Madden's First Birthday Part 2

Basically this is going to just be a pure picture overload post of all the action.

DIY Smash Cake

Sock Monkey smash cake to match the invitations.

Singing Happy Birthday - Cake Time

Cheese!

MJ was ever so gentle with his cake so he let his friends jump in for a little taste of their own.

Carter, Kennedy, Jackson, and Stella each had fun sticking their fingers in his cake for a sweet taste.

I mean how often do you actually get to sink your hands into someone else's cake and it's okay?!?! SO fun! 

Sharing is Caring ;)

 Yummy yummy

Momma and Birthday Boy

Cousin Stella

Learning time with Auntie Tiff, Annette and Jackson. Had to show off his books.

And we're done with cake.

Play Time!

We had two baby pools along with a slip 'n slide in the back yard. It was absolutely perfect weather for it too.

Can't end a great party without *kisses* 

Presents 

First set of wheels!

And that's a wrap!!

Thank you again to all our awesome family and friends for helping us celebrate Madden's 1st birthday!

We are so blessed to have you in our lives and MJ was one lucky little guy to be able to be apart of yours.

Madden's First Birthday Part 1

Lets start off with the details!

I of course got a tone of ideas off Pinterest, where else. I planned long ago that MJ's birthday would be Sock Monkey themed. While he's little and has not yet formed the ability to have an opinion or preference of party theme I'm taking advantage of picking something I want :)

All those sports, superheros and truck themed parties can wait till later.

I want it cute and kid-like. So sock monkeys it is!

I started off my making a DIY wreath. Made with two different color yarn I wrapped around a green Styrofoam wreath ring (those are my technical turns). I cute 3 pieces of scrapbook paper for the pennants which I hot glued to a piece of yard I hung across and tied. I then cut out the letters for ONE from my Cricut machine and hot glued them to the pennants.

This greeted guests at the front door, along with MJ's balloons from his one year pictures the day before.

The balloons each color of red, blue, white, and brown.

The highchair.

DIY sign made from the Cricut.

The tables were each covered in red and robins eggs blue table clothes.

Red, white, and robin eggs blue pom poms were DIY project

For the main kitchen table I placed MJ's smash cake on, surrounded by pictures from his one year photo shoot and the sock monkey hat which was the inspiration behind the entire party!

Happy Birthday Madden sign was also DIY

I made a Newborn - 12 month banner which included his monthly pictures.

It was so cool to be able to look at them all next to each other and see the changes from month to month.

The dessert and candy buffet!

Of course I had to make cupcakes for MJ's party. Mini red velvet cupcakes with a cream cheese frosting. I tried out a new recipe for a Banana cupcake with Vanilla and Nuetella Swirl Buttercream, they were awesome and most definitely a hit. 

For the candy, I got Red and Brown Monkey Vines (aka  Red and Chocolate Twizzlers), blue rock candy sticks, malted milk balls, and mini Swedish fish. I included treat bags for guests to take extra candy home with them.  

For beverages we had bottled water, beer, Kool Aid Bursts, and kid-friendly Monkey Punch

Monkey Punch included blue Hawaiian Punch, Lemonade and Sprite.

For the food we took it easy and ordered a Hungry Hobo sandwich serves with tortilla roll-ups, veggie tray, fruit tray, pasta salad, and Uncrustables for the kids.

Color themed candy.

On top of each of the Banana Cupcakes I made marshmallow fondant sock monkeys.

I loved how they turned out! Took a little bit extra time but so cute and so worth it!!!

Grey and Yellow Baby Shower

A few weeks ago I got the honor of throwing my friend Tera a baby shower

I've known Tera for just over 7 years now (wow time sure has flown by), we've worked together for two different companies and at 3 different time frames, she's moved to Delaware and back, we're both moves around town, both got engaged, both got married, and have been at each others sides through both our long journeys to get pregnant.

I was completely thrilled the early morning in December I got a call from her (granted we were going to be seeing each other at work in like an hour) when she told me she had just take a pregnancy test that came back positive and she was in utter shock! After months and years of trying, taking test after test turn up negative it was completely unexpected. And she had no idea what to do or who to call. 

I got the first call, how cool is that!!     

I've been wanting to help throw a baby shower for a long time now so I offered early on to host and was super excited when I really got too.

Invitation from Etsy by ModernBeautiful

Absolutely LOVED these invites!!

Tera decided she wanted to go with a grey and yellow nursery so I stole the color scheme for her shower too. She also loves children's books so I went for a Children's book theme. I used books from MJ's own collection and checked out all the rest at the library. With the invitation I included a really cute poem to have all the guests from a children's book instead of a card and to write a message to the baby in it so it could be read each time the book is read.  

Venue: My house

Decor:

I made all the grey, yellow and white pom poms with tissue paper, pipe cleaner and ribbon in which I hung them all around the house for the decor. I also made the "Welcome Baby Berkey" and "Oh Baby" signs with scrapbook paper and my Cricut machine. On the tables and fireplace mantle I places the books along with wooden baby blocks that the baby got to keep afterwards.

For the menu I wanted to coordinate books with the food which turned out really cute. I placed the corresponding book next to the dish with a label.

Menu:

Green Eggs and Ham - Ham and Turkey Sandwiches and Deviled Eggs

Puff the Magic Dragon - Puff Pastries

The Very Hungry Caterpillar - Fruit

Eating the Alphabet - Veggie Tray

Strega Nona - Pasta Salad

The Stinky Cheese Man - Cheese and Crackers

One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish - Colored Swedish Fish

Hippo Lemonade - Adult Strawberry Lemonade and a Kid-Friendly Punch

If You Give A Cat A Cupcake - Strawberry Cupcakes and Gluten-free Lemon Cupcakes

I've never been a huge fan of the majority of those corny baby shower games so I wanted to do something different. I complied a list of questions on children's book trivia. The questions ranged from old books to newer more recent ones. It may have been a little easier of I would have done multiple choice answers for some but oh well it was still fun.

For an activity while the Momma-to-be opened presents and as a gift, I bought all the letters of the alphabet in an assortment of fonts, sizes and styles for some craft time. Tera loved the alphabet letters I made and put up in MJ's room and had been talking about them for months. I kept giving her coupons to Michael's to go buy them but she never got around too it. So as her shower got closer and closer I decided to do it for her.  

 I got a little bit of slack from everyone at first. Every made excuses they weren't crafty or talented or good at painting or knew what to do. Excuses, excuses.

I brought out all sorts of scrapbook paper to go with the color scheme to modge podge to the letters and I also bought an assortment of paints I thought were complementary.

It was so much fun watching everyone start to get really into it. Some guests chose to do modge podge paper and others chose to paint.

They turned out awesome!!!!!!!!!

Can't wait to see them up in baby Berkey's nursery!

Me with the Momma-To-Be (excuse my dad photo bombing!)

The End of Liquid Gold

Just pulled the very last bag of break milk out of the freezer tonight!

I can't believe we really actually made it past the one year mark! I want to celebrate by not having to think about how many adult beverages I have or by going out to buy a brand new normal bra :)

Yup that last bag of milk says May 29th. That was the last day I actually had enough to freeze, then I completely slowed down. I actually started writing this post shortly after that, mid June, but just never got around to finishing it.

I always knew I wanted to try my hardest to breastfeed my child if I could in the beginning. After I survived the hardest part of those first few months my goal was to make it to one year. I never gave much thought about how you stop. I figured once we got past that one year mark I'd start reading and researching it. I imagined he would just want to keep on breastfeeding forever until I pulled the trigger and  I  would have to start weaning him. It never really occurred to me that he might just start doing it on his own or that it would happen before he was a year old. 

But it's happened.

Just a few months ago this kid wouldn't even take a bottle from me or anyone else if I was around. He took a bottle no problem at daycare, two a day in fact. He even takes bottle from grandparents or babysitters when they watch him. But there really isn't a need for him to be given a bottle during the weekend or nights unless someone else watches him because basically nursing is just so much more convenient. Even if we have a date night he no longer needs a bottle before bed, I nursed him once in the evening then feed him his dinner of solids and that's it.

So it actually worried me a bit that we would be in big trouble down the road when one year had come and gone and he was still attached to the boob. Plus he has no interest in sippy cups, no matter which type or brand I tried. But I figured we'd cross that road when we got there and kind of pushed the whole topic from my mind.

It started the first of June. 

Around 5:30 is the usual time I get home from work and nurse him right away but since we're in baseball season I leave work 30 minutes early to pick him up and then we play a little bit beforehand. Right in the middle of the week things changed.  I picked him up from daycare, we came home and sat down on the living room floor to play for a bit. Right on schedule he's hungry but when I try to nurse him he just kept pulling off and on, just refusing to want to eat. Luckily I had extra bottles on the frig for daycare the next day so I pulled one out, warmed it up, laid him on the floor, and handed off the bottle to him.

He had no problem taking his bottle. He chugged it until it was completely empty, held it up and threw it on the floor like saying "Cashed it!!"

Since that evening I'd offer him to nurse but he wanted nothing to do with the boob but only in the evenings, just that one feeding. Later that week, Saturday came and he nursed for everything else except that evening feed and continued that through all of the next week. The weekend after that he decided he no longer wanted to nurse during the day either.

My supply most definitely decreased. I continued to pump once a day at work and once at night before bed to keep up with bottle for daycare  for w couple more weeks because I don't have as much milk frozen as I thought I had. It seriously seemed like a ton, but when you count and add it all up it's wasn't. It was only like 135 oz., I give him 3 - 5 oz. bottles a day. Worst case scenario if he quit nursing altogether we would have only make it a week. There's no way I wanted to supplement with formula when we are sooooo close to that one year. Not now, not yet!! But I quit pumping because it wasn't amounting to as much as how long it took to do set up, pump and wash everything.

Luckily MJ kept his first morning nursing session.

I called our peds office 2 weeks before his 1st birthday since we were cutting it close and down to 50 ounces, we were given the green light to start transitioning to cow's milk by adding it slowly to his breast milk bottles. I started with just 1 ounce of cows milk to his bottles for a few days then would increase it by an ounce every few days or so. 

We just made it!!

Tomorrow and Monday's bottles/sippy's will be the very last of a mixture. From then on out MJ will be on all cow's milk, aside from nursing in the morning still. Not sure how long he will keep that up or how much longer I will let him until we're are completely donezo!

12 Month Update

Happy ONE year little nugget!!

 

So you're apparently considered a toddler now...weird.

Ready or not you're starting to look less like a baby and more like a little boy every day.

 

I knew time was flying by but I never could have imagined just how fast your first year would go or how much you could change literally right in front of our eyes.

 I've said it before, and I know this won't be the last time but you amaze me each and every day!

We had your one year pictures taken last week with the wonderful photographer Jennie Peakin, check her work out here and sneak peek of our other pictures. I was extremely nervous all week about them; A, they were scheduled for 6pm and you usually are already getting tired/ready for bed then since bedtime is 7pm, and B, it was extremely hot week. Meaning it just so happened to be THE hottest day of the year so far!! At 6pm it was still 98 degrees and with the humidity felt well over 100+!
But Jennie did awesome with you and overall you did amazing. We can't wait to see the rest of your cuteness!

This month has been super busy!

From daddy's baseball games to holidays to party planning. We have been all over the place. You helped your cousin Stella celebrate turning one at her birthday party. In turn, she of course helped celebrate yours. You absolutely love playing with her even if she can manhandle you already! Every time you two are together you try giving each other kisses. It's the cutest thing EVER. You're so lucky to have a little cousin just your age to grow up with. I foresee you getting into lots of trouble with her ;)

 

You are certainly on the go now!

At the beginning of the month all you did was get on all fours to rock, your preferred method of getting around was rolling everywhere and into or on everything. Each week you would start taking more and more steps crawling. Getting a bit more adventurous and more confident. Now you cannot be stopped. You're one fast little crawler!! 

You love crawling over to the hardwood and bar stools to make noise. You bee-line to the laundry room in hopes to get the chance to play in the dogs food bowls and water. You're not happy when we close that door. You'll pound on it, try to slide it open and most likely cry or through a mini fit because you can't get in.

You always get a second wind in the evening after bath time or when it's time for jammies. As soon as you're naked you try desperately to make a break for it (although I love watching your naked little booty crawling away from me so I let you!). You'll crawl to the doorway in your bedroom and then over to the bathroom or down the hallway. Always trying to get away from us to play a little longer.     

You're starting to get quite the personality. You still are a pretty mellow, laid-back kid. For the most part you're always happy and in a good mood. We can usually guess pretty easily if you're not, which is usually only when tired or hungry. You've just recently started getting some stranger anxiety, usually if you've just woken up or overly tired or have just met someone or haven't seen for a long time. But after only a few minutes you warm up fairly fast.
 

You my love, have stolen my heart!

I'm so proud to be your mommy. This first year has been a roller coaster ride of emotions and fun. There are highs as well as lows but no matter what, we come out of everything together. I look forward to watching you grow each and every day.

Love you with all my heart,
Mommy
XOXO

Highlights:

• Going to cousin Stella's 1st birthday party
• Throwing Tera's Baby shower
• Celebrated his first Fourth of July
• Watched fireworks for the first time
• July 4th cookout at the Vincent's
• Went to first parade - Fourth of July parade
• Had a sleepover at Grandma and Grandpa Gorsh's so mommy and daddy could go out of town
• Daddy's baseball games
• Got picked up from daycare by Grandpa and Grandma Dexter a couple times each week
• Celebrated Daddy's birthday
• Got his ONE year pictures taken
• Had a Sock Monkey themed First Birthday Party
• Two smash cakes and a cupcake (for pictures, birthday party and actual birth day)
• Had a pizza party on his actual birthday with mom, dad and all his grandparents
• Turned ONE!!

Age: 12 months old
Weight: 23.5 pounds percentile
Length: 30 inches 59 percentile
Head: Back up to 90 percentile
Size: Wears a few 9 month outfits still but is mainly in 12 month and some 18 month clothes. Wears size 4 diapers
Hair: Light brown.
Eyes: Love those Baby Blues!

Health: A few days after he turned 11 months MJ started getting a runny nose then had a hard time falling asleep and would put his hands up by his ears. I took him into the doctor during walk-in hours to check his ears since he never has signs of an ear infection when he does have one and it was the week of July 4th which we were going out of town later in the week so I wanted to be sure he was healthy or start meds. His ears were all good and then two days later his 6th tooth broke through, so that explains the fussy-gus! After that he's been good.

Teeth: As said above, tooth number 6 came through then about 6 days later tooth number 7 popped through. Both on the top. He now has 4 top teeth in the front and 3 on the bottom. Just started drooling a bit more this week so we might be seeing some more here soon.

Sleeping: Aside from those few days at the beginning of the month from teething and the aftermath of his birthday weekend MJ has been back to an awesome little sleeper!! He's usually ready for bed at the same time every night like clockwork. He goes to bed around 7-7:30pm and sleeps through the night until about 6:30am. He takes 2 naps. His morning nap is around 9-9:30am in which he usually sleeps 1-2 hours. His afternoon nap is around 1-1:30pm for 1-1.5 hours

Eating: MJ is one good eater!! No complaints here about that. This kid can eat. I mean like eat an entire homemade waffle plus some fruit kinda eat. He's only nursing once a day (his choice), first thing in the morning. I started mixing whole cow's milk with breast milk in all his bottles/sippys the rest of the day. I started this 2 weeks ago and my stash is just about gone, this will be the last week.

This month he started doing this awesome thing (sense the sarcasm) when he eat, spitting food out. Even to things he loves to eat like sweet potatoes or chicken nuggets. As soon as it hits his mouth he makes a disgusted face and spits it out, even if he's half way through eating the same thing then all of a sudden one piece isn't good anymore. After a few tries by me or a distraction he'll usually go about eating it again but not always the case. Weirdo! It was funny at first but not so much anymore.

Loves - Bananas, sweet potatoes, blueberries, yogurt, nectarines, peas (even though he hated them pureed), chicken, pancakes, waffles, turkey sausage, and  loves loves grapes (new this month)!!

Movement: He's on the move! Crawling that is. Pulls himself up onto his knees and will only pull himself all the way up to a stand in the bathtub of course (the most safest place to practice!). He waves bye-bye, gives kisses and starting to get the whole high-fives thing.

Milestones: Crawling. Understanding simple commands like "No" and "Give me". He's also learning to share. He hands us food or tries to hold it up to our mouths, he'll give me his paci or try putting it in my mouth, and he'll hand out his toys when you're playing.

Favorite Toys/Activities: Bath time by far is his favorite thing of all time. And playing in water. He splashes around like a crazy man. Loves having water poured over his head or being squirted with toys.  Balls! Absolutely loves playing with balls of all sizes (and yes that includes his own junk too ;)). Throwing them, rolling them, hitting them, banging balls together. Balloons. Kid goes crazy when balloons are in his face. Making noises. The louder the more proud! Likes playing patty cake and so big. Brushing his teeth. I just give him his toothbrush and he brushes his teeth all by himself. The majority of the time he just sucks on it or chews it but he's getting use to it.

Dislikes: Sitting still for longer than a hot minute. Getting his diaper changed or un/dressed, which would mean he has to sit still. Waiting to nurse in the morning or waiting to eat solid foods. Seeing other people eat and he's not eating.....meltdown city!

Words/Sounds: This kid likes to make noise and hear himself chatter. He says No-no, mama, dada, nigh-nigh, huh, and uh-oh. Uh-oh is by far his favorite word right now and says it all the time. Every time I talk to him he always will say "huh?" to me. We all swear he says thank you, it sound that clear and every single time any one tells him or prompts him to say Thank You, he will repeat it and it sounds like he really is saying it. Swear to god!

Favorite Moments:

• Madden have a total "cheese" smile now! He has his normal beautiful, perfect little smile when he's happy or laughing, and then he has a " Madden, Say Cheese" smile were he squints his entire face which I call the Chandler face seen here (that's a Friends reference for anyone who still loves watching re-runs of that show, you'll have no idea what that is kid). It cracks me up every time. I LOVE IT!

One word: HAM!

 

You're Officially ONE!

One year ago today, on July 23rd at 2:10am you entered the world and stole our hearts. You took your first breath then were handed over to me and laid upon my chest. 

 You were the absolutely most beautiful baby I'd ever laid eyes on.

You took my breath away.

 Perfectly proportioned. Ten fingers. Ten toes. My button nose. Your daddy's lips. Beautiful brown hair. Eight pounds, fourteen ounces and twenty one inches long of perfection!

Our world forever changed in the best, most awesome way and our hearts grew tenfold!

 

It's crazy to think back where we were at this very time a year ago today. You surprised us all when you decided to make your arrival 3 weeks early, you held out just long enough to officially make 37 weeks and be considered full term. You were one smart cookie, even in utero!

(Madden's birth story can be found here).

Look how you've grown!!

No longer a newborn. No longer a baby. You my dear are officially called a toddler!!

How in the world could this past year go so fast?

You've grown into quite the little person!

You have the most beautiful heart and gentlest soul. You're sweet and you're kind.

Laid-back like your mama. You take your time and do things when you're ready.You take things at your own pace. You're not in any rush and don't try to keep up with others.

You are observant and curious. You love to watch people and study them. Keep an eye on what they are doing and where they go. Trying to figure out how they do things and than try to do it yourself. 

You get more adventurous everyday.

 

Your daddy and I love watching you grow and develop each and everyday. Figuring out and doing new things. This next year is going to be full of firsts for you. We look forward to you taking your first steps, talking, going on trips together, celebrating holidays, and trying new things. We can't wait to see what lays ahead of us as a family and watching your personally develop and come out.

 

You mean the world to us. We love you all the way up to the moon, and back

 

XOXO

Mommy and Daddy

 

“Congratulations!

Today is your day.

You're off to Great Places!

You're off and away!”

― Dr. Seuss, Oh, the Places You'll Go!