MeeMaw Fee and Me!

Dear Mommy,

I am so glad MeeMaw Fee has come to town. I have so much fun playing with her.We play telephone with all of the remotes and monitors at least once a day. That's one of my favorite things to do, you know? I have to talk loud so she can hear me and she has to talk slow so I can understand. we are quite the pair!

We smile a lot when we are together.
She has helped me get this whole "pat-a-cake" thing down. I love to do the hand motions now!
She is always reading me stories. Books are the best.

Sometimes when she is done, I love reading the stories right back to her.

I am so glad that I get to spend a few weeks with MeeMaw Fee! She is so much fun! Thanks for letting her stay at our house!

Love,
Madelyn Kate

I am just about 100% positive that if one year old (gasp...still getting used to the sound of that) could write me a letter about her time with MeeMaw, that's exactly what it would say. They have been enjoying each other's company and loving on each other non stop!

One already??

Happy Birthday, Maddie Kate!

Mommy and Daddy love you!!

Today Madelyn turned one year old. We had a special day (more on that later) with our special girl! This entire week I have felt like I have been on the verge of tears. Not sad tears. Just reflective tears. I am not sure I should be this emotional but I have just been so overwhelmed by God's goodness...His presence in our lives...that I have had a hard time communicating about it at all. I have about 5 blogs that I have uploaded pictures for, but just can't find the words to go with them. I'm sure I will finish them soon. For now, we are enjoying a special weekend celebrating the first year of Madelyn's life. We are thankful for the prayers that have carried us through the ups and downs, our family's constant support and our loving Creator for the gift of new life.

We are truly blessed.

Emily & Allison's Birthday Party

Dear Madelyn,
Sunday afternoon was Emily and Allison's birthday party. It was at Jump N' Jacks (which is a big warehouse full of inflatables) and there were so many kids!You weren't too sure what to think at first, but once cousin Emily came over you were all smiles. I love that you love your cousins and that they love you. I hope that you always have a close bond and enjoy being around each other.

You three can be wild and crazy at times but then there are sweet moments when you share a big hug!

All of the munchkins were having so much fun playing and for the most part you just watched for a while.

They had a really cool party room and since we had never been there we went in to check it out. Allison was inspecting her cake with Grandma. She even performed a little quality control (shhh...don't tell anyone).

Being at their party with you was like getting a glimpse ahead to future birthday parties. Oh my! Chaos, laughter, lots of energy and sweet little friends. Birthdays have always been a big celebration in my family so I know we will enjoy planning special parties for you!

Aunt Marlo took you down the slide. I think your face tells how you felt about it! Ha. Maybe next time?

The Great Grandmas in attendance seemed to have a good time. I think they were just jealous and wanted to jump, but they both just laughed when I told them that. Someday you will learn about courtesy laughs. After I told them that they were jealous because they wanted to be the ones jumping, I got not one, but TWO courtesy laughs. Talk about insult.

Your Grandma is just a big kid! She went down the slide with the big girls and you clapped and cheered them on from below.

Your smile is so precious! It always lights up the room.

Aunt Marlo and Grandma made the awesome cakes! I think they are going to help (which really means do all the work) with yours. I am going to attempt your smash cake on my own, but we will leave the big ones to the experts.

Happy Birthday Emily & Allison!

Daddy fed you a little bit of cake. With all these nibbles you've had, you are really going to be excited when we give you your own cake on Saturday!

I am not sure you will ever have as many friends as they do (just kidding!).

After the party we went back to Aunt Marlo and Uncle Jarrod's to let the girls open their presents from family. I thought you were going to crash, but you didn't miss a thing. You watched Emily and Allison open their gifts and you even tried to help them some.

Emily loved her outfit to match Kit's (her American Girl doll)!

You kept wanting to see what Alli was doing. I was surprised you didn't get pushed out of the way considering you were crowding her space! I am sure that she will "pour" you lots of tea with her new tea set.

By your party you should have the whole birthday party thing down. Singing, cake, presents...you should definitely know what to do after all the partying you have been doing lately!

Love you baby doll,
Mommy

Logan's Birthday Party

One of my friends from MOPS has a little boy that shares Luke's birthday. It's been fun watching a little one that's only a week older than Madelyn grow. He's always one step ahead so when I read her blogs I know what is coming next! His first birthday party was on Saturday and Madelyn had a lot of fun.I think Madelyn was on kid overload! Ha! She just sat and stared at everyone for the first thirty minutes. I loved seeing all of he little ones running around. So many unique little personalities all in one room.

She finally started to loosen up and play. She really liked it when all the kids went outside and she had Logan's awesome little play area to herself. Ha! She isn't much for sharing yet!

I was so impressed with how well Logan opened all of his presents. He tore in to all of them and seemed to know exactly what to do!

I think my favorite part of first birthday parties is watching them eat their cake. He wasn't too sure about it and once he got some on his hands he started flinging it all over the living room. It was pretty funny. The whole time that was going on Madelyn was busy playing. He had a little red wagon that she kept trying to climb in to. She made it once but I think the climbing attempts were more fun for her.

Being at that birthday party made it that much more real that our little girl is going to be one very soon! It's so hard to believe but I am excited for her all at the same time!

Birthday Bash Begins

Technically it started last Thursday...so the title of this post is off a little. Despite that, after picking my Grandma up at the airport on our way home from Luke's meetings, we had a little low key celebration with family for Luke and Mom. Spending time with family is the best.

Madelyn helped her MeeMaw Fee unpack while we waited on everyone to show up. Since Grandma will be here for just under a month, we converted Madelyn's crib to full size. Our guest bedroom requires going up and down stairs so we decided since Madelyn doesn't sleep in her bed anyway, someone should!

We all had a good time over pizza, games and of course...birthday cake! All five of them have birthdays within eight days of each other. Craziness.

We decided to give Madelyn a little birthday cake to see how she liked it.

This girl didn't waste any time at all.

She dug right in and quickly discovered that the best part was the icing. Yum!

She is going to have no trouble on Saturday figuring out what to do with her smash cake!

The funniest part of it all is that she ate just about all the icing off of the top. As for the cake itself, she took a few bites then chunked it on to the floor!