A Trip to the Dallas Zoo - Grayson's First Zoo Experience

Now that I'm semi-back to blogging, I'm basically just going through my photos from the last few months and easing myself back in by doing posts on that stuff. Should be super exciting. You're welcome.

So today let's chat about Grayson's first trip to the zoo. Since we live approximately 30 minutes-ish north of Dallas, we could really either hit up the Dallas zoo which is like a 45 minute drive, or head over to the Fort Worth zoo, which is supposedly quite amazing (we've never been) but would take a little over an hour. Not a big difference, but we feel like "Dallas" people, so we went with that.

The husband took off work one Friday in April so we could have a whole day of fun. First we had lunch at Mia's Tex-Mex in Dallas (a Mexican place, imagine that) and then we were off to the zoo. For some reason, I'm guessing because the weather was absolutely gorgeous, the zoo was PACKED. Like, we had to park in overflow parking and walk a mile to get to the gates. Once we got in it actually didn't seem too crazy crowded, so I'm not sure where all the people belonging to the cars were hiding.

We weren't totally sure how Grayson would react. He's a huge fan of Addie, obviously, and he had started paying attention to the bunnies in our yard and the ducks at the pond in our neighborhood, but we thought he might still be a little young. But he actually really seemed to love it! I think in a few months he would "get" it a little more, but for the most part he seemed to have a lot of fun.

I won't lie, I think the most exciting part of the trip for him was the fact that he got to try his first little bit of ice cream. He couldn't get enough!

Overall it was a super fun day for all of us. All of these experiences are so much more fun when you're seeing things through your kid's eyes. A and I took his nephews to the same zoo a couple of years ago and I remember being incredibly hot and sweaty and having a little fun but mostly wondering what all the fuss was about the zoo. But this time I swear it was like my first time at the zoo ever, I had such a blast. Your own child just seems to make everything so much more exciting...

So now, feast your eyes on one billion zoo photos. Again, you're welcome ;)

 

Easter 2014 - Grayson's First Easter

I know what you're thinking: Easter? Really? Come on, it's JUNE for cryin' out loud!  

Yeah,yeah, I know...but somehow I haven't blogged about anything important...or really, anything at all, since like February. So when I was browsing through my photos and saw these I thought, now or never. 

So it's now.

Easter this year was not the greatest. The day started out just fine. It was beautiful and sunny, and we went to the Armenian church to attend their Easter festivities. We saw the husband's family, Grayson got to meet a zillion people, we hung out for a bit and chatted, then we headed home to meet up with my dad. 

Oh man, these pictures of G and all his cousins crack me up! 

Quite possibly the only smile of the day....look at those poor eyes. How did I not know something was up??

We went out to grab a bite to eat, and Grayson was just so fussy the entire time. Earlier that day I had told A (remember, husband is now going by "A" on the blog...when I remember, that is) that he felt hot and I was a little worried. He told me it was probably just from being out in the sun and he was fine. Well, I noticed again that he was a little warm when we were on our way to lunch, but he always gets hot when he's been in his carseat, so I kind of brushed it off as that being the reason. 

After we got home from our lunch with Papaw, I kept trying to make it a fun Easter - but it just wasn't really working. As the day went on I couldn't shake the feeling that he wasn't ok. He was dragging around and not playing like normal. He obviously wasn't himself. He was so not into his new Easter toys and was super duper clingy to me. After a bit I kind of decided to just give up on the fun and start in with the cuddling, which seemed to be much needed.

Our sad attempt at a family photo...

After my dad left a couple hours later I finally took his temperature and it was so high! I can't remember what it was now, but it was over 100...I'm thinking around 101 something the first time I took it. My child had never been sick (aside from a tummy virus) at this point, so I kind of started freaking out. Plus, I felt AWFUL that I basically ignored the signs all day. Ugh, talk about mommy guilt. 

His temperature kept climbing as the night went on, and I really started panicking. It got up to 103 and I decided it was time to call the after hours doc. She assured me that fevers in babies aren't near as worrisome as they are in adults and to just give him tyelenol or motrin, maybe do a cool rag on his arms and hands, and watch him. I felt a teensy bit better, but not much.

All in all it took the poor guy around three or four days to kick whatever it was that he had. We ended up going into the doctor and she said it was just some type of virus, but there wasn't a way to really tell exactly what it was. It was so, so sad to see my baby in that condition. Totally broke my heart!

Oh, and I forgot to mention that his birthday was the Thursday following Easter. So we made it 11 months and three weeks with not a bit of sickness, then he just felt absolutely terrible leading up to the big day. Fortunately he started feeling better Wednesday and was basically back to his normal self when he woke up on his birthday. 

So, needless to say Grayson's first Easter wasn't exactly what I imagined it would be. We didn't hunt Easter eggs, he didn't care too much about anything in his Easter basket, and he was a big old grump all day long - for good reason! Even though it wasn't picture perfect, it sure did make me appreciative for that sweet baby's health!

A Circus Party ~ Grayson's First Birthday ~ Party Time!

Now that we've covered the party decor for Grayson's first birthday, I thought I'd post about the actual party. I had no idea what to expect really - we don't have many friends with kids, so we weren't sure how many people would really be interested in hanging out at a first birthday party. Luckily, our friends seem to either really like us or really like our kid, so we had a big turn out. A few of mine and the hubs family members came, too, although we actually had family get togethers the weekend before.

Since I've never hosted a kid's birthday party, I wasn't totally sure what to do. I decided since G is so little and there wouldn't be many other kids to not worry about activities. We didn't have any games or anything planned, but it ended up being just fine. The main events seemed to be the food, the opening of the gifts, and the cake. The party started at one and we did the cake around 3:30, and by that time Grayson was on an attention high and just about to crash. He absolutely loved being the center of attention for the whole party, though, and I'm pretty sure he would love it if we invited people over to watch him be cute every single weekend.

I have to say, the party was even more enjoyable than I thought it would be. And I learned a pretty valuable lesson, I think. Even though this was kind of thrown together last minute (sad that 3 weeks feels last minute) , everything was great. I hope that every year I can remember that it isn't about some extravagant, Pinterest-perfect party. Because seriously, what kid really cares about every little detail being perfect? I'm pretty sure that we could have had six balloons, a cake, and people to sing him "Happy Birthday" and he would have been just as happy :) 

Oh - I did have another mommy-fail. I totally and completely forgot to get a picture of him in his special cake smash outfit. I ordered it from Etsy and it was the cutest thing EVER and I can't believe I didn't get one single picture of the whole thing! Insanity. 

Oh well! We still had a wonderful time with all of our fabulous friends and family, and I'm so thankful to everyone that came to help Grayson celebrate!