Eli's 2nd Birthday Party

The party was a success! We had a joint bday party this past Saturday with our friend Ellaiden, who is a day younger than Eli. Thanks, Jenny and Chris for hosting at your house! The weather was beautiful and perfect for a party. Eli and Ellaiden were so excited and enjoyed cake and opening presents and lots of friends. I think Eli's theme was trucks, which is perfect for him. He had trucks on his cake and many of his gifts involved trucks. You guys know him well! Here are some...well several pictures of the party:

The Birthday Boy is lookin' good!

Eli's truck cake. Yes, there are technically 3 candles, but I had to balance it out.











Ellaiden's duck cake, which she requested. Impressive, Jenny!






I accidentally popped Eli's head with the elastic band when I was putting on the hat...ouch!

Eli is 2!!

Get ready for a lot of pictures in the next couple posts...I have a hard time choosing which ones to post!


I cannot believe Eli is officially two as of yesterday! My baby boy is turning into a little boy! We had a day full of fun activities. I like the idea of Eli having a special day on his birthday. So, we went to a place called "Goin' Bananas" in the morning. It's basically a huge warehouse full of bounce houses, and they also have a play area in the front with toys and pretend houses and stuff. Eli had a blast! It was definitely a work out for both of us! As you can see, he found a fireman hat in the dress-up area that he did not want to take off.
We then picked up John from work and went to one of our favorite eating spots, P.Terry's, for cheeseburgers and fries. It's Eli favorite because they have a sandbox with toys where he can play while we eat.
In the afternoon, I thought I'd go take Eli to the toy store to get his very own fireman hat, and we also got some matchbox cars. After that we went to go get ice cream, and Eli had his first ice cream cone. He enjoyed it as you can see in the pictures.
So, it was a fun-filled special day! We'll have more pictures to post of his birthday party this weekend...

Farm Day

A few days ago, we took a trip to a little farm right in the city in east Austin. Unfortunately, it didn't have any animals besides chickens, which Eli was sad about. But we did get to pick our own strawberries to take home. This was a new and fun experience for both of us. It was hard to resist eating them after we picked them! The farm is called Boggy Creek Farm, and is a great place to go buy fresh produce straight from the source. We'll be going back, for sure!

Camping Trip

We went camping this past weekend at Inks Lake with some friends from church. Eli had a blast on his first camping trip! The whole way there he kept saying "Camping!...Mama camping, Dada camping, etc." over and over, and he hasn't stopped talking about our camping trip since. The weather was perfect for camping, beautiful days with plenty of sunshine, high in the 70s and low in the 50s. Also, we found out that by coincidence, Uncle Dan and Aunt Lisa (John's brother and his wife) were going to be there that weekend as well. It turns out that out of all the 200 and something campsites, theirs was literally next door to ours with one site between. So, we got to spend time with them, too. We were all exhausted when we got home, but it was so much fun!

Family Visit

Last week Eli and I went up to Dallas to see my family. We had so much fun! It was fun to see Eli play with his cousins, Grayson and Garrett who are 8 and 6, because they actually can play together more now. Eli tried to do everything they do. We got to go to the Dallas zoo, and we also had a little early birthday celebration for Eli. Wish we lived closer, but when we do get to see family, it's always a good time.
Zoo Trip:











Here the boys are feeding and petting the sting rays:












Birthday celebration:
Licking icing and then eating cake and ice cream!
Like the make-shift candles on the cake? By the way, Eli loves singing the Happy Birthday song to Boone...very cute! I'll try to get that on video...

Must Be Heaven

For the month of March, we were able to borrow a truck from my mom so that we could do some yard work and landscaping. Eli thought this was the coolest thing ever! He loved coming home and seeing it in the driveway. He called it "Dada's truck". We spent many afternoons playing in the truck. Boone also enjoyed the truck. He liked sitting in it, and it was hard to get him out. We literally had to push him out of it. The best day with "Dada's truck" according to Eli was when John, Eli, and Boone went to get dirt. Not only did he get to see the front-end loader unload the dirt into the back, but he got to bring the dirt home and dump it onto the driveway. This means that Eli had two huge piles of dirt to climb on right in his own driveway! We are all sad that we had to return the truck last weekend. It came in very handy and was a lot of fun to have around. Now Eli keeps asking, "Dada truck?"...and John and Eli both start crying...ha ha! I think I might see a truck in our future.
















Eli towing dirt in his truck just like Dada

A true trucker!