April Give Thanks, Week 5

April 29:
     Thankful for the 90 degree weather today, our walk around the block, and being able to enjoy the kiddy pool in the back yard! It was a great day.

April 30:
     The best, random, last minute BBQ; thrown together by our housing company here on base, and the kids loved it too! Thankful to my neighbor for letting me know, and giving us the info and invite. Its exactly how the end to a long day should be; free cupcake decorating, free flowers, free bounce house, free bubbles, free hot dogs, and free painting station. We even won some tickets to a family fun center! It was great.

Decorating and snacking on his cupcake.

Give Thanks,
Sarah

Brians 1st Birthday Party!

My first born, Brian, turned one in February 2013. I know I am way behind on posting this but I figured a lot of people love to see what others do for birthday parties to help get ideas. I decided I would post a few photos and explanations of what we did for his Big First Birthday!!

Like all birthdays you have to start with a theme! We chose MONSTERS!! Brian was a very cranky baby when he was a newborn, and so his nickname; monster, kind of stuck! Once we had the theme, I needed fabric and banners/printables to start picking colors and monsters from. I found this fabric:

over at fabric.com. I love the bright colors and the fact it has a dark background! Heres the printables we chose, sorry its a little hard to see, but the colors in the fabric and on the printables are all very similar!

Now that I had the theme and colors, I started working on the onesies for him, his crown, his bib, and pants. I found a tutorial on pinterest on how to make pants, and went from there. The tutorial used a pair of jeans from her son, traced them and then made the "pattern" just slightly larger then that. I loved how detailed her tutorial was. You can find it over at Growing Home, and while your over there check out all her other posts! I also made a bib and appliqued onto the bib. I have a tutorial that I made on how to make a bib, you can check it out over here at Bibs for Babies! I also appliqued onto two onesies, and made a banner out of fabric. The crown I made, I just drew out a crown that I liked, and then cut out 2 pieces of fabric, sewed them together (right sides together), then flipped it inside out and put a binding on the open side (the bottom), and then attached the monster, embroidered the ones on and finished it off with some cute stitching.

Brian wearing the crown and bib.

Heres one of the onesies I made.

Heres the other onesie I made. (Note: the monster was purchased).

The bib I made. (Note: the monster was purchased.)

This is the banner I made. (Note: The monster were purchased.)

The crown I made. (Note: The monster was purchased.)

Back of the pants, pockets on the back and on the side.

Front of the pants.

Now that I had all the clothing made, I needed to make goody bags and goody bag items. I purchased a few candies and coloring books to go in the bags, but I wanted the bags to be something the kids could have and keep. I made the bags from two rectangles, and then sewed the corners, so the bag had a flat bottom. The handles were just strips of fabric. I also made a few different monsters from felt.

The goody bags at the party and the monsters at the party!

The goody bags in progress.

Monsters in progress.

I loved the idea of showing pictures from the past year (of my birthday boy). The idea of seeing him in photos growing up was such a cute idea, and so I made frames from some scrapbooking paper I had on hand. I simply measured out a frame for a 4 x 6 picture and then used one as a stencil and cut a few out. I stuck to the same colors and used scrapbooking paper that didn't have a ton of detailed pattern on it.

The photos all framed up with the scrapbooking paper.

This is the photo chain, with the photos at the top starting at birth and the ones at the bottom being more recent.

For the entire house, we used streamers, a few balloons, and a few curled up ribbon to help give the tables some pop.

A friend and my sister-in-law helped make this wall!

A three headed monster to take pictures in!!

The gift table with balloons in the background.

The dessert table. (Check out the fabric banner I made hanging above)!

I have been making cakes for many years now, so of course I was super excited to make my sons birthday cake. Now, I was at my in-laws house and using some of their stuff and I brought a few of my tools with me, but its always difficult to bake and decorate in someone elses kitchen! It was a hot week too, in California, and the house wasn't too cool, and because of that I was struggling to get the icing just right. Anyways, I did a trial run of this cake at home (as seen in the first photo below), but hated everything about it. So, then when I arrived at the in-laws I decided to change almost everything about the cake. I also enjoyed making the cupcakes as they were simple but made a cute display!

Trial run cake- did not like this at all!

The table all set up!

The cake and cupcakes.

The cake up close.

Again.

The adorable monster cupcakes.

Just too cute, all the monster cupcakes are looking at me!

In the end I loved the cupcakes, and the cake! The top tier of the cake (the orange monster) ended up being the smash cake. The top tier was removed, and we gave it to our son as we sang happy birthday! He wasn't too sure what to do with it at first, but once he got a taste he was a happy little guy!

Singing Happy Birthday and waiting to blow out the candle!

Eating the cake!

He enoyed ripping the paper off the presents as well, and also enjoyed taking down all the decorations and playing with the balloons. I tell you the best toys are always the cheapest stuff!

Opening gifts!

Playing with the balloons!

Helping us take down the decorations!

Overall, the party was a huge success, and we had a blast planning and throwing it. We have to thank my father-in-law and mother-in-law for letting us use their house and for supplying the awesome food! We are very lucky to have such awesome friends and family members who came and showered Brian with such love and too many gifts to count! It was a great party and I am so thankful the entire thing went off without any issues!

Now time to plan Brians 2nd birthday party and our newest addition, Jareds 1st birthday! YIKES!!

Happy Planning,
Sarah

Another New Adventure

You might be thinking that our new adventure is becoming parents of two boys, but in this case your wrong! New Mexico, Cannon AFB has been a VERY different experience from living in Okinawa, Japan at Kadena AB, to say the least. The lifestyle, the housing, the "friends", the co-workers, the neighbors and even the stores/purchases are all very different. I was excited, after four years of living in Japan, to finally be moving closer to home and family. New Mexico, how bad could it be? Not horrible right, I mean California was 16-18 hours away! We could plan a trip home every year, family could come see us, etc.

Our home in NM, July 2013

Well, we arrived in New Mexico in July 2012. Not too long ago I know. As we settled in and started to get use to NM, we planned a trip home to California, for our sons first Christmas (so we could be with family). We also were announcing our second baby, on the way, while we were out there. It was a big, exciting trip! When we came back to NM, we were sad to be back, away from our family, but also because the weather was freezing cold, the dirt and dry air were torture on myself and my son! My son got extremely sick, and started coughing a lot. After many weeks of dealing with myself and my son being sick, we decided a trip back to California for our sons 1st Birthday was in order!!

My mother, myself, and my son at Knob Hill, in San Marcos, California.

My son opening gifts!

Day 3 of opening presents!

Leaving California, and clicking family photos!

For the two months between Christmas and our sons 1st birthday I worked like crazy, to get everything ready for the little guys big day! I sewed daily, made packing lists, cleaned, and found someone to watch our cats! It was on, we were heading back to California, again! Another 16-18 hours in the car, but this time I was close to almost 20 weeks pregnant! The trip wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, as I knew I was going to struggle driving and what not, but we made it back. California, family, baking, setting up for the party, Brian turning 1, a Disneyland trip, and then back to NM. It was a quick two weeks, but worth every second. Also, while back in California, our son was so healthy, and so was I. My husband however, not so much! He toughed through it though, so that we all could enjoy our time!

The dessert table! I made the cake,the cupcakes, and the banner! (That will all be in another blog post!)

The Birthday boys 1st birthday cake and a few cupcakes! Our theme was monsters!!

Getting ready for the cake! I made the bib and the crown (again another blog post!)

Digging into his cake! YUM!

Our 3 day trip to Disneyland and California Adventure!

March, April and now May! Yep its been a crazy (almost) year here. I am now 33 weeks pregnant, expecting our second son any week now! We just got an email a few weeks ago, it simply said "check your military email, as you have an assignment waiting".... wait, what? Did that email just say what I thought it said? YEP! It said we had an assignment and we could either accept them or not. My husband and I jumped out of our chairs, ran to our desktop, where he logged onto his military account and we checked the information! There it was, in all its glory...

BEALE AFB, CALIFORNIA!!!!

The actual email, with the assignment!

Oh My Gosh! It says California! No freakin way. We just got one of our Base Of Preferences (BOP)! Now I should mention after our first trip home my husband was trying everything he could to get us orders out of NM, because of how sick, drained, and well everything else we didn't like about NM. My husband tried to cross train with no luck, he applied for every overseas job opening available to his job, and he applied for BOP! We were shocked our BOP got approved! We are over the moon excited to begin our new journey in California, and plan to have family and friends visiting often!

My husbands enlistment was ending this December in 2013, and because of that part of the assignment agreement was that he had to re-enlist! So, he re-enlisted, and we are staying in this crazy, exciting military life for another five years! I can not believe it! Our next journey, our next adventure is back to California! Oh how exciting.

Now that its May, and our bundle of joy, Jared (hopefully) will be here sometime in June, that only gives us July and August after Jared man is here, to pack up and head west! We have to be in Beale not a day before September 1st, and not a day later then September 30! We are excited to take some time off too and head out to see family and show off little Jared man! I can not wait to see what Beale will hold for us!

Photo taken around 32 weeks, by my wonderful husband!

So, thats our exciting news, and I can't wait to close this chapter of our lives, and move to our next! Ill do my best to keep up with my blog, and post pictures as we travel and move, so be sure to come back and stay connected!

Everyday is an adventure,
Sarah