Baby Carter James!   I love holding the new babies.

Ronan’s first birthday party was today.  All of our very best and most wonderful friends came.  I was so so very worried about it for NOTHING at all.  It was amazing, and I think everyone had a great time.  Short of a few birthday boy melt-downs, it couldn’t have gone better.

Here are some pictures of our Ronan’s big day.

Ronan LOVES balloons!

Sweet Farah!

Walkin’ man and his birthday balloons.

Our party guests – so many amazing people.  (The other half were in the kitchen.)

Do you see anything wrong with this picture?  Let me give you a hint… helium balloon + candle = FAIL.

Balloon popped and scared him silly.  He cried until he tasted the icing.

“Hmm.  This is pretty good actually.”

“This gets it to my mouth faster.”

WIN.

Quick bath, wardrobe change, and BACK in the party!

Hooray!  Presents!

Thank you SO much to everyone who came!  Until next year…

I have been terrible about uploading pictures lately, so here is a nice little picture post.

Ronan likes to snack while laying on his back.

This is the face he makes when I use the flash now.

Look at that sweet face!

You see this huge grin?  It’s because he has the power plug.  He tried to put it in his mouth, and I told him “NO!” firmly.

Then he looked like this:

A pout?  You ain’t seen NOTHING yet.

Have you ever seen anything so sad?  It breaks your heart.  Woah, baby.

I had some other pretty great pictures to share of this play date, so I’m gonna go ahead and put them here.

Ava working the head-stand.

Ava did this, and I thought it was beautiful, so I took a picture.  So colorful!

Farah found a GREAT chair!

Everyone having SO much fun!  Ava and Farah look so much alike in this picture!

And last, but not least… Farah channeling her inner Nick Nolte.

HAHAHAHA!

I have been woefully and unforgiveably absent from my blog.  There is no excuse for that.

Oh wait.  There is.

My parents where here for 5 amazing days, and it was wonderful.  It makes me realize how close I am with them, how much I love them, and how silly I am for living so far away.  Sadly, I don’t really want to move closer to COLDmonton.  That’s what I’m calling it now.  -40?  Yeah, it’s called COLDmonton.  I want my parents to move closer to here.  My dad doesn’t like the culture, but he’d get used to it.  And after a few years, he’d even stop complaining about it.

Right.  That will happen.

Anyways.  I feel like I should apologize for my lack of substantive material, but really… I’ve had such a great time.  And I’m totally not sorry.  I wish I had more pictures.  I always say I’m going to take so many pictures it will be annoying – and then I never do.  I REALLY wish I had taken at least one picture of mom and dad with Ronan.  I really wish I had some way to capture how incredible it is to see your baby having a blast with his grandparents.  I wish I could share the emotion I feel when I watch my dad kiss my son on the cheek, and see my mom rock him to sleep.  I can’t imagine a better feeling.

I just wanted to share the few photos that I DO have.  Too few!

Nana’s first meeting with Ronan.  “Got your toes!”

“Sooooo big!”

Cuddles with Nana already.  Not shy at all!

Not so sure about the guy with the beard.  I’ll keep the cheerio’s between us.

Nana’s have the best laps for cuddles.