Jack's 1st Year Speech

Now that Jack is one year old, he has some wisdom he would like to impart to you all.

Jack's 1st Birthday! (Warning: Lots of Photos)

Happy Birthday to Jack! One year ago today, we were all so excited that he had FINALLY decided to come into the world as a healthy, beautiful baby boy! We had a fun day celebrating, beginning with a "Happy Birthday" serenade when he woke up.

Jack, fresh out of his room and ready to party!

The breakfast feast (french toast!)

Decorations to celebrate the big occasion (Jack and Tommy loved playing with these!)

Daddy and Tommy icing the cupcakes

Tommy "secretly" tasting the icing...

The dinner feast (roast beef--which Jack DID eat!)

Opening presents. Jack got the "Looney Tunes Collection: Vol 1", a big stuffed bear, a wooden train that spells "Jack", a stuffed bunny, a beany baby lion, and a nifty drum from Nanna and Papa!

However, all of these were eclipsed by the awesome ribbons Nanna and Papa attached to their present.

The single candle...Jack wasn't quite sure how he felt about it...

Singing "Happy Birthday"

Eating cupcakes and ice cream

Really enjoying the cupcakes and ice cream...

It was so much fun celebrating today! Now that Tommy is old enough to get excited about things (and in turn get Jack excited) it felt a lot more like a birthday. Happy Birthday, Jack! We love you!

Mmmm mmmm Good!

Bananas are very popular in my house (the boys alone can pack away a dozen bananas in a weekend), so it's not often that the bananas get to the "super mushy" stage around here. However, when they do...

BANANA BREAD!!!

Logan loves the banana bread recipe below. He told me last night that it's a good thing I don't make it very often, or he would gain a lot of weight. We've tried a few different ones, but this is my favorite :-)

Moist Banana Bread (from recipeland.com)

3 or 4 ripe bananas

1 egg

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 melted butter

1/2 cup chocolate chips (optional)

Directions:

Mash bananas by hand or with a mixer until fairly smooth (the batter may still appear slightly lumpy). Add all other ingredients in order, skipping the butter, mixing as y ou go. Add the melted butter last. Pour into greased and floured loaf pan at 325 degrees for 75 minutes, or 2 small loaf pans for 50 to 60 minutes.

Parenting: Touching the Hearts of Our Youth

Another Amazing video from lds.org!

Parenting: Touching the Hearts of Our Youth

Date Night, and other random stuff

As the title suggests, this post is about a bunch o' different stuff. First:

On our anniversary a few weeks ago, Logan and I decided we needed to focus more on dating during the month, as life is just getting crazier and we want to make sure our relationship remains a priority. We picked a date on the calendar, and I was assigned as the first planner of the evening (the idea is for us to take turns). Motivated by my sister Hope's blog about her date night a few months ago, I cruised some websites and decided to do a Parisian-themed evening (a great blog I referenced was Love Actually, which has some fun ideas!).

The evening cost less than us going to a movie, but it was so much fun! To create the atmosphere, I searched online for wallpaper images of Paris, downloaded them, and had a slideshow play on our TV (it's hooked up to our laptop). I downloaded "La Vie En Rose" and two Tango songs from Amazon (about $.99 each), and had them playing in the background. I printed some romantic French phrases and taped them around the living room. Logan knows some French, so it was fun having him teach me how to say each phrase. I borrowed a béret, and had a spread of cheese, eclairs, grapes, and bread, along with some sparkling grape juice. I found some videos online showing how to Tango, and we had so much fun! I also found some French films on Netflix for us to watch, but we decided on an episode of "Moonlighting" instead...not French, but fun :-)

It was nice having a real date! Logan also reminded me that our 2nd date was to the Spring Ball, which had a Parisian theme. I'd completely forgotten! So, extra points for sentimentality. Logan has the next "date night", and I'm pretty curious to see what he comes up with...

Some of the French phrases I put up

Our spread. It doesn't look as romantic without the candlelight...

In other news, Jack is walking! Not consistently, but little by little he's getting better. He is also FINALLY sleeping through the night! (Most nights.) It's been heart wrenching, but with him I had to let him just "cry it out", because he was still waking up two times a night to feed, and he's really too old for that. It took a little over a week, but he's doing it! I'm so happy to get a full night's sleep. He turns 1 next Sunday. I can't believe how big he's getting! Such a cutey :-)

Our garden has been bearing fruit...or rather, vegetables. I made a meal using elements from our garden, and it was really neat to think they grew right in our backyard!

On the left are potatoes, center are cucumbers and tomatoes, and on the right green beans.

Yum!

In other news, my lia sophia business is going great! I've been having a lot of fun lately doing parties and getting pretty jewelry :-) It's also really nice to have a large selection to draw from when I'm going out. Just a bracelet can dress up jeans and a T-shirt, and I like the feeling! My sisters out west need to peruse liasophia.com/emiliedavis and start putting in birthday/Christmas requests...

I can't believe August is almost over! Time is sure flying...

STEPS!!!!

As I was sitting here commenting on a post by Christy, Jack took a step!!!! Yay!!!! I think he's going to "learn to walk" today....

Haircuts, Anniversary and Mill Mt.

Since Tommy was sportin' sideburns and Jack's curls were starting to look a bit girly, Logan and I decided it was time for haircuts! Tommy's pretty used to them, but this was Jack's first time, so we took some pictures!

Tommy sits pretty still--although at the very end we had to give him a cookie to keep him from getting bored!

Jack "before"

a better view of the curls

Jack "after", sans curls

Monday was Logan and my 4th anniversary, and after stewing for a long time about what we should do (we are horrible at planning things like that!!) since Logan had the day off we decided to take the kids to the Mill Mountain Zoo in Roanoke. A friend of ours went recently (otherwise I wouldn't have known it existed). It's pretty small, but it has a nice layout, and some interesting animals. The boys had a lot of fun, and were really well behaved the whole trip!

Later that night Mom came over to watch the boys and Logan and I went out to eat to celebrate, but the family trip was a fun outing, too :-)

A red panda. I'd never even heard of them before!

Tommy and the alligator (?? could be a crocodile)

Tommy and the tiger, which is thankfully not alive.

Jack and Logan waiting for the ZooChoo (a little train that runs through the zoo)

Tommy and Logan on the train. Tommy loves wearing hats! He usually has it pulled down over his eyes.

Jack watching everything go by. He loved the wind!