Easter and a Birthday

This year Jake's first birthday just happened to be Easter Sunday.

Can anyone explain to me how they pick which Sunday is Easter?

I feel like it is never predictable.

Last year Easter was like three weeks before I had Jake.

I remember my mom wanted to know if I needed more maternity clothes in my Easter basket.

Crazy!

Anyway we spent the first part of Easter at home and then at Stake Conference.

Jake almost made it the full two hours without a nap!

He is getting more flexible about his nap times and even how long he can be happy without one.

It is nice to have a little more flexibility.

My "bomb" (I think of him as one when we are in public because I never know when he's going to be done) finally has a little longer fuse.

He was pretty obsessed with the grass

All dressed up for church

After Stake Conference we made sure he got a good nap and then headed down to Ryan's Aunt's house just south of the Wisconsin border in Illinois.

It is great to have some family that is only 45 minutes away.

Dinner was delicious and they had even decorated for Jake's birthday.

Ryan's cousin's, who is holding Jake, name is Paul Jacob so all over the poster he wrote #1 best name!

Jake enjoyed the banana frosting on his cupcake but he threw the actual cupcake on the floor!

We forgot to bring Jake's high chair so I got to enjoy the mess too!

(Sorry for the dump of pictures.  I just couldn't choose!)

By the time we got to opening gifts the "bomb" was just about to go off so he wasn't too thrilled.

But he managed to open all his gifts (with help from dad) before having a complete melt down.

So our stay was short but we all had a great time.

The next day I wanted to do the tradition that Elder Perry had in his family.

When their children reached their first birthday they would set the child in across the room from the family and four items: a toy, a Bible, a bank and a bottle.

Supposedly whichever item they chose and crawled toward signified the area of life in which they would excel.

For example one of Elder Perry's brothers chose the bible and grew up loving books and became a lawyer and his other brother chose the bank and worked in finance.

Jake chose the bank.

Ryan and I knew he would because it was new to him and he is all about exploring new things that aren't really toys.

I guess only time will tell if it really means anything.

I just thought it was fun to watch him choose one and crawl towards it.

It was a great weekend and I can't believe my baby is one!

JPC: 1 Year

Where did this year go?

I was looking at Jake today and he just looked like a toddler and not a baby.

I have loved watching him grow this past year and can't wait to see what this year brings.

Stats from One Year Check-up:

Weight: 20 lbs 13.5 oz (42nd Percentile)

Height: 30 inches (56th Percentile)

Head Circumference: 19.2 inches (98th Percentile)

Sleeping

He still sleeps like a champ.  

He takes two naps and one of them is usually 2.5-3 hours and the other is 1-1.5 hours.

It totally depends on the day which one is the long one.

It would be nice if it was predictable but oh well.

Feeding

He eats three meals and one snack a day.

I have stopped nursing him at lunch and in the afternoon.

He just gets a sippy cup of milk at those meals but he isn't a fan of milk in the cup.

So right now he basically drinks water.

Hopefully in the next two weeks I'll work on dropping the morning nursing and slowly decrease the amount of milk he gets in his bedtime bottle.

He eats everything and anything.

Sometimes I feel like we spend our whole day in the kitchen!

Playing

He is finally crawling!

It is just army crawling but he is making progress at getting his belly off the ground.

It is so funny that he drags his belly because I always know when he starts crawling because I can hear him.

He loves to crawl to the point with the carpet and linoleum meet and bang on the linoleum with his hands.

He still loves walking around holding our hands.

He is getting more stable and likes to try to walk up stairs.

He loves to turn the pages of books.

He especially enjoys lift the flap books.

He likes to pull things out of containers and toss them behind him.

He finally figured out how to let go of an object without throwing it.

He can now set his ball on the ramp and let it roll down.

One day he just started doing this.

I never worked on it with him and I was so amazed.

It is incredible how fast babies learn!

He loves any toy that makes noise.

And now that he figured out how to push the buttons I hear that music all day long.

Now that the weather has warmed up we've hit the park a few times.

He loves to swing and walk across the suspended bridge and in the wood chips. 

He loves the song "Do As I'm Doing"

He has even almost mastered the arm roll.

I've increased his wake time and he is now awake for 2.5 hours between naps.

He now officially has 8 teeth.

His bottom right lateral tooth finally broke through.

We moved him to the 12-18 month tops and 9-12 month pants.

You don't do the dougie? No, not in Kentucky

Over Conference weekend my sister-in-law Ashley was going to be in Lexington for the National Conference on Undergraduate Research.

Since it was only a 7 hour drive we thought we would head down and see her.

We planned to spend the night at my parents to break up the drive and then watch some conference with them on the way back,

But being the awesome grandparents that they are they offered to watch Jake and let us have a little mini vacation in Kentucky.

It was so nice to have a kid free 36 hours!

Friday morning we woke up and drove the last three hours to Lexington.

We made it just in time to check out Ashley's poster session.

Then we headed to lunch.

I found this pizza place online that was near campus and oh my the food was AMAZING!

The Mellow Mushroom makes some of the best pizza.

I got The Caesar pizza with pesto chicken and then an actual Caesar salad on top.  

So yummy!

After lunch we walked around down town and campus.

Of course we had to stop and take pictures with all the horse statues.

Then we headed out to Keeneland for the horse races.

Seriously I'm in love.

Not necessarily with the races themselves but the culture.

I would love to own one of those hats and become a southern belle.

We may need to move to Kentucky just so that can happen!

We finished the night with more delicious food.

Dinner at The Recipe at 68 and ice cream at Graeters (Thanks for the recommendation Kelsey!)

The next morning we slept in.

Oh it was glorious to not wake up at 7 and need to feed a baby!

We drove to Louisville while listening to conference.

We made a stop at the Zappos Outlet on the way and got some killer deals on shoes.

We hit up Church Hill Downs in Louisville.

The Kentucky Derby didn't start until May but we got a tour and went through the muesem.

We grabbed some lunch in downtown Louisville and then headed back to Indy.

It was a great trip but I missed my little guy.

Thankfully he was ready for some good mom and dad snuggles when we got back!

Thanks to my parents and Ashley for an awesome trip!