Peyton's First Birthday Party!

I've been thinking and planning Peyton's party for months. My mom and I were at Buy Buy Baby one day and saw these adorable purple owl boots. As soon as I saw them, I knew that was what I wanted to do for Peyton's party! After a little more thinking, I decided on a purple and grey, owl themed party!

Peyton's daddy and I made the owl cookies below. It was a week long process, but worth the effort in the end.

Aunt Tera made these amazing owl cupcakes! We are so thankful for the many hours Tera put into making these delicious cupcakes, especially in the middle of one of the busiest times of her career! We love you!

January is always a busy month at work, and the busiest week is usually the second week...the week of Peyton's birthday. Thankfully, I had done a lot of the prep work leading up to the party; so, the week before wasn't too bad. I will say that it took a lot longer to make everything than I anticipated. I'm not sure how many more homemade party decorations are in our future!

Here's the birthday girl in her beautiful birthday outfit (it's hard to tell from the picture, but it's purple and grey to go with the theme, of course)!

Peyton enjoyed opening her presents!

A puzzle!

Mickey Mouse!! Peyton loves Mickey ever since the cruise when Granddaddy would walk around with her and show her the pictures of Mickey Mouse. Poppa and Lala have a Mickey puppet that she loves, and now she has her very own Mickey Mouse!

The first thing she wanted to play with, of all of her presents, were her new books! She couldn't have made me more proud :)

Jen and James were life savers and brought their jumpy house for the kids to play with. It was a huge hit...I don't know what we would have done without it. Thank you!!

We had a lot of family and friends with us to celebrate our baby girl turning 1! It was a wonderful party and celebration...26 adults, 6 kids/toddlers, and 3 babies!

Lala and sweet Reid!

Granddaddy and Hudson (perhaps the most laid back baby ever).

Sophie, just 7 1/2 weeks old! This was her first birthday party to go to, and she slept through most of it!

We were a little worried about how Peyton would react with so many people in our house, but she did great! She had a great time!

She had Lala trained so well, walking up and down the steps outside over and over and over again! She would be inside the house, in someone's arms, and as soon as they put her down, she would make a beeline for the back door (which we kept open) so that she could go down the stairs.

Peyton and Jameson had some good conversations out by the rocking chair.

Aww, so sweet. Sierra giving Peyton a hug :)

Peyton and Mackenzie hung out while Jameson taught them all about video games.

After a few minutes of observation, Peyton thought she was ready to give it a try, but Jameson thought she could use a little more time "learning" a.k.a watching.

Peyton wasn't the only one who had a good time at the party. Mackenzie and Reid hung out and bonded over some cool farm animals.

Sierra got to eat an owl cookie.

Hudson spent some quality time in Carolyn's arms.

Tera had her hands full too!

Jameson and Mackenzie were nice enough to help Peyton open her presents (she got a little bored after a couple gifts).

Mackenzie, rather impressively, carried around this big toy trying to get someone to open it up for her.

Meanwhile, Peyton was reading another one of her books :)

It wouldn't be a first birthday without the obligatory birthday cake (or cupcake in this case)! We weren't sure what Peyton would think of the cupcake...here she is examining it.

Then comes the first bite.

Hey! This is pretty good!

I was so caught up in the moment of giving her her first cupcake/sugar/dessert that we forgot to sing to her! Here we are trying to recreate that moment. Peyton could have cared less, she just wanted to eat her cupcake :)

Yummmmmy! She definitely got her mommy's sweet tooth!

What, is there something on my face?

Happy birthday sweet baby girl! We love you!!

Peyton and her Mommy

Peyton at 1 Year

Peyton is such a sweet little girl! She has really blossomed in the past week. She has become so playful, fun, and a tease! She'll pretend to give me her paci, and right when I reach for it, she pulls it back and laughs! She also loves playing with her daddy. He'll lay on the floor and pretend to be asleep, and she will go up to him and attack him! She'll fall on his back, stick her finger in his ear, touch his nose, and pull his hair! It's so funny and they both love it! The other night, I was getting her bath ready, and Peyton was with me in the bathroom. Then, Matt peeks his head in, Peyton giggles, goes after him, then comes back to me in the bathroom. This is repeated a couple times until Matt goes to sit down. Well, I guess Peyton wasn't ready to stop playing because when she came back into the bathroom, she kept looking at the doorway, waiting for Matt to peek his head around. When he didn't, she walked out and looked all around until she found him. I don't know why, but I thought is was so cute and sweet how she was just walking around trying to find him. It was one of those moments that I think I will remember for a long time.

Peyton's favorite things (other than Mommy and Daddy, of course) are books, cups, and string. Weird, I know, but she has really loved cups from a very young age, and she loves to put string in her mouth and just suck on it while she plays! She also loves, loves books! It makes me so happy to see, and I hope her love of books continues. Peyton also loves her stuffed animals (which is good because she has a lot...thanks party to my stash that I pass on to her)! She falls all over her big stuffed puppy dog and gives him lots of hugs and just lays on him. We also started giving her stuffed animals while she sleeps. She sleeps with her sheep and turtle. She has preferred this sheep from a very young age; so, once we finally decided it was okay to put stuff in her crib, this was an easy decision. It's fun to watch her as she's falling asleep, or after she's woken up because she'll play with them :) Peyton also loves birds and dogs (real ones). She squeals and points when she sees either one. We were around some dogs a few days ago, and we let her walk up and pet them. She loved touching them and getting licked in the face :) It was pretty cute!

Peyton also loves food! We've finally made the switch to all grown up food! We're still super paranoid about her choking; so, her bites are pretty small, but at least she's moved on from baby food! She pretty much likes anything! If she really likes something, she'll say "mmm mmm" the entire time she's eating! She definitely enjoys eating (like mother, like daughter).

Peyton's stats:  30 inches (75%), 23 lbs 15 oz (90%), head size is 97%!!

Here are her bear pictures! One year old!!

(Don't worry, we got the hat off of her before she let go of that string and popped herself!)

Miscellaneous - 12th Month

This was so sweet. Peyton was rocking Freeway (my favorite stuffed animal when I was younger, and by favorite, I mean, I brought Freeway EVERYWHERE, slept with him and smelled his ear for a very long time...perhaps into high school).

Peyton loves her stuffed animals :)

Helping with laundry.

Staring adoringly up at her daddy while he plays his guitar.

Yummm, Cheerios!

Sitting on her new train!

Peyton's Nanny

Peyton, and we, are so blessed to have Mary Anne in our life! Mary Anne is Peyton's nanny, and she is absolutely awesome! She has watched Peyton for about 2 days a week since Peyton was 5 months old, and from day 1, Peyton has loved her. She smiles when she comes in the morning, and it makes it so much easier to go to work when I know that Peyton is in good hands! Mary Anne takes Peyton on walks, goes to the park, builds forts with her, reads books, etc. I love coming home and hearing what they did that day.