happy first birthday, manning!

one thing about having all of the birthdays close together is that there is a lot of self-inflicted pressure to make each day special instead of just a birthday 'lump' for all three.  without family nearby, a party of any type is a lot of work and expense.  this year we decided on a family trip this weekend instead of a party.  but without a party, it is less obvious how to make their day special - especially when manning doesn't really have any 'favorites'.

and with vbs this week, my time is even less than normal.  so last night i worked on wrapping up manning's few gifts - we let the kids shop for him in the dollar bins at target, i got some hand-me-downs from friends, we bought a trailer for him to ride in behind our bikes and the grandparents sent a few things too.  more than enough when we already have almost every toy ever made.

like always, our sweet manning woke up happy!  he is just such a joy for start to finish every day.  i had to take a picture to show the big one year old!!

and the smiles just kept on coming.  he enjoyed some chocolate chip zucchini bread for breakfast and was a big fan of his birthday balloon.

after breakfast he wandered into our room and found his presents.  he just sort of moved them around a bit and then came with me when i left.

so the kids were a disaster today.  we were all exhausted from vbs last night.  i knew today was going to be rough for them, but i underestimated how much 9 hours of constant crying and whining was going to make me crazy!!  i was seriously on the verge of tears all afternoon.

first was swimming lessons for the big three.  i think the lessons are more work for me than for the kids.  we are at the ymca from 9 until 11:30 and there are two different showers.  once home we got some lunch (pb&j and a plum for the birthday boy) and the real, non-stop crying began.  they just take turns so that it never stops.  i took care of some computer tasks, showered, made a cake and got dinner ready.  matt was coming home from work early so that we could do presents and cake before i had to leave for vbs.  i was really over the edge at this point in the day and we were running very late.  manning woke up from his nap right as matt was walking through the door so i had him get manning because i was working on dinner (quinoa, sweet potato, black bean croquettes with a pumpkin seed cream sauce - manning loves this and so do matt and i).  the one thing i wanted was a picture of me with the birthday boy.  as you can see, it didn't happen (and i am a little devastated).  i did get one with matt at least.

let me tell you, it was chaos, yelling and crying and then, "smile for the camera".  manning was awesome when you consider that he was just waking up and we were rushing him to open presents  and the other kids were the ones doing most of the opening.

his present from mason was funny because he was shaking the maracas and enjoying the sound and then he tried shaking the police car in his other hand.  the look on his face when it didn't make noise too was pretty funny.  at least matt and i thought so.  he was surprised and then a little disappointed so he went back to shaking the maracas.

notice how the three bigs are huddled around and opening the presents while manning is left out in the cold.

his sad cake.  i made a german chocolate mix i had in the pantry and then topped it with marshmallow creme.

before we had dinner (it was actually still cooking), we sang to our sweet boy.  he was robbed at the end.

once the monkeys and i left for vbs, daddy and manning got to eat a quiet dinner together before the birthday boy got some cake.  it made me very happy to know that he liked it even though i had to miss out.

i hope manning's first birthday was special.  we were going to go to the zoo but i just couldn't i barely had enough time to do anything that needed to happen as it was and the forecast was iffy.  oh well.  birthdays aren't the most important thing and i did the best i could.  and now we have no more 'babies'.  love.