Firsts and Seconds

So I've been absent from blogging for a little while. Ok, more like 9 months, but who's counting?! I want to try to make a better effort, and figured since we've had a lot going on lately now was as good a time as any to update the masses.

So I've decided the theme of this post would be about recent Firsts and Seconds, since we have had several of those happening lately. For firsts, we celebrated Cassady's first birthday, and took his first trip to Florida. Yay for fun firsts!! Secondly (pun intended), we celebrated Cassady's second Easter, and most importantly want to share the news that we are expecting a second child, WHOO HOO! How's that for a big second?! I'll be 20 weeks along tomorrow (already half way there, yikes), and we expect to find out what we are having next Wednesday. That will of course be blog gold as well, but let's just take this one post at a time.

Cassady's birthday, our Florida trip and Easter all happened in the same week, so I'm basically just gonna throw a bunch of pictures of all the fun up here for you to enjoy. I'll start with the birthday party. Cassady's actual birthday was on April 1 (yes, April Fools Day, and for those that don't know or remember, the joke was on us because he was three weeks early!), but we waited until Saturday the 3rd to have a party. Lots of family made the long drive from middle and west Tennessee, and we felt so blessed that they were able to share in the fun and celebrate with us. The theme of the party was monkeys, and we had a blast playing with that as far as the decor and invitations were concerned. Here's a copy of the invitation we sent out:
For decor, I kept it pretty simple (traditional kid birthday stuff like balloons and streamers) but tried to incorporate the monkey theme into as much of it as possible. To seat everyone, we set up 3 card tables in addition to using our dining room table, so here are some shots of the tables and their center pieces.

Standard card table set up and center piece. You can't tell from the photo,
but we had little candles burning inside the mason jars

I also had a lot of fun with the favor bags. I shamelessly stole the idea from some super creative friends to make little fabric bags and stuff them with recipes that we served, seed packets and some candy. Also found this cute little monkey basket (which was recycled the next day as Cassady's Easter basket, score!) to display them all in!

You can't see the fabric very well, but it was a yellow and
green jungle print, perfect for our theme!

And for the big decor finale, here are some shots of the dessert table. Included in the menu were yummy "Going Bananas Cupcakes" and my mom's wonderful "Monkeying Around Banana Pudding." In addition to making and decorating the cupcakes, we also made a little mini smash cake for Cassady to dive into. Pictures of that to follow!

I'm not usually the crafty type, but I have to give a big pat on the back to myself,my mom and mother-in-law for how cute these cakes turned out!

A few general pics from the party and present opening:

Let's get this party started in here!

Laughing with G-dad

He started slow with the presents, but got the hang of it quickly.

And finally, after all the presents, it was cake time! I decided to save it for last, since I knew we'd have to probably whisk Cassady off to a bath immediately after. Like the presents he started cautiously, but was fully engaged in no time!

Overall, it was a wonderful day of celebration with our family, and we are just so grateful that they were all so very generous with our sweet boy!

Moving along to our next first, Cassady took his first trip to Florida recently, where we spent time with our college friends Craig, Allison, their 9 month old daughter (and Cassady's future love interest I'm sure) Evie, and Sarah and Brandon. Katie and William also made the trip down from Athens to hang with us all. Thanks so much for hosting us guys, we had a wonderful time!

Bestest friends!

The adorable Miss Evie

Deep thoughts

And lastly, we have a few pictures from Easter to share. Sadly after all of the planning and craziness of his birthday party the day before, we did not get around to doing an egg hunt, but still had a wonderful day!

The haul. I think the Easter bunny has a real thing for Cassady!
Either that or he employs a bunch of "helpers." *wink wink*

What do ya mean, the Bunny put up this gate on his way out?!

Must not want us to track him...

Well, I believe that's it for now. I will try my very best to continue updating, especially as we get closer to welcoming Cassady's little brother or sister into the family this fall!