Category: Parenthood


For Morgan’s first birthday, I planned on doing a little Lumberjack Theme. It just seemed fitting for a fall baby. I actually had started planning it the summer before he was even born. Darrell gave me a hard time about it. I made up some fun little mementos of his growing pictures from each month.

The biggest downside of the party was that because of his seizure the day before his birthday, we had to push the date of the party back a week. We still went out to celebrate on his birthday. Grandma had come up for his birthday, so we went out to Romano’s Macaroni Grill and then got him a little carrot spice cupcake with cream cheese frosting from a little stand in the mall. He loved the little cake.

Since we had to push the party back, a lot of people who were going to come didn’t end up making it. But overall, we had a great time and Morgan had a good time. The party turned out just like we wanted. I made a tree stump cake (with a plaid interior), a stack of pancakes cake, and a bear smash cake. For food, we did a big lumberjack breakfast. We had mini quiches, biscuits and gravy, sausages, and pancakes.

Other than the festivals in the other post, we had a really quiet April. The only other big thing we had was Easter. It was the first year we did Easter with Edward and he had a blast dying the eggs, looking through the baskets, and then doing an egg hunt. He was so excited to do the egg hunt that we did it three or four times.

May was huge for our family. Darrell was laid off in March from Milsoft and our family took a hit. He focused on studying and getting ready for interviews. He went through a bunch of interviews and never got a call back so we were getting a bit discouraged. Then, beginning of May, he did an interview and got an offer a couple days later. He had one more interview scheduled, so he waited to accept until after his interview. Low and behold, his last interview called him shortly after he got home from the interview. After discussion and back and forth, he went with the last one. So he began his new job at Concur Technologies in downtown Bellevue on May 8. We were excited for the new road ahead even though we were a bit nervous as he had been working from home for the last 4 years and now he is going back to having a commute. It took Edward awhile to adjust to not seeing Daddy all day whenever he wanted.

So, once Darrell signed the offer, we celebrated. One of my friends offered to watch the boys and we spent a night just us. There was a Cirque du Soleil show, Luzia, in Seattle at the time so we headed out for the night to see the show. I love the shows and they are some of my bucket list things. It was a great date night and we had a lot of fun.

To help Edward out with Daddy being gone all day all of a sudden, I took the boys down to San Diego to visit with my family. We spent a week and my family was excited to meet Morgan for the first time. It was a lot of fun hanging out and the kids got to hang out with their cousins.

While we were in San Diego, Grandma and Papa surprised Edward and took everyone to Sea World for the day. Edward loved seeing all of the animals with his favorite being the Orca. He is all about the Orca. Morgan had a bunch of fun seeing everything and all of the activity around him. Unfortunately, around lunch, he started to throw up and then not feel good. We weren’t sure if it was the heat or what exactly it was. It only really affected him at the time, so we just kept him hydrated and cool. Then it slowly hit almost everyone else in the group. Overall, a very successful trip for the crew.

June was a blur. We had parties, lots of time at friends houses, splash parks, and we hosted another Exchange student from Spain and he arrived towards the end of the month. So we had the welcome party for him and Edward got to play in a lake and also use his kite he got for his birthday. Both boys had a blast playing and seeing all of the other people. The boys are definitely extroverts.

To round out our June, we went down to St. Edward’s State Park and attended the Midsommerfest. It was fun and Edward got to wander around and see a different holiday. We had friends with us and it was hot, so we hung out in the shade as much as we could.

There are always a bunch of stuff going on for the Christmas holidays in Seattle. This year, we took advantage of some things we hadn’t before and we loved doing them. First up, we took the link train downtown and wandered around to see the sights down there. We wandered through the Sheraton Hotel’s Gingerbread village, the Olympic Fairmont Hotel’s Christmas Tree Festival and their Teddy Bear room. Then we grabbed the monorail and headed towards the Armory and the Seattle Center to see the Space Needle, the train setup, and we took Edward ice skating for his first time. He was nervous at first, but after a bit, he became more stable and loved going around.

We also went to Woodland Park Zoo and did Zoolights. It is the one thing we try to make sure we do each year. Edward loves seeing the lights and playing at the Zoomasium with all the snowballs they have.

We got a snow day and the neighborhood kids had a blast sliding down our street. Edward and Darrell spent a good portion of the day outside. They sled down the street, built some snowmen in the park, and even built an igloo. Darrell also brought out a bunch of hotchocolate for the kids to drink and they all loved that.

We took some family photos for Christmas Cards and even went and did our annual Santa Photo. We have been doing the Santa Photo since Edward was a year old and we have made it to see the same Santa thus far. We love him!

And last but not least, we began something we hope is a tradition. Edward loves watching the Polar Express, so we decided to do a Polar Express movie night and invite his friends. We put the movie on, got some pizza and hot chocolate and all watched. Since most of the mommy friends I have love to bake, we added a side mommy thing and did a cookie exchange. There were lots of cookies to go around and everyone seemed to love it. I made these cute little snowmen with Reese’s in them for each family to take one home.

These first couple months with Morgan have been difficult in some ways, but super exciting in others. Difficult in that we are still trying to find a balance between giving Edward attention and getting Morgan what he needs. Exciting because we are seeing Edward grow every day as he fully accepts his new big brother status.

Morgan’s favorite thing to do right now is to lay underneath the tree and stare up at all the lights. He is slowly beginning to sleep longer at night which is really nice for Mommy. We love seeing all of his faces and he is such a happy baby!

My favorite photos are the ones of the boys when they are being sweet to each other. Edward is loving being a big brother and always wants to be close to Morgan. He wants to sleep with him every night and it is super sweet.

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