Halloween Fun

We had a super fun month celebrating fall and Halloween!  Here are a few of my favorite pictures.

Silly skeleton | Her crying makes him a little nervous | In their orange PJs

Super man and his little lady | My little pumpkins | Trick or treating FUN!

Lovin' on his baby sister | Superman! | Our family of four

We spent our Halloween trick or treating with William's friends from "town".  Teddy's mama (and my sorority sister) does a fabulous job hosting a pre-trick or treating party!  We always have the best night with this crew.  This year was by far the most fun.  The kids finally understand what is going on and were so much fun to watch!  Before walking up to one of the houses William told me it was "spooky" {in a super spooookyyy voice}.  That kid sure does keep me laughing!

The day before Halloween we made a visit to the zoo with Mimi for Zoo Boo!  As always, William had a blast!  The elephants were still #1 on his list followed by the fish, the carousel, the lion and the black bears who were eating pumpkins.  We even fit some pumpkin decorating and pizza eating in between all of that!

I'd say this was our most successful Halloween yet!  The only thing that could make next year better would be temperatures below 90 degrees outside....it was HOT this year.  I will admit, I'm pretty excited about dressing baby girl up next year!

Fun at the Zoo

I've been really bad about doing our weekly updates.....maybe I'll catch up soon.  For now, I'll share one of William's favorite activities, the zoo!  When William was just a year old he cried when he saw the elephants.  Now, they're his #1 favorite.  He loves watching them get a bath!  During their bath time the trainers will give the elephants a snack when they do tricks.  William would stand and watch for hours if you'd let him.     

The monkeys, carousel and ice cream are also favorites. :)  This past trip the bear really caught his attention as well as the jelly fish.  Hopefully, Anna Grace will love the zoo as much as we do!    

Fun Fall Activities

In mid October I started working "part-time".  I actually work somewhere between part-time and full-time.  Regardless, it's so much better than 5 days a week!  William and I kick off my part-time status at Houston Zoo Boo.  We had the best mommy/son day.  :)  We got to watch the elephants get a bath (he's still talking about it), we rode the carousel, went to the petting zoo, painted pumpkins and obviously rode the train!  After our adventures at Zoo Boo we met Daddy for lunch in Rice Village....followed by shopping of course.  I can't say how wonderful these extra days have been with William.  I definitely don't think I'm cut out to be a stay at home mom but, an extra day or two a week at home with this little man is perfect.

That following weekend our favorite friends came over for Halloween cookie decorating.  William just dumped a whole container of sprinkles on his cookie and then proceeded to eat a mixture of frosting and sprinkles.  #sugarhigh  The older kids were much better at decorating their cookies!  We are so lucky to get to call these guys our best friends.

Happy Fall Y'all!!!

Texas Safari

William and I went on a super fun 27 hour road trip last weekend!  On Sunday morning we drove to San Antonio to meet my mom.  We planned the trip because my dad would still be in Africa (and we figured she'd be getting bored) and it was her birthday!  The other purpose of the trip was to visit the Natural Bridge Wildlife Safari that is just north of San Antonio.  To say William had fun is an understatement.  This little guy was ecstatic!  He loved feeding the animals a snack (the park provides you with this when you enter) and he even got up the courage to pet some goats.  The entire time we were in the car he was saying "what it is?" "a SNACK!"  When we'd tell him what kind of animal it was he'd say "oooohhhhhh".   He was really interested in the ostrich and kept calling them ducks.  :)
The next day we road a boat on the riverwalk, had ice cream, did some shopping, rode on a trolley (he's obsessed with buses so this made his day), sweat a lot, and saw the Alamo.

Super excited for the safari to start  |  Getting his snack ready  |  My dad hunted this Kudu in Africa  |  Look, a Zebra!  |  Nice goats  |  The Alamo  |  A duck...better known as an ostrich  |  He's super expressive!  |  Morning boat ride

Sometimes quick trips are the best trips!

Lions, Tigers and Bears!

This past weekend my parents made a trip to Houston to visit us....aka.....William.  :)  My dad will be heading to Africa on Friday, for a three week hunting trip, so this was a good weekend to catch up with them.  We figured we needed to get Papa ready for Africa by visiting the ZOO!  

So excited to see the train arrive!

We hadn't visited the zoo in nearly a year, and we couldn't have picked a more perfect day to go back.  It was overcast and cool outside!  Rare for an August day in Houston, Texas.  We had a great morning looking at all the animals, riding the carousel and of course riding the CHOO CHOO.   William was a little nervous about some of the bigger animals.  He kept telling the daddy elephant "bye bye" but thought the baby elephant that was eating hay was neat.  The monkeys were probably his favorite.   He loved watching them jump around and swing from the branches.  The mandarin monkey (with the colorful face) scared him to death and he wasn't interested in the petting zoo.  The train ride was, as always, a hit.  He gets so excited when that train pulls up.  Cutest. Things. Ever.

Family Fun  |  Look, A Monkey!  |  Not Liking The Mandarin Monkey  |  Beautiful Giraffes  |  Typical Family Photo  |  Making Some Noise  |  Best Pic Of The Day  |  Say Cheese!

After our fun at the zoo we stopped by Gordon's latest project in Rice Village for lunch at Punk's (if you go you gotta try their fried chicken, deviled eggs, pickles and biscuits!).  My parents loved seeing what Gordon's been up to at work, we all loved the food and William loved running around the courtyard.

We had a great weekend relaxing with my parents!  We even found some time to buy a big boy training potty (yep, it's nearly that time) and we did some yummy grilling on the green egg in the evening.  We can't wait for Papa to get back from Africa so we can hear all his stories!  

WJG Zoo Birthday Party

Like all the other milestone and special occasions in my life I had been planning William's first birthday party for years!  When he was first born I thought about doing a whale theme party.  But, when William was about 4 months old I changed my mind.  Over breakfast one morning Gordon and I were discussing when we should have the party since it would be the same weekend as his brother's wedding.  We both agreed that having it at our house (like we had originally planned) would be too stressful since there would be so much company in town (and lots going on).  So, we started talking about venues and the zoo came to mind.  I'll admit it was a little pricey to reserve the pavilion but we figured it would be worth it in the long run.
I got serious about buying and making things for the party after Christmas time.  Let me just tell you how time consuming party planning is...but I sure do love it!!  I'm going to do a separate post about all the party details.
Sunday morning we went to the hotel for breakfast so we could say goodbye to Ashley and Brandon.  Nobody had seen William all weekend so we decided to head to the galleria area.  :)  My parents came by the house after that to help me finish making the fruit kabobs, gift bags and to load everything up.  As I mentioned before, it was Earth Day at the zoo so parking was a nightmare.  Luckily, Alison and her mom were there to help me set everything up while the boys parked the car (and Skye watched William). 
We had fun visiting with all of our friends and their kiddos.  William's teacher and school friends, Britton and Amos, came too!  We sang happy birthday, opened presents, ate some yummy birthday cake and headed to the carousel.  By the time that was all over it was time to load back up.   
All in all things went good.  I was disappointed to not have one of the things I ordered back in February.  I had ordered the cutest labels for everything and they got lost in the mail.  The company sent them to me again but they didn't get to us in time.  :(  I was pretty bummed but already have next years birthday theme picked out and I'll be able to use them then.  Unfortunately, I wouldn't recommend having a birthday party at the zoo.  Parking is too far away so it takes forever to get things in and out.  You only have the pavilion for 2.5 hours so it makes things quite chaotic!  If they'd had an area that we could put our stuff after the party (so we could walk around and enjoy the zoo) maybe I'd recommend it.  But....they don't.
We DID make great memories, spent time with some of our favorite people and William had a fun time....and that's all that matters.  :)  I know it was hard for people to find parking and make it to the party in time so THANK YOU to everyone that came.  Since becoming a mom I've learned just how protective mothers are.  I want everyone to treat William with kindness and love him as much as I do.  So, having everyone come out to the zoo to celebrate with us really warmed my heart!!! 
This past year has been jam packed with wonderful memories.  We've watched William learn to drink from a bottle, eat real food, sit up on his own, open Christmas presents, try birthday cake, crawl, babble and much much more.  We are so blessed to have wonderful families that have gotten to experience these things with us along the way.  I can hardly wait for all the new stuff that's to come over the next year.   :)

Birthday party guests-  some of my old co-workers: Anne and her 2 kiddos, Stacy with her girls, Rachel and her daughter and brand new baby, Jacqui and her son.  Gordon's buddies: Barteau, Cesar, Zito with his wife and adorable daughter and John Davis and Kendall with little Piper.  William's mimi, grandad, GG, Pop, Nana, Papa, Uncle D, Skye, cousin Susan and Daniel, his teacher (Ms. Melissa), 2 of his school friends and of course Alison, her mom and her 2 kids (that were such a big help!). 

• William looking at his pretty cake!  The adorable hand knitted elephant next to him is from his GG and Pop
• Opening presents (he loves playing with the paper).  Parker was our helper.
• With his Uncle D
• I love how he's smiling up at Gordon from his new wagon from Nana and Papa!  Melts my heart!!!
• Silly baby
• SO in love with my little family of 3
• Singing "happy birthday" again!  He thought the hat was pretty funny.
• With his mimi
• Hanging out with Ms. Melissa while we cleaned up.  Thank goodness she was there.  :)

ZOO!!!

I know it's taking me forever to post about William's birthday party at the zoo.  I'm hoping to post something by the end of the week.  There are just SO many pictures to pick from!  In the mean time I thought I'd post some of the pics from after the birthday party. 

Once the party was over and we'd cleaned up the pavilion we rented we had to load it all back into the cars.  It was Earth Day at the zoo so parking was a nightmare....it had taken Gordon forever to find a space in the paid parking garage so he decided to just head home and unload the stuff.  I was sad to not have him there to walk around the zoo with us but knew he was exhausted (and that the 3 of us have lots of opportunities to visit the zoo together).  Thankfully, it was a beautiful (and cool) day in Houston.  William's mimi and grandad walked around the zoo with her cousin while the rest of us went exploring and rode on the carousel a couple of times.  There were a ton of giraffes, the elephant was giving itself a bath, we saw some wild dogs, bears, a spider monkey, a sleepy lion and lots more!  

 



 

Left to Right, Top to Bottom:

• The whole gang in front of the jaguars
• Looking at the giraffes, zebras and ostrich on Uncle D's shoulders
• With his papa looking at the sleeping wild dogs
• William with his GG and pop.  He loves his pop's cane :)
• It was so fun watching the elephant take a bath
• First time on the carousel
• With Nana and Papa
• Loving the carousel ride!

 

I love looking at these pictures!  I'm just so glad that William has gotten to spend so much time with all of these people that I love so much.  Each one of them has made an impact in my own life so seeing William with them makes my heart smile.  I know we will cherish these pictures forever.  William will be able to look back and "remember" all these fun times with his family. 

I can't wait to see everyone again for our upcoming trip to Midland for a little Duck Dynasty fun.