Happy Birthday Samuel!

We had such a fun time at this party and a lot of fun planning it. We knew we wanted to keep it simple and have a party similar to Matthew's first birthday.  So we baked lots of cupcakes for all of our friends. We hung a bunch of green and blue paper lanterns in our live oaks and clipped about 150 pictures to them as well. All of our friends and family came and had a great time.

Here are some of the high lights.

1. Hot dog bar for lunch
2. huge bowl of m&m's for the bird houses
3. pumpkin spice cupcakes
4. pictures on the trees
5. birthday boy's highchair and hat
6. bird house favors
7. Rolo pretzels
8. drinks
9. paper lanterns hanging from trees

The lanterns looked so nice in the trees.  I would have left them for a while but it looked like rain so we took them down that day.

I also made Samuel a birthday banner.  I was really happy with how it turned out but it took a long time to make. 

And here's the birthday boy in his high chair waiting for his cake.

 

Samuel was so cute.  We found this hat at Hobby Lobby and he wore it the whole time.  I think he knew he was the center of attention.

The little cake I made turned out so cute. And of course, I had to make him a pumpkin cake.

Mmmmm! Yum!

 I think he liked it!

Kisses from Grandmother.

"I'm done!"

I got him out of his highchair and we went straight to the bathtub. 

After we got cleaned up, we went inside to open presents. 

Samuel received so many wonderful gifts. But after they were all opened, he chose to spend the rest of the party crawling in and out of the very large gift bag my dad brought.  He was laughing the whole time. It was so funny!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAMUEL!!!

Samuel

November 3, 2012

1 year old

Happy Birthday sweet baby boy!

I can't believe you have been with us for a year now.  We are truly blessed to call you our son.  We adore you.  You are growing into such a sweet little boy.  It has been exciting to see you learn and discover what this world has to offer.   

We are so thankful that God sent you to be part of our family.  He has been so good to us!  We pray that you will grow up knowing that it is safe to trust and follow God.  He has a special plan for you and we look forward to seeing it unfold.  Your joyful spirit is a continual reminder of our Lord. 

I am honored to be your mother.

Love,

Mommy

all dressed up

It took us a long time to decide what to wear for Halloween this year.  In fact we did not buy something for Matthew until the day of.  You can imagine I was running all over town to complete his costume.  The shirt and boots were found at Smarty Pants, a resale shop here in Waco.  I got the bandanna at Academy and the hat came from Baskins.  He calls it his Woody hat.  The costume was completed by his great grandaddy's Texas Ranger badge.  It is an honor for us to have it and to let Matthew use it for his costume.

"The Cowboy"

We were lucky that he wanted to be a cowboy.  This outfit doubled as a costume for his cousin Maverick's 1st birthday party a couple of weeks later. The theme was cowboys and indians.  

We had never really talked to Matthew about Halloween or trick or treating so he did not really know what it was. In fact, this was our first year to trick or treat. But once candy was mentioned he was ready to go. 

We went to the Bruer's house first.  Mr. and Mrs. Bruer live right across the street from us.  They were giving away normal size candy bars and packages of skittles.  Not the fun size ones.  I think they gave us two.  

"Let's go get more candy."

Matthew had a lot of fun trick or treating.  He tried to dig in each persons candy basket to get more candy than he was given.  He even tried to go into one person's house.  We only went around our block but ended up with a whole pumpkin of candy.  

And here is Samuel.  This was his first Halloween   He was supposed to be born before Halloween but I guess he wasn't ready yet.  So he missed it last year.  

 "Super Sam"

We put him in the Superman costume that Matthew wore for his first Halloween. He was so cute but it was a stretch for it to fit.  Matthew was only about 6 months old when he wore it.

"Super Matthew"

He was so happy to get to walk in the street.  

He even got to do a couple of fly byes.

Here the boys are going to our neighbors house, the Manhands.  They are so sweet and love our boys.  They also have two dogs that Matthew and Samuel love.  

We had so much fun, and ate so much candy!  In fact Matthew ate too much and was sick in the night.  Yuck! We will know better for next year!