Enzo's FIRST Birthday!!!

March 9

PICTURE OVERLOAD!! I went all out for this birthday party since the Munks were in town and don't get to come to any of our other events and activities. It was great to have both sides of the family here. And the excessive about of pictures also accounts for me growing up more and realizing how quickly this time is passing and there will be no other way to experience Enzo at age 1 after it passes except through pictures.

We did his birthday party a few days earlier so all the family in town could be there. His actual birthday isn't until the 15th. I decided to do a farm theme for Enzo's birthday. I saw a farm theme cake about a year ago and thought it would be so fun. When it got time to planning I looked at a bunch of other themes, but I still liked the farm one the best.

I ordered these invitations through Etsy. They are awesome and the lady I worked with did a great job and was happy to follow all of my requests. I LOVE how they turned out.

We had a few stations for the kids

This wagon was also a gift and Enzo LOVES it! He starts to whine when we stop pulling him.

The food was sure fun to plan! And see all the cute ideas on pinterest.

(The chicken feed was chex mix. It arrived a little later)

I love this mason jar/lid/straw idea and that I got to use it!

The little birthday farmer! He had just woken up from his nap

All of our guests!

So excited!

Everyone participated in the finding the baby chick

The posse

I love this little horse. It has the most charming song! I'll be so sad when it stops playing. Its also great fun to imagine the man recording it :)

Enzo LOVES to play with necklaces--mostly to eat them!

Gifts

The cake! I generally want to take advantge of an event to make a cake, otherwise its just too much work and I need a deadline.

I saw this somewhere, probably pinterest. A haystack smash cake. Simple and perfect for the theme!

Enzo didn't quite know what to think :)

Going for a ride. This is all Enzo wanted to do for the next week.

I loved the outcome of the party. I was able to space a lot of the prep the week before which made things a lot more manageable. And thanks to all the family who helped get everything ready.

Rock Climbing

March 8

It was great to have everyone stay with us while they were here for the wedding. The next day, we enjoyed hanging out and headed over to the FitStop gym to do some rock climbing. We are pretty rookie and didn't even know how to put the harnesses on! But it was fun!

Zac did great working on his courage. He tried several times with the goal to go higher each time and he achieved it each time!

Jason

Max. This was a free climbing area. It was pretty hard for Max to lift himself. I'd love to get him in something that helped him strengthen his muscles. We think he has low muscle tone, so this type of stuff is really difficult.

The windows on the bottom of this picture are floor to ceiling windows. So Zac got higher than the ceiling.

Trying to figure out the harness.

Wild Emily! She did awesome and got around this negative angled wall.

Jon did great too! I missed getting pics of the best run he had. We watched a film about rock climbing the month before and it was pretty empowering. Jon jumped to grab a couple holds and was able to get to the top when otherwise he wouldn't have reached.

I'm surprised that I did ok too. I think watching that film helped me be more comfortable. Although once I got pretty high, my heart started to race. As I get older, I'm becoming quite a wimp.

Another Wedding!

March 7

Weddings are such fun and stress, but mostly beautiful! And this one was no exception. David, Jon's brother, married Rachel Davison. The temple ceremony was beautiful and I'll never forget the enlightenment we had there.

PS Happy Birthday Dad

Ancestor Wall

March 4

Another pinterest inspiration. I saw a board like this with large pictures of kids in the family. Then later I saw a wall with a clean grid of black and white ancestor pictures. I combined the two ideas and got this.  The frame is actually moudling for baseboards. I painted it and since we are renting, I used command velcro strips to put each length on the wall. The chevron background is fabric. On pinterest I found a recipe for an easy to make, easy to clean wall paper adhesive for use on fabric. Its just cornstarch and water. It worked great and was very forgiving. I did have to reapply the cornstarch mixture a few times and make sure it was wet enough, because it dried quickly. Then I measured out where I wanted the frames. Each frame is wired on the back. I found a method, again on pinterest, for how to hang in a grid and get it to be straight and equidistant.  I LOVE how it turned out. I wish I could add more pics, but I think that would change the design aspect. Someday when we have house I'll make it bigger. The first row on the left, is Jon's dad's line. The second is my dad's line, the third is Jon's mom's and the fourth is my mom's line. Included in the pictures are both Max (Christian) and Enzo's (Strong) namesakes.

Soldier Hollow Olympics

March 1

Every winter, Zac's school starts their cross country skiing program. Last year, Zac only skied once a week, this year he skied twice a week. He is doing great. I'm not able to be out on the snow with him regularly because I have Enzo. Last year they did the olympics, but I didn't know that was a spectator event. 

This year I made sure to go. Luckily, it was a beautiful day! 

Zac class was France. For the cook with a book the week before we actually read a book called Crepes by Suzette and made crepes in his class-so yummy!

One of the older classes coming down the track

Food station

Zac is in the green-waiting in the food line.

The biathlon was on that side of the property. The older grades do that. 

I have a couple fun videos of Zac skiing, but those won't upload :(  They did a race down some nordic tracks and then ran back. They did an obstacle course, and a slalom track.

But here's a good one of Zac and Enzo.