Dear Wes, Let's Go On An Adventure

Dear Wes,

Since the day you were born, life has been an adventure. Even your entrance into this world was trailblazing its own course. I admire that about you. Yes, I know you aren't even a year and a half old yet, but I know your spirit, and it is one with a fiery passion. One that I am sure will thirst for exciting journeys and fascinating experiences.

For now, I get to introduce you to the tiniest sliver of the world as we go on our own adventures. You are strapped on my back and off we go. To the ocean to find seashells and starfish; around town exploring hidden treasures and sharing a cup of chocolate ice cream; soaking in that sunny Vitamin D and inhaling the fresh air on a day hike.

This is what living looks and feels like.

Thank you for being my little pal. I am lucky I get to explore the world with you, and see it through the wonder and awe of your eyes. I wish you a life full of love, curiosity, and adventure.

Love,

Mama

(P.S. I am wearing Wes in the LÍLLÉ Baby carrier in charcoal and I absolutely love it.)

Christmas Morning 2014

On Christmas morning at 6 am on the dot, Luke marched his way into our room just as he does every day. I didn't need to worry (and I never do) about setting an alarm to make sure he didn't go down without us because his sleeping schedule is like clockwork. (These are the joys of Christmas morning with little people. It's still predictable and easy to wrangle them in without running downstairs and spoiling all the fun.)

"Good morning, mama!" he chimed. I rolled over with a sleepy smile on my face and replied, "Merry Christmas, Luke! Guess what? Santa came last night!"

His face lit up and then we had a lengthy discussion (more like an interrogation because you know how 3-year-olds are with all the questions) about the affairs of sliding down the chimney and eating cookies and drinking milk. 

About 45 minutes later, Wes was chirping from the other room signaling his grand entrance for the day, and off we bounded down the stairs to see what tricks Santa had up his sleeve this year! 

(By the way, can we take a quick second to let that picture of Wesley's face sink in? It's the face he pulls when asked to smile. The kid is a ham with a side of goober berries.)

The looks on their faces were priceless. It's the kind of thing you wait to see your whole life, but you don't know you were waiting for. Does that make sense? I was more excited this Christmas than I have ever been, and had actual butterflies flitting around in my stomach as we sat out the toys on Christmas Eve. Their reactions didn't disappoint. There were sounds of crisp, ripping paper and those terribly annoying, plastic, wire doodads littered everywhere. But the best were the grins and gasps as each present revealed itself.

That right there is my excited face.

This is Wesley's. (Too freaking cute to handle.)

This is Matt's. (So much joy radiating from that handsome mug!)

And this is Luke's. (Disney movies will do that to ya!)

We need to talk about this present. This may seem like a boring, old picture of some horribly wrapped present which looks like Christmas barfed all over it. While that is true, this is going to be one of those pictures I look back on in 10 years and have a good chuckle over. You see, Luke was watching me attach all of the gift tag stickers to the gifts under the tree about a week before Christmas. The next day when I came downstairs after taking a shower I found this present covered in gift tags. He's found a serious, new love for stickers and he thought he was being the most diligent helper in all the world. He used the entire pack and then some, leaving none for the other gifts we still needed to tag, but I didn't even bother to buy more or care. All I could do was laugh and admire his handiwork.

And then this is what he did when asking him to "smile like an elf!"

Let us take another minute to coo over yet another picture of Wesley being ADORABLE. He finally got a mimi (what we call blankies at our house) just like his big brother and this was the very first thing he did after we unwrapped it. And they haven't parted since. Such a beautiful love story, is it not?

Santa ate all the cookies and drank all the milk! This was actually the first thing to be inspected upon coming downstairs Christmas morning. Luke approved of Santa's efforts.

Ahhhh, my favorite part—the food! The very first year Matt and I were married we started the tradition of making the most ridiculous and grand Christmas breakfast. Or more like a Christmas break-feast. It has evolved over the years to include FIVE beverages. One for every dish, as I like to say. The french toast goes marvelously with the chocolate milk, the hashbrowns work nicely with the orange juice, the bacon pairs well with the sparkling cider, the sausage complements the grapey undertones in the grape juice, and the eggnog takes the edge off the churizo and eggs. Stay thirsty, my friends.

After we recovered from our food comas, we tried on Mr Potato Head's glasses, but decided they didn't go with any of our face shapes. We built car tracks looping from the stair railing, which launched into the new toy barn. We attempted to skateboard, but decided on boarding the Death Star instead. (But it's basically the same thing since I already wiped out on the skateboard in an attempt to look cool. Fail.) Oh, and Luke and Wes nearly finished off an entire bag of Butterfinger bells.

Christmas 2014 was a wonderful success, and I am overflowing with love and gratitude for my gang of boys. Hope you all had the most merry of Christmases, and here's to the happiest new year!

P.S. Here are our Christmas mornings from 2011, 2012 and 2013!

Teaching My Boys Gratitude

I remember the first time I ever helped put together packages for families in need. I was about 9 or 10 years old and our church was hosting a holiday food and supplies drive. The gym at our church building was brimming with people, canned goods and non-perishable foods, personal care items and boxes. I was plopped into the canned goods and boxed food section of the assembly line. There were hundreds of cans of green beans and piles of stuffing and cake mix, among various other foods.

There are this many families who would be going without a holiday dinner if it weren't for us, I thought to myself, somewhat alarmed and awestruck. Being the youngest of eight, our resources were somewhat limited at times, but I never went without food and the basic necessities to maintain a happy life. I had no clue what it was like to go without, and a part of my little soul ached for these people. It ached for the other 10-year old girls like me who lived with uncertainty every morning as they awoke if they were going to have food to eat that day. I was very young and that experience brought a whole new perspective to my small, sheltered world.

Gratitude is often said to be the key to to happiness in life. Practiced daily, it can transform life from a cold and resentful place to one of light and joy, even in the most dire of circumstances. Matt and I have experienced our own shifts in our outlooks on life when we have cultivated a grateful attitude. And it truly is life-changing.

Our goal as parents is to teach our boys gratitude. Starting now at this phase in their lives. We are diligent in teaching them to say "thank you" and try to help them understand exactly what it means. Luke is starting to understand. We are also mindfully seeking for opportunities to pair that gratitude with service and have a holiday tradition of helping out families in need.

As we went to hand out fliers for a neighborhood food drive a few days ago, I explained to Luke what we were doing. "You know how your tummy feels when you are hungry? Well, some little boys and girls don't have food to eat, so we are going to find food to give to them so their tummies don't hurt."

I could tell he was trying to process what I was saying as he scooted alongside me. After we finished handing out all the fliers, Luke looked up to me and said, "We find food for boys and guhls, so der tummies feel bettah." I was filled with so much warmth at the sweetness and concern in his eyes. I am not sure if he really understood, but that moment was charged with love.

Gratitude, coupled with service, is the ultimate form of love and charity, and that is what I aim to teach our boys. There will be plenty of faltering and failing as a parent, but I know that if I set those basic, yet profound principles for them, few other things will matter. All of their goodness and kindness will stem from that foundation.

Count all your blessings, tell the people in your life you love them, and enjoy your time with your family and friends this weekend. Happy Thanksgiving!
 

An Awesome Astronomy 1st Birthday Party

Last weekend was Wesley's official first birthday party! The theme was an aWESome astronomy party. Get it? I didn't even realize our little guy puts the Wes in awesome until I thought of the party theme, but he is a pretty spectacular kid, so it's not surprising, now is it?

Here is how we decorated for it...

 

Target has an adorable line of sustainable items that just so happened to go along with our astronomy theme. It's like the stars were aligned... (I am in one of those terrible joke telling moods, so bear with me.)

Constellation cookies! He is a Scorpio if you couldn't tell by my marvelous cookie decorating handiwork ;)

It's aWESome to be one banner!

We had a pizza party, so we served the fruit and salad in some mini, scallop-edged boxes and used milk bottles to serve the soda in.

The cake smash is always the best part of a first birthday party. These parties are basically pointless without the cake smash, am I right? Matt kept reminding me that Wes will not rememeber this party so why did I go to all the effort? For posterity's sake, of course! One day Wes will look upon these archives and thank me... or loathe me, but that's a different topic of conversation for a different day. We are focusing on sunshine, cupcakes and sprinkles today. Literally!

And last, but not least, the piñata! It may have taken a quarter of an hour to bust open, but it was definitely a hit! (Okay, I promise I am done with the ridiculous puns.) You can find out how to make your own DIY piñata here!

And here is a list of the party supplies:

Susty Party disposable cups

Susty Party disposable tablecloth

Susty Party disposable wooden flatware

Wit and Delight for Target disposable plates

Spritz silver striped disposable napkins

Handmade banner

Glass milk bottles

Scalloped edge salad boxes

Wilton gold and silver edible stars

DIY moon piñata