playing catch up: Lee's FIRST birthday.

Lee is 13 months today, so I guess I'm only a month late in documenting his "big" first birthday.  I'm honestly surprised that we managed to get a celebration in there at all.  Lee's birthday happened to fall in the middle of Kevin's graduation, family visits, family moves and packing for our own move. 

I did manage to get one picture of Lee on his birth-day even though we didn't actually celebrate until the next day. 

This picture is just as Lee woke up, his hair does the craziest things in his sleep.

It felt like Lee's birthday took us by surprise, life was so insanely hectic for the last little bit of our time in Utah.  Of course, I initially planned on throwing a themed, (probably over the top) cute and well planned party but it just really didn't work out that way.   Looking through the pictures I still feels some pangs of guilt for doing so little for Lee in general at that time, he had a LOT of "independent play" time those last few weeks with me packing every spare minute and Kevin always being on campus working on his thesis and then on thesis corrections that had to be done on campus before we moved.  I've been trying to make up for it with some good quality play time since we moved. (in between running out at the drop of a hat to look at houses)
It is crazy to think that he has already been with us for a year.  And of course at the same time, he has become such an integral part of our family and our lives.  We love our Lee boy. 

At one Lee is; sweet-tempered, content, detail-oriented, a people and situation observer, a music lover, a little dancer, a book lover, a picky eater (hates textures unless it's what mom and dad are eating right then), very cautious of what he touches, a fantastic independent player, a daddy's boy and a very slobbery kiss giver.
Lee just broke his first tooth within weeks of his first birthday and didn't start legitimately crawling until just after. 

For Lee's party we had a family BBQ, Kevin's parents were in town for graduation, my parents came and all of my married siblings and their families were there too.  Of course we missed Sister Tanner and the two youngest in my family were doing lifeguard certification.

Lee was completely uninterested in opening his presents, but no worries there, he had REALLY good helper cousins to do that for him.  He was genuinely excited for his presents for the most part. (one of which his cousin Emily has and has been his FAVORITE thing to play with every time we go over.)
PS: really glad that pregnant me is the backdrop for almost all Lee's birthday pictures, poor planning on my part.:)

(notice all the boxes in the corner)

Lee is a very cautious kid when it comes to tactile experiences so we weren't sure how'd he'd react to having cake.  Ha, as you can see, he was not thrilled with touching it at all. Though, he was DELIGHTED to be fed the sugary deliciousness.

Happy birthday to Lee.  I was glad that he got to have one "cousin birthday" before we moved since he probably won't have too many (if any) more of those now that we live a *little* far away. (Until his cousins' families join us down here in Houston of course..crossing our fingers) Not that he'll actually remember it but I do have photographic proof, so we're good. 

So, so grateful for our miracle baby Lee who has grown to be our miracle toddler Lee.  I think I love most having his personality become more and more pronounced we still can't believe what a blessing he is. Worth the wait is a complete understatement.

"SO big!"

Lee really is getting old. I love all that he is learning to do except the tantrums. :)
When he finally caught on to the "how big's the baby?" game a few nights ago I almost died. He gains such genuine pleasure from having us play with him and pay good attention to what he is doing. He just wanted to play again and again, I'm sure mostly because he had both of his parents undivided attention while he was doing it.

During a conference for our church Saturday and Sunday, (Church leaders speak to the membership as a whole twice a year)a speaker, Rosemary Wixom, gave such a good reminder about how easy it is to be distracted from our children by the ever present and available technology today and how MUCH it impacts them when we do;

 "Unfortunately, the distractions of this world prevent many children from hearing encouraging words that could shape their view of themselves..."

" ...The answer to our prayer of how to meet our children’s needs may be to more often technologically disconnect. Precious moments of opportunity to interact and converse with our children dissolve when we are occupied with distractions."

 Good reminder for me to be "with Lee" when I'm with him and not plugged into some form of technology or media so often.

*the whole talk was Wonderful, read it here.

sweaty head syndrome.

Lee has what we like to call *sweaty head syndrome*. Ever since he was first born his little head (wait..big head.) could really sweat.  A lot. Wet circle every time we take him out of the carseat. Wet circle in the crib. Wet circle on our pillows. Basically wet circles are always found when Lee has been sleeping somewhere.  I don't know what he is going to do in humid, hot Houston when we move this summer.  Just wanted to make sure I documented it before it's a forgotten baby memory.

(use Lee's hand for scale.)

dapper dudes. *sunday with my boys*

*dapper dudes:lee+papa*

Lee is looking and acting more and more grown up everyday it seems like. I can't believe he's only a month away from turning one.  We are having so much fun with our little Lee Boy.  (even on sunday...even though three hours of church is a lot for an eleven month old to handle...at least he's cute while he's at it)
Here are some pics from our Sunday that I couldn't resist sharing:

song of a bird.

Living with Lee has made me realize how unaware I've become of certain things in my surroundings. We played outside at my mom's today and I couldn't believe how sensitive all his senses are. Good reminder to stop and pay attention from Lee boy.