Paige's first birthday party

We celebrated Paige's first birthday a couple of weeks ago. I thought and thought about a theme and came across pictures of a pink and gold themed party on pinterest and loved it! 

 I started planning for this party in January. Sounds a little crazy, I know, but I'm all about planning ahead. This is our last first birthday party so I wanted it to be special. 

I love these invites so much. They were meant for Paige. 

I ordered this cake from Gaylacake and love how it turned out. I just wanted something simple. I got a pink smash cake for Paige which matched the actual birthday cake.  

I had number one cookies as favors....

I love this monthly photo banner I ordered from an etsy shop. 

When I planned this party in my head I pictured a nice, warm spring day. It was sunny but very chilly. I wanted to use our kitchen table for decorations and have everyone sit outside. We sat outside, but it was windy and chilly! The Southern Indiana weather never cooperates. 

I can't believe my sweet girl is one! I swear there were other people at the party, but I failed to get pictures of anyone. It was just too crazy. My parents were here, Adam's parents/step parents, my brother, Penny, and Autumn, Adam's sister Lacey, and Alison and Easton. 

Paige was not crazy about her smash cake. I'm thinking she didn't like everyone staring at her. 

I bought this high chair a few years ago to use for pictures, but never thought I would get to use it for my own child. I painted it pink to match the party theme and love how it turned out. 

Paige was interested in opening gifts for about five seconds until something else caught her eye. She got all kinds of goodies! 

We rented a bounce house for Ella. Her birthday is in the winter so we never get to do anything outside. It ended up being a lot of fun for the kids and adults!

The best part of a birthday party is playing with all the new toys!

Thanks to everyone who came and made Paige's first birthday a very special one!

Paige is ONE

Our sweet Paigey Leigh,  

I can't believe it's been a year since you were born. What a year it has been! I was scared to death while I was pregnant with you, but you stole our hearts the second you were born. 

You were a happy, content baby the moment you came out and to our surprise you have stayed that way! You have been the biggest blessing to our family and the closure I needed to move on. I never thought I wanted another child not because I don't love having children, but because I had to go through so much after having Ella. I never fully thought I was done though, and after six years we were blessed with you! 

You have been an angel baby. You rarely cry unless you need something. You love to eat and sleep. You love to play and explore your surroundings. You are content, happy, and full of joy all the time. Your smile could light up a room. You are the best of the best! 

You babble all the time and can say: "bye bye", "mama", "dada", "dog", and "uh oh." You are not walking yet, but you are the fastest crawler we have ever seen. You are cruising around, and we know it won't be long before you are running around the house. 

You LOVE to eat and probably eat more than your sister. You haven't met a food you don't like except bananas. You eat three good meals a day and snack often in between. I'm not sure where all of this food goes, because people are always commenting on how small you are.  You love your bottle and your sippy cup. Even though you love to eat, you were not very interested in your smash cake for your birthday or your pictures. 

You are such a good sleeper and still take two naps a day and sleep 12 hours at night. You have only been sleeping through the night for the last couple of months, and up until that point I wasn't sure I was going to make it. The first ten months of your life were exhausting for me. I was like a robot getting up during the night to feed you. We finally made it though, and you now sleep from 7pm-7am. Thank you!! You nap from 9-11 and 2-4 without fail. You still need that morning nap, and I can't see that you will drop it anytime soon. 

Sweet Paige, we love you so much and can't imagine life without you now. The first year with a baby is typically not easy, but you, my dear, have been nothing but a joy. You have added so much to our lives and definitely filled a void we didn't even know was there until we had you.  

Your daddy, sissy, and I love you so much! 

Field Day- First Grade

Ella had her first field day this past Friday. Thank goodness the weather cooperated. It ended up being such a nice morning. It was so fun to watch Ella compete and see what good sports her and her classmates are. They really showed compassion for each other in many ways, and that is so heart warming to see. 

Ella and her friend, Jossalyn, had such a good time together. It was sweet to watch! 

"Veal's Seals" ready for the games to begin! 

Jossalyn and Ella warmed up by running laps. 

Ella really got into cheering on her friends...

Ella competed in the team relay and the soccer ball kick

They also ran the mile which wore them out! 

 First grade girls competed against the second grade girls in tug of war... but lost:( Maybe next year!

It was a fun morning cheering on Ella's classmates and spending time with my soon to be second grader! 

San Francisco

We just returned from a whirlwind weekend trip to San Francisco. 

Adam recently accepted a job offer from a company out there (he will still be working remotely from Evansville) and had to go out to finalize a few things. We decided to make a weekend out of it since San Francisco has been on my bucket list for quite some time. 

Adam flew out on Thursday, and Ella and I left on Friday morning at 6:30am. Those early flights always sound good until you have to get up at 4am to get ready and head to the airport. Our flight was delayed by about twenty minutes which meant we had to run to our next flight in Chicago. I was sweating it, but we made it. 

We arrived at the airport in San Fran around noon. Adam met us at baggage claim with a San Francisco starbucks mug in hand. He knows the way to my heart...coffee! We checked into our hotel and had lunch and headed out for a little sightseeing. With only a day and a half we had to make the most of our time. Chinatown was on my list of things to do, and we happened to stumble upon it a couple of blocks down from our hotel. Ella and I ended up going back to Chinatown the next day too. We went in one shop, and a little eight year old Chinese girl followed us around the shop. She was very pushy and tried to hand Ella everything in sight. I got the biggest kick out of her using the cash register and card machine. She is in the second grade, but she sure knew what she was doing! 

The streets of San Francisco are some of the HILLIEST streets I have ever seen. We were going to try to walk to Lombard street, but it just was not happening with a seven year old so we got an Uber to take us the rest of the way. If you haven't used Uber you must. It's so much better than using a taxi. 

This is the view from the top of Lombard street. So pretty right? It was obviously cloudy, rainy, and chilly but still beautiful! 

Lombard street was packed with people which I was not expecting.  We couldn't even get a picture without people in the way. These people behind us did not take the hint to move. Lombard street was so gorgeous and colorful. I would not care to live on it with people constantly around. At the top and bottom are people directing traffic. It was crazy. 

We did walk to fisherman's wharf from Lombard Street, because it was a downhill walk. :) 

It was so cold by the water so we didn't stay long. I had to get a nice view of Alcatraz before we left though. 

There were people eating bread bowls of clam chowder everywhere. We are not much on seafood, but it looked so good. It's hard to see in this picture, but there were birds all over the place. They were literally swarming people. 

We were so exhausted from an early flight so we headed back to our hotel to rest up for another full day!

We woke up around 5am the next morning, which was nice because we were on the early cruise to Alcatraz. 

Our hotel was so pretty. We stayed at the Omni in downtown San Francisco. Everyone that worked there was so friendly and accommodating. My only complaint about staying downtown is the fact that it's hard to find an open breakfast place on the weekends. Most places are only open during the week. 

On our way to Alcatraz!! 

We got such pretty views of the Golden Gate Bridge on the way over! 

We walked up four steep hills to get to the actual prison, and it of course had to start raining on our way up. Upon entering was the laundry area and showers pictured below. 

We waited in line around the showers to get our headphones for the guided tour. 

It was very damp, cold, and depressing. Definitely not somewhere I would want to live but still fascinating to see.  Walking through you just imagine everyone that lived in those cells and what went on. Each cell was very small and stale. On the tour they talked about how the wind would just whip through there at night and how cold it was. 

Ella found the tour pretty interesting... until she got bored. ;) 

This was the only small window the prisoners could look out to see the view of San Francisco. 

I loved the Alcatraz tour. Alcatraz is somewhere I have wanted to visit for a very long time so I'm happy to check it off my bucket list. 

We walked to Pier 39 where we had lunch at Hardrock and went to the aquarium. That was not on my list of things to do, but Ella couldn't pass it up. I thought she deserved to do something she wanted to do. 

At this point it was POURING. We were fairly close to the Golden Gate Bridge so we took an Uber over to see it. When I pictured going to San Francisco I didn't picture seeing it in the pouring rain, but we had to make good use of our time! 

It was very foggy, but still a beautiful sight to see! 

Alamo Square was the last thing on my to do list. Ella and I ended up going there later that afternoon once it stopped raining. Ella loves Full House so we had to go see the painted ladies. We also found the house that was used when they showed the front of their house. It's on 1709 Broderick Street and just about a mile walk from the painted ladies. 

It was a jam packed day and a half in San Francisco. Even though the weather was less than stellar, we made the most of our time! I don't think I would want to live there, but it's a nice place to visit. Hopefully I'll see you again sometime San Fran!!