Beckham's 2nd Birthday [part 2]

I had planned months in advance for Beckham's 2nd Birthday party, but one thing you can't plan for is the weather. It was seriously in the 60s the week before Beckham's party and it raaaaained for like 4 days straight. Saturday, the 19th it was super cloudy and stayed in the lower 70s...in July....in Louisiana....INSANITY! Everyone was saying this was a once in a lifetime occurrence and it really was. It's usually in the upper 90s- crazy hot, sun beaming, all of that! But, not this year! It was down right cold, and I know 70s sounds like perfect weather, and it really is- but not for a swimming party with a bunch of 2 year olds. :( Last year, we had the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse jumpy and it was almost too hot to jump in it. So, I thought this year we would get a water slide and all of that. Ha! The joke was on me. The jump house would have been perfect this year with the crazy weather.

With all of that being said, Beckham and all of the kids that came seemed to have a great time anyways. A few of them got kind of cold at times, but they'd go wrap up in a towel for a little bit then head back out to play some more. Because it rained so much prior to the party, our yard was a mess. We are still trying to grow grass in areas so it turned into a muddy mess. None of the kids minded but I'm not so sure the parents were thrilled with them getting so dirty. Anyways, this post is sounding more and more like a Debby Downer and I really don't mean for it to be. I just worked so hard and had such high expectations that I was kind of bummed that the weather didn't cooperate. Oh well I guess, you live and learn.

So, we didn't really have a 'theme' this year. I just went with a color scheme and did everything water/Summer related (water slide, kiddy pool, sand pails, sunshine etc.) Everything turned out so cute! I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves.

Beckham's birthday is only 3 days before Butch's so it's always crazy around here trying to plan for Beckham's party(s) and also include something special for Butch. This year, Beckham's party fell on Saturday, the 19th, which is Butch's actual birthday. I couldn't think of any way to plan anything other than have Beckham stay the night with someone after his party so we could go eat or have some kind of date night. Almost all of my plans for Butch's birthday got changed around but that's another post. I was talking to my step-Mom, Monica about doing something for Butch's bday and she enthusiastically volunteered to keep Beckham, which was great. She was so excited and he loves her so I knew it would be no problem. So, Saturday evening after everything died down and we were cleaning up Beckham went home with Monica, a few hours later she text me letting me know that everything was great and she said that Beckham, while in the bathtub, unprompted, said "Beck Beck Birthday was FUN!" At that moment my heart melted and it didn't matter about the horrible weather, or that I didn't think everything was just perfect- HE had fun and that's really all that matters to me.

All in all, we really had a great day. It was a lot bit crazy at times (as usual) but I generally enjoy planning his parties and I think everyone enjoyed the festivities. :)

 thank goodness for Ella or Beckham wouldn't have opened any of his presents! 

side note: I can't believe I have a 2 year old. :(

Beckham's 2nd Birthday [part 1]

Beckham's actual birthday (16th) fell on a Wednesday this year so we had planned a small get together with Butch's parents and brothers. (My Dad was recovering from surgery and my Mom was already coming over the next day.) As soon as Beckham woke up I had a box full of different decorations to hang all over the kitchen. He really loved it and liked watching me climb and stand in the chairs (great things I'm teaching him, I'm sure).

Anyways, I made roast, carrots, potatoes, garlic bread, and I baked Beckham's first and actually only-since we had cupcakes at his big party 2nd Birthday cake. I made funfetti cake with whipped cream cheese icing. Roast is also one of the only meats Beckham really likes consistently. Even though there was a lot going on, with four additional people in this small house- we were in tight quarters, Beckham still ate really well and was so excited to blow out his candle. Weeks prior to his birthday, if anyone asked what he wanted for his bday he would say a candle. ha! It's the little things. He has a slight obsession with blowing out all types of candles. So, we ate, sang, and let him blow out his candle and after he blew it out he said, "do it again." So, we let him blow it out a few more times. Grami and Pop brought some presents for him to open, and naturally I got zero pictures. Yep. This is my life. So, here are the few, poor quality, iphone pics that I actually got on his real birthday.

Dear Beckham

Dear Beckham,
First of all, happy birthday. Two years ago today I laid eyes on the most precious gift from God. I honestly can't believe you are already two years old. Where has the time gone? You amaze me every single day. You can throw a fit like no other, but you are truly the sweetest, gentlest, smartest little boy in the entire world. You still want to be a big boy so badly, but I am still enjoying you be a little boy for right now. I love when you say, you're Mama's baby because you really are and always will be. It is easy to have a conversation with you- you can tell us everything you want, how and when you want it. You still love your blanket (bean) and have to drink cocoa (chocolate) milk every night to go to bed. Honestly, you would drink cocoa milk all day everyday. We tried to get you potty trained by two years old, but you just weren't interested. You are sometimes a little too smart. I often ask if you want to try to teetee in the potty and you simply say, "no". Hopefully before school starts you will want to use the potty.

You really love to play baseball with Daddy at night, but you both had to wear your LSU hats together. You can run, jump, and climb on anything. You even get stuck quite often trying to climb up the bathroom cabinets. You still love to take baths-thank goodness. You never want to get out. You love drawing on the bathtub with the markers and crayons. You also still love Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, you watch the same movie every single night to fall asleep. Actually, the movie pretty much plays all day long whether you're in there watching or not. You are a night owl for sure (you get it honestly) it's 1:00am as I'm typing this. We really need to get on a better schedule before school starts and I have to go back to work. Speaking of work, it's going to be really hard to leave you. With the exception of a couple of days, we have pretty much spent every waking moment with each other this Summer. You are definitely a Mama's boy (which I love) but you are increasingly becoming more stuck on Daddy too. One of your favorite phrases to say is "where did (anyone) go?" If I'm not in your eyesight, you ask "where Mama go?" and the same for Daddy. I think your favorite place to go is Walmart. You always get a prize and are a really good shopping buddy. You've finally grasped the concept that we have to pay for things before we open them, which means we can't open anything in the store. It took some time to learn, but you've got it now. You have exceptional memory. You will start talking about things that happened weeks ago. For example, Donna came over one day and you were amazed by her blue toenail polish. Then, about a week later in the bathtub you were rubbing blue crayon on your toes and I asked what you were doing and you said "paint toes blue like Don". Genius.

I could go on and on and on for days about all of the amazing things you do. You are so special and one of a kind. I am truly thankful, grateful, blessed, and all of the above to be your Mom. I don't think you'll ever quite understand what joy you have brought to my life. I know people say this all the time, but I truly can not imagine my life without you. It's like I wasn't fully living or loving until I laid eyes on you. I hope you always know how much I love you, little boy. You truly are my sunshine and as I write this tears well up in my eyes because I want to be the best Mommy possible. When you're older I want you to be proud to have me as a Mommy because I am so proud to have you as my son. I love you, sweet boy, to the moon and back.

Compare to six month and one year letter to Beckham.

two year favorites

All images from google. Compare to 1 year and 18 month favs. Some things have stayed the same and I didn't include in this post. The 'bean' as Beckham says, or his blanket is possibly his night time necessity. He says, "Mama, fix bean." Which basically means he wants me to come tuck him in. I love it. I think the bean will be around for a while, so I didn't find it necessary to include it again-just making a brief mention. Also, he still loves his Jake soap. We have also bought Ninja Turtle soap (which is bright blue) I seriously thought it was going to dye his hair blue, thankfully it didn't! Anyway, here are some of his 2 year favorites.


Bubble Lawn Mower- The bubbles have long ran out, but he didn't particularly care for them anyways. He does LOVE bubbles. That's kind of his and Monica's (aka Munka) thing. Just about every Monday or Tuesday she comes over and brings bubbles. Back to the lawn mower, Grami keeps her lawn in tip top shape so he really loves to mow with her. Uncle B got him this mower last year for his birthday and he didn't really care anything about it until this summer, but now he loves it. He will say, "be right back, going to mow grass".

Thomas the Train Ride-Along- Similarly to the Mickey Ride-Along I mentioned in another favorites post, this is basically the same thing except it's Thomas the Train (duh!). He has grown fond of Thomas the Train recently. I He has an app on the ipad that lets you color Thomas pictures, play a matching game, and watch videos, so he wanted to bring Thomas in from outside and ride it in the house.

the Baseball and LSU hat- Okay, these go together because we have a nightly ritual around here where Butch is trying to train Beckham for MLB plays baseball with Beckham after his bath. Every night Beckham tells Butch to sit on one couch, me on the other (to watch, of course), then he needs his LSU hat- Butch also has to wear an LSU hat; he backs up to the front door and throws the baseball a minimum of ten times. Sometimes he's tired and doesn't want to do it as much, but some nights he'd throw it for hours. He's actually getting really good. We haven't mastered the whole catching thing but he throws the ball really hard. Butch just beams everytime he does it. It's so cute! I need to mention that he also throws the ball with both his left and right hand.

Black and Decker tool set- I'm the worst a buying and giving presents right before birthdays. So, naturally I bought this little tool kit about a month ago, and immediately gave it to Beckham. I should have waited, I know, but it was so cute and the tool look like real tools, which is why I think he likes them. Either way he has hammered every nail in our porch, tries his hardest to unscrew anything possible and carries around his tool box like he's a real handy man.

Beckham's Clubhouse- I couldn't find an exact picture of the Rainbow Play System that we bought, but this one is close enough. It has a rock wall, slide, three swings, clubhouse equipped with captains wheel and telescope, and under the clubhouse can be turned into a sandbox. After Beckham slid down the slide really fast a few times and hit his booty, he is a bit afraid of sliding by himself. Some days he'll climb right up and go, but other times he likes for someone to hold his hand or at least stand really close to the slide so they can slow him down.  He rarely uses the ladder now, he just climbs the rock wall. He has mastered the rock wall completely- doesn't use the rope at all. It was quite expensive, but I knew he would love it for years to come (and he does) so I'm happy with the purchase.

Mickey Mouse- Beckham has a mad obsession with Mickey Mouse, truly always has, but even more now than ever. After setting up the TV and DVD player in is room I bought a few movies for him to watch and the only thing he wants to watch is Mickey. Literally, the only movie that he has ever watched in his room in almost a month is Mickey. I have to find more Mickey movies because he is showing zero interest in any of the other movies I bought. Also, if I would have know how his love for Mickey would grow I would definitely had waited and done the Mickey party this year. However, I am still putting out the big Mickey wooden cutout by the driveway just because...

iPad and iPhone- This will probably never change throughout the course of Beckham's life, but he still is completely obsessed with electronics. I was sick of him constantly wanting to play with my phone I got to thinking about my old phone that he dropped in the toilet; I was wondering if it had dried out and possibly still worked. So, I plugged it in and sure enough- it works! So, Beckham now has his own iPhone. The screen comes on and all of the apps work, thankfully he can't actually text or call anyone (because that's his new favorite thing to do on my phone). He still loves the iPad and plays it almost every day. One of his favorite things to do on both the phone and the iPad is listen to music. He knows how to get to the radio and says "play me a good song" and starts dancing. I know I say it a lot, but he is seriously the smartest kid ever.

Anyways, those are just a few of his favorite things right now. He realllllly loves all things outside. I swear the child would sleep outside if we let him. The mosquitos are terribly bad right now, but he doesn't even pay any attention to them. He loves to do anything and everything outside. I'm what you would call, indoorsy....and it's approximately 1000 degrees right now, thankfully Butch could live outside too; so it's nice that they can hang out together outside (when I don't want to sweat my face off).  :)

high five for Friday!

1. Saturday we headed to Yaya and Grump's house to celebrate Mom's birthday a week early and catch up after their Alaskan vacation. We had a great time. We road in the boat, swam in the lake, all that fun summer stuff. It was a great time. I shockingly didn't get that many pictures- I guess we were having too much fun.

2. This week started off very crazy. While at my Mom's over the weekend, I got a call Sunday that my Dad had to have emergency surgery. My Dad rarely gets sick so I was a bit nervous. Beckham and I ended up leaving a little earlier than planned on Sunday so I could be at the hospital when Dad got out of recovery. Everything went as smoothly as possible but he was in a lot of pain. I ended up staying the night at the hospital Monday and came home Tuesday after lunch. To say I got little sleep is an understatement but I was happy I could be there for him. He even said, "boy I would have been in a bind if you hadn't stayed." That's his was of saying thank you. :)

3. OMG! I got Beckham's 2 year pictures back! I'm only going to share a few (or four) because I have two other posts in mind before his birthday so I'll be posting more later. I absolutely LOVE them!! I literally printed 107 total (5x7s and 4x6s) and got a 16x20! Ah! I'm obsessed!! I have never really been completely happy with any of his other pictures, but I am beyond pleased with them. Shout out to Sarah Farmer Photography.

4. I am in full on birthday planning mode. Cakes are ordered, decorations are being made, goodie bags, ordered tables, chairs, other random things....it's all coming into place. We are going this weekend to get food and a few things we've still got left to get on the list. I am sooo excited and utterly shocked that my baby boy is about to be two years old. It's sad and exciting. But, mostly sad! I just want him to stay little, but I am truly enjoying watching him grow and learn everyday. I could go on and on, but again...another post. :)

5. Lastly, today actually Thursday-  Beckham got an early birthday present from Maymay and Daddy Mac since they will be cruising on his actual birthday. They literally walked over a trampoline. It was amusing and scary seeing them cross the road, but they made it and boy, was Beckham excited to see it. He had jumped on a similar trampoline at a friend's house, which gave them the idea, but he loves it. He immediately wanted to get in the "jumpaline" as he calls it. It was so cute and wore him out, which always helps since he is a ball of energy 24/7.

high five for Friday!

Happy Fourth of July!!

Three in a row...I'm on fire! :) OMG It's July!! Where has the time gone? The Summer? Wow! Only two weeks left until Beckham's birthday...geez I'm not ready! This week was pretty uneventful. We had a pretty laid back week, which was nice. So here goes my recap.

1. Last Friday was my best friend's Gender Reveal Party. I 100% thought it was a boy. I was so confident- never for a second did I think it could possibly be a girl, but boy oh boy (no pun intended) was I wrong! It's a GIRL!!! I was shocked at first, in actual disbelief...but now I'm super excited!! Her name is Keely Kate (which I love for obvious reasons). Of course she'll be Beckham's little girl friend. Ahh I can't wait!

2. Saturday night was a rare occasion where I got to have a Girl's Night! I hadn't been out with my girl friends since Amber's birthday in January...yeah, way too long! Anyways we had a fun night out of the house and did a lot of little shopping for Keely. It really made me excited about her arrival in December. Girl stuff is so cute!

3. Random picture of Beckham throwing pears for the deer to eat behind Grami's house. He is definitely an outside boy!

4. Yesterday we had a play date with Kevin, Erin, and Jake. Beckham and Jake are only seven months apart and it is so fun to see them play together. Jake is just starting to talk and it's so cute how he says "Beck Um". We basically just ate, visited, and watched the kids play. I'm telling you...pretty uneventful week.

5. Our Fourth of July festivities included swimming, grilling, and eating red, white & blue popsicles. Ha! Butch grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, pork chops, and sausage and sauteed onions and squash. I made a peach cobbler with some fresh peaches. It was all delicious! Beckham actually ate two whole hot dogs and two popsicles. He didn't nap at all today and passed out around 10:00pm-which is really early considering how late he's been staying up.

Tomorrow morning we are headed to my Mom's to celebrate her birthday a little early. We also haven't seen them since there trip to Alaska, so I'm excited to hear about there travels and Beckham misses his Yaya!

That's all for this week... :)