Toddler time and birthday fun!

Today we had Ben's birthday party. We had family and neighbors come to celebrate with us. It was more for us than Ben. Ben doesn't know what's going on, but we knew that this would be the last chance for us to celebrate a 1st birthday with our kids! So we threw him us a party and he we loved it!





Ben is our late walker. Josh and Zach both walked right at 11 months and Faith was walking at 9 months. It's actually easier when they walk later! We feel like we have an extra month or two with our baby! At his birthday party he started taking some steps. He had already taken up to 8 steps, but that day he started taking 20 or more steps at a time. Ever since his birthday he has been trying to walk everywhere instead of crawl.





Now we are officially at the toddler stage!

One Year Check-up

At baby Ben's 1 year check up, he measured 26.5 inches and weighed 17 lbs, 8oz. He is still below the 5th percentile. His doctor said that an average 1 year old weighs around 22lbs! That seems so big to me! Guess I'm just used to small babies, since all mine have been below the 5th percentile. They grow so fast, that I get the advantage of them being little a bit longer.

But they don't stay little for long. Josh is now in the 50th percentile while Zach is catching up at the 25th percentile.

No shots today though as Ben is just getting over a little cold.

Happy Birthday Baby Ben!

Today my baby is one!

Josh and Zach decided that we needed to go to Chuck E Cheese to celebrate Ben's birthday. Ben got to ride the rides and Josh, Zach, and Sissy played all the games and won a ton of tickets that were cashed in for candy!

Then we came home to brownies! Josh and Zach blew out the candle with out even giving Ben a chance! I don't think Ben minded. He was eager to dive into the brownie. He ate it faster than we could cut the rest of the brownies! We had to let him nibble off of ours to keep him from screaming for more brownie!

Happy 1st Birthday, Ben!

New Years

Happy New Year!

We celebrated a New York New Year's with the boys and watched the ball drop at 9pm. It was hard trying to keep them awake but once they drank their sugar sparkling apple cider they were ready to stay up and celebrate a California New Years! We all laid down together and fell asleep. I think this is the first time in a long time that Sean and I didn't stay up until midnight (okay, maybe the first time Sean didn't wake me up at 11:59pm). We all slept through the new year. Faith stayed up...she was at a party with some cheer friends.

We brought in the new year as we always do, at the beach! We didn't actually bring it in that way, but we go to the beach every New Year's day. This time it was a bit different as there was a negative low tide (really really low), so we went to the tide pools. We saw all kinds of anemone, sea stars, and even an octopus! We couldn't keep Zach from stepping into the water between the rocks. He was determined to get wet and he succeeded!

Earlier in the day we took baby Ben on his first bike ride. He loved it! All the boys have loved riding on the back of our bikes. Josh is now old enough to keep up with us on his own bike.

We also enjoyed the sunshine and played in the backyard on the swing set. Playing in the backyard is rare for us as there are always so many kids out front that our kids want to play out front.

It was a great day to spend together as a family. I love bringing in the new year this way as it just seems to set the year off right!