Birthday Boy!

This sweet boy is one—and I don’t know how it happened so quickly! As I prepared for Thanksgiving this year, I couldn’t help but reflect on what I was doing “last year” at this time. The memories are so vivid, that it is hard to believe it was already a year ago. I spent Thanksgiving last year in a hospital with a warm newborn cuddled on me, and a plate of leftovers from the meal my mom prepared for my family. This year, that little baby sat on my lap munching on his own roll while we ate.

We celebrated Nate’s birthday by going swimming together at Scott’s work. He had pumpkin pie for his first birthday cake. Don’t worry—he can have any kind of dessert he wants on his birthday as soon as he has an opinion. For some babies, their first cake or other sweet is given to them on their first birthday. Not so for Nathan. He’s already sampled his fair share of cookies and cake! He loved the pie!


 

  

Some notables on Nate:

• Nathan LOVES to play ball! When he was only seven months old he was watching Scott throw the football to Jared and started bouncing up and down while making baby noises. I told Scott that Nathan wanted a turn, and sure enough when Scott threw the ball to him he grinned from ear to ear. And then he picked it up and threw that ball right back to Scott! He throws and chases footballs and basketballs all over the house.

 • Nathan also loves cars—or anything with wheels. It is so cute to watch him push cars all over the tile floors. I often find him clutching wheels he’s rummaged from Jared’s stash of Legos.

• Nate has never really “crawled.” He gets around with a funny gorilla-type scoot. It’s hard to explain, but we have some good video footage for memory sake.

• Nathan has been taking several steps at a time for the last couple of weeks. He is so proud when he does it and looks around with a huge grin on his face making sure we see how big he is.

• Nate is attached to his blue silky blanket that Grandma Asay made. Every time he sees it he giggles like he hasn’t had it for years.

• He loves to turn off the TV while the kids are watching it. It drives them all crazy, but it’s hard not to laugh at the same time. He pushes the button off, looks around at everyone and starts laughing like he is the funniest thing!

• Nathan has never slept through the night.

• Nate brings such joy to our family. I love how everyone rallies around everything he does. They love every new accomplishment and I often hear one of the other kids exclaim, “Mom, guess what Nate just did!” He loves to play with the big kids, and lately he has taken quite a liking to Kaitlyn. He loves when she takes him outside or lets him play the piano. We love this boy!