Happy birthday, Grady!

Hard to believe that 1 whole year ago, our baby boy was born!  One of my gifts to Grady this year was his baby book...completed that is!  In looking back through all of the pictures, soooo much has happened in one year it feels like we have had Grady forever!  Yet at the same time it feels like just yesterday we brought him home from the hospital.   

January 28, 2010

January 28, 2011

We had a WONDERFUL birthday weekend!  The whole immediate family was here...I don't think this has happened since our wedding 6 1/2 years ago!  We came pretty close last year when Grady was born, but we were missing Denise and Garrett.  Mom, Whit, and Adam made it into town Wednesday morning.  Mom had never really spent any time in San Francisco and Adam had never been to California, so we spent the whole day in the city site seeing, exploring, eating, and a little shopping!

Whit, Grady, and Adam on the Trolley...a great way to see a lot of the city...Grady loved it!  He smiled and laughed the whole time.

At the top of Coit Tower showing off the new walking skills!

At Fisherman's Wharf

It was a beautiful day!  Lots of sun and not too cold.  By the time we were done with our site seeing (and after walking who know how many miles!), little Grady was exhausted!  Here he is in Barney's...and in his second pair of pants for the day (and this wasn't the last)!  We shopped a little and then had Mexican food for dinner.  At that point, we were too far away from the car to walk.  So Adam and I took a cab to the car while Mom, Whit, and Grady finished up dinner.  I definitely got the better end of that deal...when Whit went to pick up Grady out of the high chair, he was a mess (to put it lightly!).  Long story short, they ran (literally) around the corner to Old Navy, grabbed whatever pants they could find in his size, and had to change him in the family dressing room.  It was apparently quite the ordeal!  Let's just say, when they came out of the store, totally disheveled, and got into the car, Grady was not the only one who smelled like poop!  

sleepy boy

Thursday we ran around Berkeley and got a few things ready for Grady's big party.  Friday...Happy Birthday Grady!  We started the celebration with banana pancakes for breakfast!  He loves them...I even let him have a little taste of maple syrup on them!  And I pretty much had him were his birthday hat all weekend long!  Dad and Allis got here late morning and we had Bakesale Betty's for lunch (yum yum) and spent the afternoon getting ready for the party.  Nicole also arrived on Friday and we all met for dinner at our favorite little Lafayette Mexican restaurant for birthday dinner.  FYI...we were not only celebrating Grady's birthday that weekend...he shares his birthday, Jan. 28, with Grandpa Charlie, Papa's is Jan. 30, and Nicole's is Jan. 31!  The last weekend in January will always be a celebration for us!

banana pancakes for birthday breakfast

After dinner, we all went to get ice cream and Grady had his first ice cream cone!  Loard's Chocolate Showers!  He would not let me take it away from him!

being a crazy man after dinner and ice cream!

The whole family

Saturday we had Grady's birthday party...family came over to the house for lunch...grilled chicken sausage dogs with onions and peppers, potato salad, baked beans, chocolate cake, and homemade ice cream!  Everything was delicious!  And for the most part the rain held off until later in the day.  We had lots of fun!  And Grady got lots of fun new things to play with!

The boys is their matching shirts...Grady looks sleepy because he had just woken up from his morning nap...we let him sleep until the guest started to arrive for maximum happy time!

everyone watching grady eat cake...lots of cameras!

Chocolate cake!  He did like it, but I wouldn't say that he totally plowed into it like I have seen some babies do.  John has pointed out that in hind sight, though the cake was really yummy, it was very dense.  Maybe we should have done something light and fluffy with a frothy icing instead???  Oh well, it tasted good.  And Grady definitely got to eat plenty of it!  

That afternoon and evening we spent pretty low key...sweats, Zachary's pizza, and playing games, both Grady's new toys and some of our own!  We had a family round of Catch Phrase after Grady went to bed.  It was pretty funny!  It think that I am going to request a game all the time from now on.  We played until we couldn't play any more because we had gone through ALL of the words in the game!    

VEG-TA-BLE!!!!  

All in all, the weekend was a blast!  We are so thankful for our family and how much they love and support us.  We couldn't ask for better people to love Grady!  We love you all!

Recently someone asked me how I would describe Grady, what is his little personality like.  And so far, this is what I would say...sweet, loving, joyful, relaxed, determined, a bit of a goof-ball, curious, and playful.  I am sure I could think of several more adjectives to describe him, but these are the ones that instantly came to John and I.

So, in one year of life Grady has learned (in  no particular order)...how to eat real food, how to drink out of a cup, how to walk, how to share, how to kiss, how to sleep through the night, how to dance, how to communicate (kind of!), to wave, how to obey mommy and daddy (slowly but surely), play hide-and-go-seek with monkey, how to point and say, "dis?", how to fly on an airplane, how to open cabinets, and the list goes on!

In one year of life we have learned...how to be a family of three, how to live a lot less selfishly, how to love and encourage each other as parents, how to put others needs before ours, how to make each other laugh, how to make it through the day without showering or brushing our teeth!, how to run on little sleep sometimes, how to back each other up, and what it is like to love your child...we are learning something new everyday it seems!

Happy Birthday, Grady Bear!  We love you!  To many more...