Graham reported to the Duck room on Monday and was very excited about it. He definitely missed his friends from the Panda class and was glad to play with them in the gym and see them at lunch and in the halls. This class has a lot more boys, so that is probably the main difference. He had a very good first week and ended the week by getting to go to the treasure box, so that was great! The teachers really seem great and we are getting a lot of feedback, so that is good.

On Tuesday, we kicked off the morning singing Happy Birthday to Evan! Graham was so very excited that it was officially his first birthday! We took him to school in his bday shirt and bib and with one of his balloons. I took cupcakes for his class at snacktime, there were 7 of them right around one, a couple older and a couple younger. I bought the mini ones for the kids and then big ones for the teachers, the kids really dug in to them. It was super cute and those posed for lots of pics! After school, we went to Red Palace Chinese Buffet for dinner. Graham told our waiter that it was Evan's birthday and sure enough at the end of our meal, they came out with this big dessert with a candle on it and sang to him, so that was super cute. We left there and went to Barnes and Noble and spent Evan's birthday gift certificate and for the first time he played at the train table with Graham. He was walking all around it and it was really cute! We called it a birthday after that!!!!

On Thursday afternoon, I picked up the boys early and brought them back to the office to see the Grinder Monster Truck and meet the driver. Graham was of course very very excited and Evan was just taking it all in. John was great with the boys and despite it being very cold outside, we still had fun checking out Grinder and the GraveDigger Experience, and got some cute pics!

On Sunday, we headed to church and for the first time, Evan just went to the nursery the whole time. He isn't getting a bottle during the day any more for me to give him during service and he is just way to babbly and fidgety. So, I went to get both boys for communion and they did great! It was very warm afternoon and so we went for a long bike ride / stroller ride through the whole neighborhood and then walked over to see Courtney's new horse. It was super fun being outside, too bad the warm day isn't here to stay!!!!!

We were in party prepping mode all week in anticipation for Evan's big first birthday party on Saturday afternoon! Evan had a bit of a cold, as did I and eventually so did Dean. On Wednesday afternoon, we thought he might have a touch of pink eye, so we ran in to the doc and luckily got to see Doctor Johnson for a second sick appointment in a row. She confirmed that he just had a cold, and no sign of pink eye. So, that was good. However, we ended up re-focusing on his rash. A few days after finishing the steroid cream, it came back in the exact same area that it was before, on his right side of his belly area. She said to go ahead and resume the cream again and she asked me lots of question, just trying to determine if it could be anything that he was coming in to contact with. Luckily, he has his one year appointment this week, so that will give her another chance to check on it.

On Thursday evening, Dean and I had my rescheduled holiday party for my department to attend. As we planned to do in December, we dropped the boys off at Tyler and Bobby's and Graham and Evan had a fun play evening with Josephine and Vivienne. They had dinner and got changed in their PJs and played and played. We picked them up about bedtime and Evan was asleep before we even got out of the driveway. Graham talked all the way home about all the fun things that they did and then conked out right after we got home.

On Friday, I dropped the boys off first thing that morning and then did my party grocery run, and headed home to cook and clean and start decorating. I went back out to get the cake that afternoon, which was super cute and then got the boys and Graham was very excited to come home and help me decorate. He was beyond excited for Evan's party day to arrive!

On Saturday morning, Dean and Graham headed out to swim lesson and had lunch out at McDonalds. That gave me some time to do some final party prepping and get Evan down for an early nap.....which turned out to be a short nap! He was ready to party. We had a great turnout, about 15 adults and 7 kiddos counting our family, so it was a good sized crowd. We missed a couple families due to sickies, so that was a bummer, but I guess tis the season! We had yummy food and then Evan.....and Graham and the other friends opened his gifts. It was chaotic, but lots of fun. Then, it was cake time, he wasn't to sure about it at first, but once I got it to where he could get to the actual cake part past the icing, he liked it pretty good. The Veggie Tales theme turned out really really cute, it was very colorful and just all around fun. Shortly after everyone left, Evan conked out and took a late evening nap, he was worn out!!!! He got up, ate some dinner, and went right back to sleep and Graham conked out early as well!!!

On Sunday, we headed to church and were greeted with lots of birthday wishes for Evan. We had the altar flowers to celebrate his birthday and it was announced so that was nice. Both boys were so good in church too, so that was nice. We spent the rest of Sunday afternoon trying to get the house put back together and making some modifications to the den for all the new toys and to try to phase out some of the babyish things and re-arranging the gates a bit. He is taking more and more steps at a time, but hasn't totally turned to full out walking yet, but it probably wont be long!!! He weighed in at 23 pounds and 14 ounces on Sunday night and will still continue to eat anything and everything, so I hope that continues!!! On Sunday, I added a couple ounces of whole milk to his bottle and he didn't miss a beat, so we will do that a few more times and then make the big switch!

Graham officially starts in the duck room on Monday. He visited it a couple times last week and he and I talked to the teacher one morning and it seems like it will be a good move for him. He will be in a class with mostly boys for the first time in a very long time, so that is probably the biggest change. We are excited to see how he settles in and how he does with more learning time and less playtime!

Evan's rash cleared up after a week of the steroid cream and we have transitioned over to Aveeno lotion as opposed to the Johnson and Johnson for both boys. Hopefully once the weather breaks and we aren't running the heat so much, it wont be an issue at all. Evan continues to eat any and everything and have the best appetite. He is finishing up his formula that we have on hand and then we will switch him over to milk. The only bottle he gets is at bedtime, so here in a couple weeks, we will work on transitioning that one out as well! He is still taking a few steps here and there, but quickly drops down to crawl and gets at it much faster, so that seems to be his preference for now! I brought up four totes of 24 month / 2T clothes from the basement and washed them and worked them in to Evan's closet to get ready for the season change. It is basically clothes for both seasons, and lots of it! I hope he gets to wear most all of it, so many cute things!!! I took Evan for his one year photo shoot to Olan Mills. He did really good for the first couple sets, but after three outfits and multiple background and props, he started to get a little tired of it all. But, we still got some amazing pics of him and it was definitely a successful shoot!

We had a pretty low key weekend. On Saturday, we broke out Graham's new play-doh factory that Grey and Reed got him for Christmas, that made for a fun afternoon. He really loved it and it was something different for him to play with, as you can see, he is all smiles, ha ha! Later in the afternoon, Josephine and Vivienne came over for a playdate with the boys, so that was a lot of fun. They went from room to room playing with all the different toys and had a really good time.

We headed back to work and school for our first full week in quite a while. Graham had asked about school a few times and seemed ready to get back at and see his friends. We were all kind of ready to get back to our routine and get the eating and sleeping schedule back to normal. Evan settled back in to school as well, but he had a little rash that appeared on his belly and didn't spread but didnt go away either. So, on Thursday, I went ahead and took him to the doc to have it checked out. We got to see Doc Johnson, so that was great. She checked him out and decided it was a touch of eczema and prescribed us a steriod cream to use twice a day for about a week and said it should do the trick. We need to switch to a more moisturizing lotion than the baby lotions as well. That was one issue that we never had with Graham out of all his sickes! Evan weighed in at 23 pounds and 6 ounces!

On Saturday, we headed back to swim lesson for the new session, the first time since about mid-Decemeber. Graham settled right back in, so that was good. He has really made a lot of progress, so it is gonna be fun to see him at the pool this summer! We left there and headed to Lillian's second birthday party at her house. Graham was very excited of course. She got lots of neat toys and Graham and Evan both were quite interested in her kitchen. The party was a Dora theme and Lillian was a sweet little birthday girl! Next up is Evan's birthday party in two weeks, we are getting super excited for it!

On Sunday, we headed to church and then to Christiansburg for our last round of Christmas celebrating. We went to have Christmas with Brad, Kelly, Grey and Reed - we had to cancel a couple times because of sickies. So, we were glad to get to finally meet up with them. The kids had a lot of fun exchanging presents and seeing what each other got. We played a bit and then went and checked out their house that was under construction and then headed home. And another busy weekend comes to a close!

Hard to believe that 2010 is over!!!! What a super fast year that it was! We headed to back to work and school for a short three day week and then had a nice four day weekend to ring in the new year! We spent most of Thursday taking down all the Christmas decorations. Graham was helpful, but also disappointed that we were undecorating. We had to explain a lot that we would get the decorations back out next year for Christmas. He really did enjoy the season so very much!

On New Year's Eve, we headed downtown to the Science Museum at Center in the Square with Tyler, Bobby, Josephine and Vivienne for the Bouncy Ball Drop. We each got a bag of balls and at noon we dropped them from the 5th floor. It was jam packed and really neat. We headed down on the market for lunch afterwards and both boys crashed on the way home! It was a gorgeous warm day and so we headed outside for some fun. Dean and Graham went for a bike ride and I broke out the cozy coupe car for Evan. He is a tad young for it, but he sure did like it! He would scoot it a little bit, but then he would slide down off the seat. Of course, Graham thought it was the neatest thing ever and as soon as Evan got out, he crammed himself in it and tooled around a bit!

We headed over to Julie and Mike and Carson's for a New Year's Even party, it was a kid friendly event with all couples with kids. The boys went in their PJs and Graham took his sleeping bag and watched movies with the other kids. Evan took his bottle and to sleep in the guest room right around 8pmish just like normal. We thought for sure the kids would fall asleep watching movies but sure enough they were wide awake. They rang in the new year with us and then we packed it up and headed home!!!! The boys went right to sleep as soon as we got home! But, of course, they were up bright and early Saturday morning! We stayed in on Saturday and took it easy, trying to savor the end of our Christmas vacation!

On Sunday, we headed out to church and there was a potluck lunch afterwards. Graham still really enjoys the sunday school lesson each week. Evan is pretty much only staying in service for about the first 20 minutes or so and then he just gets to babbly and fidgety and I take him to the nursery with Graham and then bring them both back in. Again, both boys konked out on the way home and we were able to get them in bed when we got home and they napped for about two more hours and so did we! We got up and headed to one last Christmas hurrah for the choir at the Gardner's house. So that was fun. Graham is all about wishing everyone a happy new year and of course enjoyed going to another party!

Evan is still super active, eating like crazy and on the move like mad! He weighed in at 23 pounds and 4 ounces. We are still super excited for his birthday coming up in a few weeks and for the party. He is such a smiley little guy and charms people every where that we go. Graham is also getting so excited for his birthday and I think he is gonna be a big help come party day!