adventures with mayer and grayson: March 2011

I am so, so sorry it has taken me this long to write about a birthday party for 2 one-year olds. My partner in crime and I were having technical difficulties swapping pictures....you would think two women with a few degrees under their belts would be able to figure out how to send pictures to each other and then be able to download the pictures. Well...we got it all figured out and now I can tell you all about Grayson and Jillian's Birthday Shenanigans.

A little background on Grayson and Jillian - they met way back in September in a playgroup while their mommies were in a mommy meeting getting to know each other as well. They discovered that their birthdays are only 5 days apart. A couple playdates later, little Grayson and Jillian decided they should throw the mother of all First Birthday Parties...together. And a quick shout out to my partner in crime, Janelle, that was the easiest birthday party I have planned and a huge thank you for being so great and easy going about everything (and offering up your house as party central). We pretty much split everything 50/50 and I think the party was a huge success. I always judge the success of party by the amount of crying and temper tantrums. There were no tears!! Maybe a few tears when kids were told it was time to leave, but it was nothing a goodie bag couldn't solve.

Enough talk, here are the pictures!!

The Monkey Cake by Janelle

The Cupcakes by Jenn

me and my partner in crime

The Uhlmans

The Bradfords (KC, Janelle and Jillian)

why are all these people singing and staring at us?

eating his cake like a sandwich

seriously...what baby does that?

the opposite of eating cake like a sandwich, but she is still super cute

the moms with our big 1 year olds

they sure know how to party like rock stars

Me, Troy and the birthday boy

It's been an exciting time around the Uhlman household the last few days. Grayson's actual birthday was February 26th which we celebrated with just the four of us and the following day we had a party (more on the party later). I sound like a broken record but I really can't believe it has been a full year since the child joined the family. It seems like just yesterday I was begging the OB to please take the baby out - at 41 weeks I was beyond done.

On his big day, we celebrated by going to his big brother's last basketball game and then running some errands. I know...it was too exciting, but that's how we roll. After we got home, Grayson opened his presents. Well... Mayer opened most of the presents while Grayson watched. And for dinner I made some Grayson-friendly pesto and he had his first cupcake. Cupcake Time was awesome, he had it everywhere and just at the last second when he was all done, before Troy could attempt to clean him, he put both hands up through his hair. He required to be put straight into the tub to be undressed and immediately bathed. But it was totally worth it.

Yesterday, Grayson had his 12 month well baby appointment so here is all the wonderful and unique things about Grayson.

*weighs 23 pounds and is 29 inches long and wearing 18 month clothing, almost 18-24 month.
*almost completely on whole milk (no more bottles!!).
*eats just about everything we eat, he loves to eat. he wants whatever we want and will point and grunt until he gets it.
*is one happy baby

*loves to make people laugh.

*says ma-ma, da-da, buh-buh, cat, katze and gra. Buh-Buh is for our cat Belle Belle and Gra is for Grandpa and Katze is german for cat.

*the cat Buh-Buh is his most favorite thing in the whole wide world. If you ask where she is he will look for her and he loves to pet her. She is slowly coming around to him (much quicker than she did with Mayer).

*is walking everywhere. he likes when mayer chases him. grayson walks so fast and puts his arms straight back behind him. he looks like he's on the ski jump

*can bend down and stand back up without holding onto anything.

*can point and he is starting to wave bye-bye.

*loves to snuggle and get hugs. He will give big gross open mouth slobbery kisses if you ask for "grayson kisses"
*imitates his brother all the time with similar sounds and movements
*hates being put into a car seat or stroller - this has been since day 1 but what are you going to do
*has so many funny expressions and sounds - one vocal baby

*has finally figured out that toys do more things than just go in your mouth. will actually push cars and make noises

*loves to take all of his toys out of their basket and then put them all back into the basket (very helpful!)