Happy Birthday, Mom and Music Monday

My mom turned 50 on August 12, and we celebrated this past Saturday with a Coney Island themed surprise party!

During the planning stages of the party, I went through a lot of old pictures for a poster board I was putting together and a dvd that a friend created as a gift to my mom. It was fun and emotional. I saw deep, unconditional love in my mom's eyes for my sister and I. I recognized it because I possess the same look now in my own eyes for Matty.

A few days before my mom's party, I was listening to Taylor Swift's, "Never Grow Up" {which makes me sob every time.} All of the previous occasions when I had listened to it, I only thought of how I felt about the song in regard to Matty. This time, I put myself in my mom's shoes. And my grandma's shoes. I imagine that my mom's 50th birthday is bittersweet for both of them. It's sad yet so incredibly amazing to watch our kiddos grow up.

As much as I may want Matty to remain my little boy that I can always protect, I would never want to deny him the the joy that he has brought me. If I never would have grown up, I would have never known love like this.

Happiness is different things at different stages in our life. Some days, happiness is sitting back and watching others take the main stage. As parents, we do that from the beginning. I'm sure it gets harder as our children get older and we become less integral as they make their own way and build their own families. But I have to think the ability to do that symbolizes the greatest degree of love and selflessness and is a sure sign of  your own contentment; to be genuinely happy for them and to know you had some sort of hand in creating the love they have in their own eyes, for whatever it may be that gives them that sparkle! And if we never completely let go of the simplicity and innocence of our own childhood, it will make it so much sweeter as we watch our own children grow up. Of course we all have days where we wish we {and they} never would have grown up, but the truth is, the circle of life is a beautiful thing.

Here's to you, mom! Thank you for letting me grow up, even when it was hard to do.

The BIG 2 and Music Monday

Well it's official: Matty is 2!

The big day was on Saturday and we started Matty's birthday off by introducing him to his Thomas big boy bed. He loved the Thomas face, but was not impressed when Dada started assembling the rest of the pieces to it. I think he thought he was just gonna have a gigantic Thomas head to carry around. He did get used to the idea and even slept in it all night, but only after a lot of carrying on. We tried the bed: he wanted to play.  We tried the crib: he wanted to climb out.  So we resorted to leaving him in his bedroom, closing the door and putting up a gate. This resulted in a screaming toddler.  Eventually he found his way to the bed and when we checked in on him a little while later, he was all cozy in it. I was not quite prepared for Matty to reject his crib so quickly after getting the bed. Another one of those bittersweet moments, but I'm really happy he likes it!

UPDATE: I've been working on this post for a few days and Matty has slept in his bed since Saturday night, including naps, but tonight for whatever reason, he wanted his crib, so that's where he is.  Guess we'll be leaving it in his room a little bit longer.  Yes, the part of me that wants to keep the "baby" in my baby is happy about this!

After showing Matty his bed, we came downstairs to the living room where Matty found a Thomas train table; needless to say, this pretty much occupied the rest of his morning.  This first pic pretty much sums up Matty's feelings about it:

{hooray!}

 {peek-a-boo}

{which of my boys loves it more?!}

Now with all of this train talk, you would think that would be the natural theme choice for Matty's party. Nope. Matty's first love used to be Curious George, but now George has taken a backseat to Thomas. That's not to say that Matty doesn't still love George. So mama made an executive decision and decided to have a Curious George themed banana split party. I figure the train stage will last a lot longer, so there will be plenty of opportunity for a Thomas and Friends party in the years to come.

We woke Matty up extra early so that he would nap early and be ready to party at 2 p.m. Our master plan failed and Matty went napless.  {He was a trooper, but eventually it did catch up with him...}

Gift opening began as soon as guests started to arrive. Try and tell a two-year-old that he has to wait!

The banana splits were fun, but we have way too much leftover, so if you're in the mood for one, you know where to come! We ordered the cake from Wegmans and as usual, it was excellent!  If you have a Wegmans in your area, I highly recommend their cake.  Ours was half vanilla cake, half chocolate with chocolate pudding filling throughout and whipped cream icing. Scrumptious!  And it looked awesome too!

When we began to sing "Happy Birthday," Matty got shy for a second.  He stuck his fingers in his mouth and buried his head in my shoulder.  It was such an "awwwww" moment!

It was a fun, happy time.  Matty had a blast and we are so thankful to our family and friends for making it a spectacular day. We look forward to what year number 3 will bring for our family!

In sticking with the "Curious George" theme from Matty's party, I chose yet another song off of the soundtrack {can you tell I love me some Jack Johnson?!}  It's a beautiful song, that to me, shows us that our curiosity just may lead us right back to where we were. Where we were always supposed to be.

"What's for Dinner?" Wednesday

No cooking for this mama tonight! That's right, because it's my 30th birthday! My wonderful parents had us over for dinner and my dad made me authentic Chinese, which we washed down with birthday cake. Well, I enjoyed my cake after I gave Matty a bath:

Not only was today my birthday, but it was also my first day back at work after a two week vacation; however, it was not nearly as painful as I had imagined...haha.

I had a lovely little day, but my favorite part occurred around 2 a.m. which I guess technically wasn't my birthday yet because I wasn't born until somewhere between 9 and 10 a.m. I think, but close enough...you see, my lil monkey's sleep patterns were off a bit while we were away ( a few nights in KC, he ended up in bed with us in the middle of the night). That said, this morning, he woke up around 1:45 a.m. We brought him into bed with us hoping he would fall asleep, but he thought it was playtime. After a few minutes though, he settled down and wedged himself between us and rested his head on my chest. Dada put his arm around the both of us and we lay like that for a few minutes. I thought to myself, "I couldn't ask for anything more..."

It didn't last too long because Matty became restless again, but it was the perfect beginning to my 30th birthday :)

Also, today I share my birthday with one of my favorite blog hops: