November: Part 2 - The Birthday

I'm finally getting around to sharing some shots from Reid's birthday party. I went back and forth a TON on what we should do for his birthday. We considered everything between a huge party with every adult and child we could think of to no party at all. ;) 

Ultimately, a busy schedule won out and we kept it simple. Just a few close in-town family members, adults only, at our home. I bypassed cute invitations for quick e-mail messages and just ran with it.

The 'theme', if you could call it that, was Pow-Wow. Here's a few of the decorations.. they're mostly just fall-ish things.

The week before, I had spruced up this little IKEA table by adding wood planks to the top.

We had sugar cookies and carrot cake cupcakes for treats.

This was the food table before everything was out. The pictures are of Reid from the last year. The frame on the table is a tee-pee print. We had potato soup (made by my mom), taco soup (made by Dac's mom), all the toppin's, chips, and dip.

No complaints from the birthday boy.

After dinner, we sang happy birthday then dug into treats and presents.

He had a great time being a ham all night.

Dac, my G-ma Millie, and G-pa Ed

Same - plus Kevin.

Aunt Darla and Terese

G-ma Jo and Margaret (Reid calls her Margie)

Val

My mom and Dad

Opening presents... that's Austin in the background.

Aunt Deb

David and Terese

He loved making everyone laugh and having so many playmates to choose from!

I hated not to include more people but it was manageable given my stress level at that time. =) Reid was happy and I'm glad we went ahead and did something to celebrate. We are so fortunate to have SO many people who love our boy and support our family.

 That night, after the party, I held my almost two year old and thanked God for another year with him.

The next day, on his actual birthday, we went to church then went to Gambinos for pizza. =) Reid approved of that too. Then, following a good nap, he got to play with all his new toys.

November: Part 1

Here's a quick rundown of our November. Another whirlwind month in the books.

First, Reid got new PJ's. His Aunt Val does that for Halloween. =)

 Sky and I had a dinner date at Pizza Hut before taking a painting class. Look how grown up!! =/

 We had a great time. This girl is funny.

 Arteests!

 My snowman. The sample work showed a pink hat. You know I couldn't be having any of that. ;)

 Reid's a little stinker. One day I was talking to him while he ate a banana. I said "that banana is good for your belly isn't it?" so he lifted up his shirt and rubbed the banana on his belly. Makes sense. But I see he's literal like his daddy. =)

 He thought he was pretty funny. =) So did I.

 One day, Dac and I did a photo session for our dentist's office. While we up there, we tried a new local place for lunch... Fork and Fennel. It was different... but cool and pretty good.

 We had our first snow of the season. Here's Reid not cooperating for a picture with Felicity at church.

 And here he is being mind blown before we left for church.

We went to our first birthday party of a daycare friend. Reid had been invited to one in October (the one of Oakley pictured below) but we were out of town for a wedding. Hutton turned one and it was an adorable milk and cookies themed party. Reid loves Hutton so I was glad we got to go.

Reid and Oakley had a great time. =) They are 1.5 months apart and are just cute as can be together.

We had a TON of family photo sessions and we photographed these guys' pretty wedding. 

 And snuck a family photo while we were there. =) I had just danced with Reid a little earlier and he got mud all over the front of me! Thankfully you can't see it in this picture.

 Val and I at the reception.

After a long day, we headed out for a family dinner. After a couple months of feeling like I never saw these guys, it's been nice to spend more time together again!

 One of my new treat loves is the chocolate chip peppermint brownie fudge sundae at Braums. Yum.

 I got a haircut!

 We got new flannel sheets for our super chilly bedroom. Love them.

 We had a wonderful (unfortunately pictureless) Thanksgiving. We both had a couple days off and used that time to prepare for Reid's birthday party later in the weekend. We also got to spend time with both families that day.

That night Dac and I ordered our new Christmas tree from Lowe's and ran to pick it up the next day. For a number of reasons, we haven't got a new tree since moving into the house several years ago. We've still been using (when we've actually put one up) the one after being married a couple months. We were living in a small, one-bedroom apartment at the time so the tree was very tiny. I loved that tree though... still do! It just looks even smaller in our bigger front room so I've been excited about a new one. We got a good deal on it and here's Dac putting it up!

 I also tackled a little DIY project. Thanks to Pinterest and instructions from a blogger who'd already done this, I covered our 'seen-better-days' IKEA end tables with wood planks. It was simple. I just had our local lumber store cut the wood down to size, stained it (twice), then had Dac attach the boards to the top of the table. Voila!

 The day of Reid's party (I'll have a whole post on Reid's birthday soon), Val came over and used her new Conair Infiniti curling iron on my hair. That thing is so cool and it was fun to have curls for the night!

 Here's a little sneak peek of Reid's party decor.

AND... the treats I took for his daycare buddies. =)

More to come soon!