Party Time!

We celebrated Nate's second birthday this past weekend. We had family coming into town all week and by Saturday the weather was ready to cooperate and we had a wonderful day for a party! Let's start with spring break week...

The weather was pretty cold most of the week. We finally got some warm air on Friday, but unfortunately we weren't able to spend too much time outdoors the rest of the week. On Monday my dad flew into town and began his visit. My mom was already in town because she had been helping out while Matt was on nights. Nate got to spend some quality time with his Baddaddy on Tuesday and then on Wednesday Matt's mom and grandfather came into town. My brother, Chanlee, and Indiana came into town on Thursday and Matt's dad and Tricia were in town for the party on Saturday. Nate has a lot of family that love him and were willing to travel to celebrate his special day!!

The party was scheduled for Saturday morning so as not to interfere with nap times. I've learned that as a parent you pay attention to things like that! Nate had several friends show up to party with him. The theme of his party was pretty much anything that goes! Cars, trucks, airplanes, boats -- you name it, he loves it! Here are a few pictures from the big day!

The cake courtesy of Matt's mom! 

We made the tables look like roads. 

The food table -- yum! 

A front view of the food table 

The birthday boy and his bubble machine! The bubbles were a big hit :-) 

Food!! 

I think Nate ate chips, chips, cake, applesauce, and a side of chips. 

I wasn't exaggerating about the chips! 

Hanging with Uncle Jeffery 

The food table was a huge hit!

Family photo! I'm so excited Nate was actually looking at the camera!

We had so much fun celebrating Nate's second birthday. Everyone had a great time and we enjoyed visiting and hanging out with family and friends. Here's to another year of fun with our little man!

Happy Birthday, Nate!

Well, it happened. Nate turned 2! I am so excited that I have such a happy, healthy little boy, but he is growing way too fast for me! So, what is one to do when you turn two? If you live in Florida the only reasonable response is to go to Disney! And that's what we did. I got off work on Friday and we headed to Orlando. Matt was on nights so we woke him up and hit the road. My mom was in town so she made the trip, too! She had never been to any Disney park before and she was excited to go. 

We arrived late in Orlando so we headed to the hotel and went to bed. The next day we got up and headed to Epcot. I had never been to Epcot before and Matt remembered it being a lot of fun when he was younger. It was okay. It is definitely not my favorite of the Disney parks. Nate had a lot of fun walking around, looking at boats, and meeting Donald, Goofy, and Daisy. He was one tired little monkey by the end of the day, but he refused to nap! We went back to the hotel and he insisted on running around like a crazed individual. We decided that he would crash early and decided to try and find food. We did manage to find food, but there was a 45 minute wait. Thankfully, Nate napped as we were waiting. He woke up and was in a better mood. He was excited with his birthday dinner of hot dog and French fries. We went to this cool taco place called Rocco's Tacos. It was loud and crazy, but fun. After dinner it was bedtime and we went back to the hotel to crash. Nate didn't have a birthday cake, but his party is coming up soon and he'll have plenty of cake then!

Nate was rocking the birthday shirt from Aunt Megan! 

In our choo-choo pajamas and ready for bed on the first night. 

Slide!!

 We had two of these moments. One was due to a tantrum and the other because he was tired!

Must get to the water.......

He loved playing in the little park. 

 Here he was playing jungle baby....

Mom and Tinkerbell

Goofy got a mommy initiated high five. He was so excited while standing in line to meet Goofy. 

Okay, so forget Mickey Mouse. If you asked Nate if he wanted to go see Mickey his reply was, "And Donald Duck!" Donald was the first character he met and he loved it! 

We also ran into Daisy!

We were exhausted by the end of the day, but we had a lot of fun! This picture is a little rough because we were staring directly into the sun. As you can see, Nate is the only one with the sense to look the other direction!

We are excited to see what this next year holds in store for our little family. Nate is growing up so fast, but we are loving every minute of it!! Hopefully party pictures will be coming soon!

Christmas in February?!?!

Okay, I admit it -- I am way behind on the blog. We have been busy, busy, busy these past few months and I'm just now getting around to it. Also, Nate can be very demanding when I sit down at the computer to type, so it is becoming increasingly more difficult to blog when he is around.

Let's start off with Thanksgiving. My parents came down during the week so we could eat turkey and do our Christmas celebration with them. We cooked lots of turkey, dressing, and the fixings and ate on it for a few days. Nate was very excited to see his NiNi and Baddaddy (his way of saying granddaddy for my dad) and he had a lot of fun opening his gifts from them.

Nate scored big -- he got all of the Cars characters. 

It was hard getting all three of them to cooperate!

Matt had a few days off at Christmas and we decided to make the trip back to Hamilton and Beulah to celebrate with his family. We met up with his mom and Tim to exchange gifts a few days before Christmas. Since school let out two days before and since we had two babies in tow, we decided to go out to Cracker Barrel for our Christmas lunch. It was yummy!

 Leave it to Nate to play with his cars outside of the restaurant!

 Nate, Noah, and John!

That night we had Christmas with Matt's dad and Tricia. Nate racked up even more presents and we had a blast hanging out with all of them! We decided this might be the perfect time to take Nate to Callaway Gardens to see Fantasy in Lights. He loved it!! He was so excited to see the lights and ride the trolley.

Nate and John both received a bicycle from Joe and Tricia. There was a little competition to see which brother could get it together first... 

Matt had a little assistance from John and ended up getting it together first... 

Nate was excited to try his out with a little help from Uncle Adam! 

Nate and Big Daddy checked out the trees inside Christmas Village at Fantasy in Lights. 

He was excited to ride the trolley! 

On our way to see the lights!

On Christmas day Nate opened even more gifts. He had a fun time playing with his new Lightning McQueen car! Christmas night we went to visit Matt's grandfather and Nate decided to show out by throwing a tantrum. We have officially entered the terrible 2's! Watch out world!!

Big Daddy broke out the train set for Nate. He loved it! 

He spent a lot of time chasing the choo choo! 

Santa came! 

 Nate loved his Lightning McQueen car! It took awhile to figure out how to work it...

and then he promptly got it stuck....

There is no reverse so he has to have someone on hand to help him out! 

He also spent some time reading with Daddy!

It was a nice trip, and I am glad we were able to go spend some time with family. Hopefully we'll be seeing family again soon as our little man turns 2!!

Nate does Disney

Matt had a few days off at the end of October and the beginning of November. I took a day off, we hopped in the car, and traveled to Orlando. We left on Thursday evening and made it in to town just in time to crash for the night. The next day we decided to take Mr. Nate to Animal Kingdom. He had a fun time looking at the cars and riding the dinosaur ride. We took him on the safari ride and Nate was more interested in watching the jeep behind us than checking out the animals. Oh, well. He had fun! I took him on the dinosaur ride and then we went to see It's Tough Being a Bug. It is a pretty cool 3-d show that scared the crap out of Nate! He screamed through the entire show. Matt and I felt like horrible parents because we took him in and couldn't get him out! We attempted to make up for the travesty by getting him a front row seat to the afternoon parade. After the parade we decided to head back to the hotel so Nate could nap. We were mistaken. After a short 10 minute nap in the car on our way back to the hotel, Nate was up and ready to go! We took him to Downtown Disney and let him build a Lightning McQueen car. I think that made up for the Bug's Life show!

Here are some of the animals we saw:

Waiting for the dinosaur ride! 

Nate loved the dinosaur ride! 

Nate wanted to chase the birds that walked around the park. 

On a break from stalking the birds!

On Saturday we took Nate to the Magic Kingdom. It was way more crowded than Animal Kingdom. Matt and I don't really do crowds or stupid people very well and our day was filled with both! We decided to tough it out for the little one, but didn't quite make it long enough for the light parade or fireworks! We took Nate on the train to Fantasyland. Once we got off the train and got the fast pass for Dumbo, Nate fell asleep. We grabbed lunch and chilled for awhile before Matt woke Nate up to watch the show at Cinderella's Castle. Needless to say, Nate was not interested in the princesses. At. all. We decided to head toward Dumbo so as not to miss the fast pass time when the pirates came out. He was interested in the pirates, but Dumbo was waiting.

We made it to Dumbo and Matt rode with Nate first. Nate had a fun time, but according to Matt he was dying to get in line for the Goofy roller coaster ride. Sadly, Nate was a few inches shy of making the cut! I took Nate on his second ride. While we were in line he was in the mood to ride in the race car ride to our right. He was too short for this one, too. After Dumbo we ventured to the Tea Cups. My little adrenaline junkie was in love with this ride. He helped Matt spin the tea cup faster and faster. Our last ride of the day was It's A Small World. Nate loved it! He was clapping and dancing throughout the entire ride. We rode the train one last time and then hopped on the ferry to head to the car.

The boys waiting in line for Dumbo. 

I think Nate still wanted to be napping! 

Nate eventually warmed up to the ride! 

Dumbo for the second time! 

We loved Dumbo!

After an eventful day at Magic Kingdom, we took Nate back to Downtown Disney to eat before crashing at the hotel. After eating we came back to watch Bama barely squeak out a win over LSU. On Sunday we packed up and headed back. It was a fun, eventful weekend. Matt and I were exhausted, but we had a blast hanging with our little man!