Wells is Two!

Wells turned 2 on June 3. Life has been so busy lately that I'm just getting around to posting it. I wrote the post below during his birthday week - some of his favorite things as a freshly minted two-year-old. It's amazing to me that some of things these have changed in such a short period of time.

We moved just 3 days before his birthday but decided that wouldn't keep us from partying it up. We hosted a small group of family and friends for his big day and I'll pepper those photos throughout.

Loves:

Gue-tar
Doggies
Plow trucks
Doing "gigas" (Basically tackling mommy.)
Music class
Singing (So much that it warrants a list of his favorite songs. See below.)
Lucy Dog + Wilbur Dog ("I love Wibur dog." "I love Lucy dog." "Where Lucy dog go?")

Favorite songs:

Hello, Everybody
Goodbye, So Long, Farewell
ABCs
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
Sandpiper

 

Funny Sayings:
"Eek! There's a mouse in Mr. Newhof's plow truck."
"Eek! There's a mouse in Mr. Newhof's car."

Playing:
Rocket ship, rocket ship, to the moon - fly! On mommy's legs.
Driving his Fisher Price car with his bike helmet on.

Eats:

"Macancheeeese"
Wadamelon
Pack packs
Waffle toast

Wells continues to be such a source of joy. He is sensitive, sweet, joyful, and charming. We couldn't love him more if we tried. Happy belated, sweet boy, we love you oh so much!

The Big 0-4

Yesterday my first baby, Elia, turned four.

I normally say that I can't believe (enter offspring's name here) is (enter said offspring's age here) but four I saw coming.

Elia has grown so much in the last year. I think it's in large part to her starting preschool in the fall. She knows all of her letters, can read maybe a dozen familiar words, has picked up little phrases and mannerisms (for better or worse) from kids at school, and has become more confident since the fall. Honestly, it has felt like she was four for a while now.

Regardless, we were so excited to celebrate the big 0-4 this weekend. We hosted a painting party for her and some of her classmates at the Grand Rapids Art Museum on Saturday. The party was great and included a tour, story, time to paint, and of course, we had time set aside for cake and gifts.

I was so impressed by how nice and well-behaved these kids were. It was so much fun to watch Elia play with kids she spends time with every day.

She was over the moon about the party and it seemed like all of our guests had a nice time too.

After the party, I took Elia to an Easter egg hunt while Todd took Wells home to nap.

We followed up her big party day with Easter Sunday. A combination birthday/Easter weekend is kind of loco guys. We had Easter baskets and bunny pancakes before church followed by Easter brunch with both sets of grandparents. Followed by cake and gifts.

It was SO MUCH FUN AND EXCITEMENT for the kids.

Seriously, so much celebration. How lucky are we? And we're not even to her actual birthday day yet.

Since her birthday fell on a Monday, it wasn't the most celebratory day of the multi-day celebration but we did presents before school and she got to wear her "It's My Birthday' t-shirt to school, which was a hit.

Yesterday was also the first day of a cooking class she and I are taking for the next few weeks so e grabbed a quick dinner at Donkey and then headed to class. We had a great time and are looking forward to the next class.

All in all, it was a fantastic birthday for Elia.

I cannot wait to see how she grows and changes this year. I wrote a sappy Facebook post about how wonderful this little peanut is and I'm going to conclude the longest birthday recap post of all time with a large portion of it:

"My girl is a thoughtful, careful, creative, inquisitive, gentle and caring child. She has the memory of ten elephants. She loves singing, playing school, drawing, practicing her letters, and cutting with scissors. She made me a mom and helps me learn how to be a better one every day. She asks the most amazing questions that make me think about things in new ways. She is growing more independent every day but still needs me (which is good for a mother's heart). I can hardly remember life without her. Elia Grey, my love for you is fierce and deep and I pray your year is one of both joy and growth. Happy birthday, my little love."

31

In celebration of having just completed 31 laps around the sun, I thought I'd share with you 31 things.

1. Today is my birthday.

2. I am 31.

3. The kids slept in today until 8:00! This is nothing short of a birthday miracle.

4. We've spent this weekend celebrating with great food and great company.

5. Todd's brother, Scott, and his new fiancee, Jessica were in town visiting.

6. In the name of celebration - their engagement (yay!) and my birthday - we ate our weight in delicious meals from The Sovengard, Grove, and That Early Bird.

7. The Sovengard is particularly dreamy.

8. Delicious too. Butternut squash fries with apple butter and Westside Punch were my favorites.

camp wells (wells is one!)

It's been just over a week since Wells turned one, and a week since we celebrated his first year. We invited friends and family to join us at Camp Wells - his camping themed birthday party. We hosted at my in-laws' lake house, the perfect spot to let a gaggle of kids, ages 6 and under, run wild.

egn: third birthday

We officially have a three year old.

I keep hearing myself say that I can't believe that Elia is three but, honestly, I can. Two was hard to believe but three, I saw coming. Honestly speaking, this year has seemed long. Not too long, exactly, but so much has happened in the last year. We've felt really tested and challenged as we navigate the growing pains of life as a family of four, all while Elia navigated becoming a sister, sharing her parents' previously undivided attention, plus all of the normal wonderfulness that comes along with toddlerhood. I've been looking forward to the promise of three, like our very own little happy new year.

happy new year!

Happy New Year! We had a great time ringing in 2016 with friends and celebrating Todd's birthday last night. For those who don't know, my husband is a NYE baby, doubling our reason to celebrate every December 31. (Happy birthday, Love!)

With the new year comes the anticipation and excitement of the chance to start fresh. I'm not big on resolutions but since turning 30 in October, I have found myself in a reflective mindset, thinking about things I can work on, areas where I can grow. Based on those reflections, I've decided to define intentional focuses for the coming year and specific ways by which to approach them throughout the year.

My focuses for 2016 are:

Family.
Faith.
Wellness.
Enough.

In the coming week, I'll share what I mean by each focus and how I plan to prioritize them throughout the year, including some concrete actions I'll be taking in the coming weeks.

Until then, I'd love to hear what your focus or resolutions for 2016 will be, please feel free to share in the comments below. Here's to a wonderful 2016!

this is thirty

A week has past since I celebrated my thirtieth birthday. It was a wonderful day. Waking up to receive a cake delivery from the man you love and your favorite girl is a great way to start a birthday. Presents in bed with both kids and cake for breakfast were the next treat of the morning.

It was my day off and my mother-in-law offered to take the kids so I had several hours free to do with as I pleased, a true luxury. It only seemed right to spend some time with my mom on my birthday because now that I'm a mother, I understand how special and significant birthdays really are, especially to the mother. We met for lunch at The Kitchen, a Wolfgang Puck concept that recently opened downtown. The food was delicious and I was so glad to have spent that time in such good company.

get a sister

I have Fridays off and last week Friday, Todd and I had made plans to meet for lunch and take the kids to visit ArtPrize. Wells had his four month checkup that day so we moseyed downtown afterwards and since we were running late, decided to just meet Todd at his office for lunch. He had lunch waiting for us in a conference room and to my complete surprise, my sister was waiting there, a bouquet of confetti-filled balloons in hand, when I opened the door.

My sweet sister flew in, all the way from Seattle, to help me celebrate my upcoming thirtieth. (Still upcoming...I'm squarely in my twenties, I swear.) The arrival of my sister was gift enough but she also made arrangements for a delicious dinner at Reserve with our parents and brought sweet and thoughtful birthday gifts.

egn: second birthday

It has been a big weekend at our house, due entirely to the fact that little miss turned two on Friday. Two!

We kicked off her birthday morning by decorating her bedroom door with streamers and it was pretty cute to see her try to figure out what that was all about. 

She opened her gift from us, a water table, after that and was outside playing with it by 8:00 AM. 

After water play, some errands, and music class, we had a special birthday lunch with Todd. When we walked into the restaurant she yelled "Happy Birthday!", just to make sure everyone knew it was her day.

She was excited about her yogurt parfait until she realized that it was vanilla yogurt, not plain. Thank goodness her sausage and mom's pancakes saved the day.

It happened to be the nicest day ever on Friday and after nap we were back to the water table only this time, she donned a bathing suit, which she insisted on wearing for the rest of the night.

My parents and grandparents came over for birthday dinner and we grilled out, pretending summer had arrived. It was a great backdrop for a birthday party. 

Elia even tried her birthday treat, strawberry frozen yogurt, and Grandpa Bob was happy to finish it off for her.

On Saturday, we had Elia's birthday party with friends at a local gymnastics facility. We had the gym to ourselves for most of the party and the kids had a great time running around and trying out all of the gym equipment.

What fun! It so great to see all of our friends' kids growing up and playing together.

We enjoyed a quintessential birthday meal after all of the fun in the gym: pizza and cupcakes. Then, Elia opened presents from her friends, what a lucky girl! We have the most thoughtful, generous friends and she loved everything that she got. 

We were so happy to celebrate our babe's second birthday and so grateful to everyone who helped make it special for her. Happy birthday, Bug, we love you!

To look back on Elia's first birthday see this post and this one.  And for more fun from this year's party, check out my friend, Jess's blog - she's so great at documenting this stuff and took tons of pictures!

twinkle, twinkle

The weekend prior to Elia's first birthday, we were blessed to celebrate her first year with our family and some of our closest friends.

We chose a "Twinkle, twinkle, little star" theme for the party.

And decided to keep things pretty simple, with just some snacks and of course, a cake.

I was particularly concerned about the cake since Elia, up to that point, had never had anything sweeter than a mango and, absolutely no added sugar, and I'm pretty committed to keeping it that way for a while. I spent more hours than I should admit looking for the perfect cake recipe for her party. I finally settled on a carrot cake recipe with cream cheese frosting, which seemed to go over pretty well.

When I was a girl, my dad made my(and my siblings') birthday cakes every year and they were always magical. We never knew the theme ahead of time, and we couldn't wait to see our cake on our birthday morning, they never disappointed. Keeping with that tradition, my dad came over early to help with Elia's cake. A fun tradition to keep up, and an added blessing, as I'm terrible at frosting cakes.

To be honest, we weren't entirely sure what to do for a first birthday party. We've only been to one before, and that was on a beautiful summer day so we all visited outside and watched the kids play together. Turns out, that's all you need to do, even on a rainy spring day. All of the kids who were there got along swimmingly, and it was really fun to see them all interacting.

As an added bonus, I had not only my sister visiting but, my little brother walked through our door the night before the party, in town to help us celebrate and help my sister move cross-country. What a blessing and what a surprise!

 All in all, Bug was so happy to have her friends and family over to play.

What a joy. Thank you to everyone who helped us celebrate and sent birthday wishes!