy Birthday and give him his first present: Elmo Balloon from Grandma Flora and Grandpa Jim. It was from the dollar tree! Score! Anyway, he was very thrilled. He was confused then happy excited about the balloon and all of us singing.

We had some french toast breakfast with strawberries and of course then it was time to play with everything in his room. He's pretty much got the dream bedroom with every toy possible and pretty much all of it is second hand. Love it because I have spent hardly anything on him his whole life. So they say having kids is expensive, well if you are frugal, and I have to be during this stage in our lives, its not that hard.

So anyway, then it was a mad dash for us to get his party all ready and decorated. We put up the games, streamers, decorated the cupcake/brownies, set up the food table, pick up pizza, cut up the fruit and pizza, blew up balloons, and finished the party favors. I was very nervous/anxious and excited. I had never thrown a party for kids before. Grant's first birthday was a family party and Grant only went to one toddler party ever and we were late so we didn't really experience it much. Anyway so the guests arrived. We invited 8 toddlers. My mom thought I was crazy for inviting that many children but I thought it would be okay.

Four kids were there at the beginning and I thought, okay this will be good. Everyone got their lunch. Then after everyone was satisfied we started the games. First, Pin the Nose on Elmo. They each got their own nose and they seemed to like taking turns. Then throw Dorothy the goldfish (Elmo's best friend) into the fish bowl. Grant's cousin that is his age really like that activity. They each got a turn putting the fish bean bags into the bowl. Then we let the kids just play those games some more. Once I noticed Grant getting bored and asking for his other toys we knew when to move the party along. At this point three other guests arrived. We let them get comfortable and get turns on the first two games. Then we did the pull string Elmo pinata. Its didn't break and I didn't think it would. Perry muscled it and then they got the fruit snack treat inside. Then it was cupcake time. We forgot to think of matches and our good friends had some emergency matches in their car. They saved the day! lol. The alternative wasn't working very well (burning some paper on the stove until lit on fire). We sang the birthday about four times by the time we got the candles lit. Then he blew out the candles and all the kids were even more happy campers. After that it was basically the end of the party. Perry pulled out all our push toys an the kids "vacuumed" and "lawn mowed" to their heart's content. The all also got a bit crazy from the sugar. The kids then filtered out and Grant was very good about giving the party favors to his friends.

Overall the party was a complete success. I think next time I will do a cupcake mix rather than a brownie. It was kind of hard to get the paper off the cupcake liner. We didn't open presents because I was afraid the kids might have a hard time sharing the new toys and also right after the party is typically nap time and it would have been hard for Grant to part with the toys right after opening them.

After the party Grant played with his yard toys and got really messy in his sand box. He really had a lot of fun. It was so sunny and nice out.

Party Boy enjoying his spread.

Elmo! The eyes are too big or the nose is too small.

Delicious.

Costco combo for the adults. MMMmmMMM!

Sophie and Natalie the cousins.

My pride and joy.  I made it out of a balloon and foresee many more homemade pinatas for future birthdays.

He has been asking to hold it for a month. Now he finally can!

Abbey, his girlfriend from church.

Cupcake brownie time.

Sand/water soup that he actually tasted, but I think the fact that he was "making" soup made him more prone to eat the soup my mom made for dinner that night. 

The presents!

The late goldfish named Orange.

The promised elmo ice cream.

Two Years!

So most people say they can't believe how fast time flies. And I think they imply that its because life was a breeze and everything was great the whole way. Well lets just say it feels like he is two years old because it feels like it took that long to get here. I'm not saying I didn't have fun. Grant and I have tons of fun. Lots of tantrums and more to come due to the stereotypical "terrible"twos coming up. But you know, since I know that I can embrace it and be validating and understanding and try to keep my cool when I'm hormonal, which happens, and really no one can help that, we have the good times too.

I love my little boy so much. He is no longer my baby. Especially since there is a new one coming along and I don't want Grant to be considered a baby when a real one will be here.  He is full of energy. He is very smart. He is very social and always wants to play with me, but does well by himself if I have something I need to do for no longer than 10 minutes straight. Let me just say that whatever my to dos, they are done in little chunks through out the day. I never need to plan learning activities because Grant seems to engage himself in activities like that anyway. Grant knows his colors and shapes by just playing and reading books with me. He knows a couple numbers by their symbol but can count almost to 20. Grant knows many letters and can almost sing the alphabet by himself. Speaking of singing, as you know he sang "I am a Child of God" by himself this week during family home evening. The day after for nap time he sang his own lullaby song with all the right words to himself while I rocked him. He has a sense of humor and likes to joke and trick us. He has an astounding long term memory like months of not seeing some one and then knowing exactly who they are when he sees them again. I know this is a bragging blog but I have got to document what my little barely two year old is like for journaling sake.

Grant loves to cook, clean up, vacuum, help me with my projects, DRUM, sing, play any music really but  drumming is his favorite, loves to read, do puzzles, play basketball, golf, or baseball. Eating is usually a disturbance in his day but he loves snack time, and I love snack time because it improves his mood and we get to sit at the table and talk a little. I feel basically that Grant has that zest for life that everyone wants and he seems to know he has no limit to what he can accomplish. He  will always try and want to do new things and help me with everything.

That about sums him up. And it really is a summary because one can never describe a person with just words, you have to see them in person.

A couple days old.

One year birthday!

At his 2 year birthday party...on his birthday.

Matchy Matchy

So grant has very particular things that need to be in order. He is quite the cleanly baby or I mean toddler and he hates messy hands, does the "clean up" song a lot and just needs things to be right. So anyway, besides all that the other day I saw a new side of order for him. I let him pick out his outfit. The kicker was when we were picking out which slipper shoes to wear and as you can see by the picture they totally match. He chose the shoes and then said to me "brown shirt, brown on shoes!" Wow. He knows how to match! That was pretty cool. So anyway, my boy is quite the character.

Valentine Fun.

In honor of lover's month, on February 1st Grant and I made sugar cookies. Earlier in the day we made them and cookie cutter cut them. Grant had a lot of fun with that and the pictures would have been real cute but I didn't take any. So I made sure Perry took pictures of the decorating stage. Grant loved it and ate many many cookies! And I think he did a pretty good job frosting for his first time too!