One Wild Year with Miles

 This past weekend we had both of our families over to celebrate Miles's first birthday.

We had pulled pork, chips,  salad, potato salad,  and of course cake!

It has been a wild year for sure!

Miles got a new water table that he and big brother have been loving!

He wasn't too sure about gifts, but he loved the tissue paper.  And brother was more than willing to help open all the presents.

I made Miles this dairy free cake.  I only made half the recipe so it was just one layer, but it was perfect.

I think he was a fan!

It was so fun celebrating our Wild ONE with family!

1st Birthday Photo Shoot

Last Saturday we set out to take some pictures of Miles for his birthday.  A "1" balloon, a stuffed lion, a chair, and the cutest almost-1-year-old made it an easy job! 

Happy Birthday my sweet baby boy!

Months of Miles: 12 Months

Happy Birthday sweet boy!

Diaper Size: 6

Clothes size: Mostly 18 months now

Things you love: babbling and talking, pulling to stand, chewing and teething on toys, drinking water from your cup, crawling everywhere, splashing in water

Things you don't love: when we take things away, when brother won't let you have a toy, when you're waiting for more food

Milestones: You are still babbling up a storm and are starting to say a few words (most commonly "mah!" at the table when you want more food).  You imitate our sounds and words a ton too.  You started initiating peek-a-boo and it is the cutest thing.  You still love crawling and pulling to stand on everything.  This month we went on a long road trip and you did a great job in the car!

Sweet baby Miles I can't believe you are one!  This past year has definitely been a wild one, but it has been made so sweet by having so much extra family time to get to know you!  You are so funny and fun and you keep us on our toes.  Everyone always comments on how cute you are and we have to agree.  I just love you so much my Miles.

 

Spring Road Trip

 We recently got back from an almost 2 week road trip.  Usually I'd write a whole bunch of posts about all the things, but someone in our house has a big 1 year old birthday coming up so my focus has been there.  So here's the highlights of our trip.

First main stop was Pigeon Forge, TN.  We stayed 4 nights to enjoy some time in the mountains.  It was a great town with so much to do and see.

Cooper loved trying out the rides at the Pigeon Forge Island.

We also took him for his first game of mini golf.

We spent a day hiking in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Splashing in the creek is always a favorite.  So many people stopped to comment on how much fun Cooper was having here.

We drove to Newfound Gap on the Tennessee/North Carolina border.

So beautiful.

The Appalachian Trail runs through Newfound Gap so we hiked a few steps of it ;). It was completely uphill at this point so I didn't make it long with Miles on my back.

After our day in the national park, we headed back to The Island to try out the Ferris wheel.  Cooper was not a fan of it stopping at the top, but I'm glad we were all able to ride it together.

The main destination of our trip was to see our friends in Virginia!  We originally were supposed to go to a family wedding up that way in April so we had planned to see our friends then.  When the wedding was postponed, we decided to go ahead and still go up to Virginia to see the McCulloughs with a few stops along the way.  It was so good to see them and let the kids play.   We played a lot at their house and also got to explore a few places close to them like this park.  

So thankful for all the seasons of life I've walked through with Erin.  I miss her being close by, but I'm so thankful for our time together and for all the ways that technology keeps us connected so we can stay in touch between trips.  Erin, thanks for at least moving to a pretty place to visit ;)

Reading books on their couch.  Most of our time was spent with all the kids running around and making messes, so I had to snap a picture of this calmer moment.  We had such a great long weekend visiting them!

On our drive home we ate inside our first restaurant in over a year-- a Chipotle in West Virginia.  Most of our stops we tried to pick up food and eat at a park and luckily the weather held up for a lot of the trip, but our first day leaving Virginia was rainy all day.  So we decided to eat inside Chipotle and it worked out well.  Miles is always a big fan of the guacamole!

We stayed a night in St Louis and found a hotel with a ballpark view.  It was so fun having this view out our window.

We also had tickets to the game.  We went over and ate dinner and then as Miles and I headed back for his bedtime they announced that the game was postponed to the next day due to rain.  So we missed out on the game, but it was fun to get to be inside the stadium-- you can see the St Louis Arch in the background from the stadium top deck!

Our last stop was in Tulsa and I found a hotel with an indoor pool so we could do a little swimming.  We got to Tulsa Wednesday evening and let the boys swim for a while before dinner.  Both of them had a blast-- this baby loves water, I can't wait to see how much he enjoys all the water play this summer.

Our stop in Tulsa was geared around checking out the Gathering Place.  We tried to go last year on our way home from Kansas City (when COVID was just beginning) and Cooper ended up getting hurt as soon as we got out of the car so we didn't stay to play.  I'm so thankful we planned this as part of our trip and got to redeem that a little.  It is such a cool place-- we spent all day Thursday there with a short break for rest time and dinner before going back before bed.  There were slides, sand, swings, and really cool playgrounds.  There's also lots of water things to do!  Both boys loved it.

Miles thought the sand was really funny.

Lots of places to climb.

One final ride on the zipline Thursday evening.  Friday we headed home and were able to be home for lunch and naps.  We had such a great trip and saw so many things together!  But we were all thankful to be home too.

Months of Miles: 11 Months

 

Diaper Size: 5

Clothes size: Some 12 months, Some 18 months

Things you love: babbling and talking, pulling to stand (especially on the bathtub for some reason!), chewing and teething on toys, drinking water from your cup, crawling everywhere.

Things you don't love: when we take things away, when brother won't let you have a toy, when you're waiting for more food, 

Milestones:  You moved to creeping on hands and knees pretty quickly this month and you love crawling over things-- you crawl up on the trampoline and over the other side, up onto little chairs, across the couch, and you also navigate the step into/out of our living room really well.  You started pulling to stand and love to do it on anything you can find.  You finally figured out a cup and love to drink water from your straw cup with meals.  You're still babbling like crazy and have started looking for people when we name them.

My sweet baby boy I can't believe we're only a month away from your first birthday.  You are showing so much of your personality this month-- you love to explore and you love to talk.  You also started screaming and yelling a lot more.  You snuggle close and love to be near me, but also take off to check out other places around the house.  You and your brother are starting to have to navigate sharing toys more and neither of you are huge fans of that-- but it's so fun seeing you play together.  You are so sweet and chill most of the time and you just light up our days.  I'm so thankful you are mine my Miles a moo.

Bluebonnet Boys

 

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Last weekend we took advantage of a nice evening and grabbed some bluebonnet pictures for the year.  We were able to go back to a field off the Bluebonnet Trail that we've been to the last few years and it was pretty easy.  We've been taking lots of walks along this trail lately, so we've been watching the blooms start and it was fun to grab some pictures of the boys.

Baby's first bluebonnet pictures

Sweet brothers.  Cooper always wants Miles in his lap, but he's just too big so we have to compromise and sit them next to each other.

My bluebonnet baby.

And just for fun I always like looking back at the previous years' pictures:

2020

2019

2018

2017

Easter Fun

Since Cooper's birthday was in the week before Easter, we didn't do as many Easter themed activities this year, but we still had a few things.

This is our Jesus Tree-- isn't it beautiful ;)  I had looked online to try to find a Lent devotional for kids or families and one of the things I came across was called a Jesus Tree. Cooper loved our Jesse Tree that we used to countdown to Christmas, so I was intrigued by the idea of a Jesus Tree.  Basically it is a story every day from Ash Wednesday until Easter Monday and the stories are all about the life of Jesus-- his birth, his ministry and miracles, and his death and resurrection.  There were actually several options on Etsy and I ended up buying this one-- mainly because I liked that the ornaments could just be printed on cardstock and the stories were simple and each one had a question and a prayer at the end.  And it was cost effective since we weren't sure if this was something we'd continue in later years.  We did really enjoy it and I am planning to put the stories on the back of the ornaments and laminate to store for future years.  It was fun having a little devotional that we did every morning over breakfast.

I don't have pictures of our own, but we also did our same Resurrection Eggs that we've done every year.  These are a very simplified version of Resurrection Eggs, but I think they tell the story well.  And one of my favorite parts that we started last year and continued this year is the surprise in them.  We do the eggs every day in the week leading up to Easter and the last egg is always empty as a sign that Jesus rose from the dead.  On Easter Sunday I fill it with candy as a symbol of the sweet surprise of Easter that Jesus is alive.  So when Cooper opens all the eggs Sunday and is telling us what the mean (since we've been doing it all week he knows the story by Sunday) he gets to the last one and shakes it and is totally surprised.  Then we talk about how fun that surprise is and when Jesus' friends went to the tomb they expect him to be there but it's empty and that is an even better surprise.  This really stuck with him both years and he tells everyone about it (although he didn't remember it from last year, so it was fun that it was a surprise again!).

 

We also participated in the Plano Parks and Rec "Easter egg hunt."  They hid signs with pictures of Easter eggs along one of the longer trails.  Each sign had either a challenge ("hop like a bunny 10 times") or a riddle (What does an egg do when it laughs?  Gets cracked up). You take pictures with them and send in proof and are entered for a prize pack.  For us it was just a fun way to get outside and do something different on our walk!

We also dyed eggs this year for the first time.  Cooper helped mix the colors and was very interested in it.

I had planned to use them to make confetti eggs, but there was no confetti in stores at the last minute, I had no rice (which was the other idea I found) and I couldn't even find our 3 hole punch to make my own confetti.  So I gave up--maybe next year we'll be more prepared.

Sunday we went to church with my family at Woodcreek since they had an outdoor service.  And then back to my mom's backyard for lunch and playing.  Cooper loves to match Miles and it's actually the only way I can get him to dress up-- because he gets to choose matching shirts for them.  

While his cousins and brother were too excited about an impending Easter egg hunt to enjoy much lunch, this boy savored all the foods on his plate.  

While Miles napped the other kids did an Easter egg hunt.

Emptying the eggs and sorting the candy from the coins.

Then we let Cooper hide the eggs for Miles and Miles crawled to get them after nap time.

This was the only one he picked up.  He loved it!  So big brother got to get the rest-- win win.

It was a happy Easter indeed!