Justin's 1st Birthday Party!!!!

On Sunday, September 2nd we had Justin's 1st Birthday Party at my Aunt Connie and Uncle Dave's house (Justin's godmother). His real birthday is not until Friday, but we wanted to take advantage of the long weekend!

THANK YOU SO MUCH AC & UD FOR OPENING UP YOUR HOME TO ALL OF OUR FAMILY AND FRIENDS - IT MEANS ALOT TO US!!!!!!

These pictures are in no particular order (because I am too lazy to arrange them cronologically!). I will put another post up with cake pictures - that deserves it's own post :)

Thank you to everyone (we had over 40 people!!!) who travelled to Chicago for Justin's party. I know that some people would have rather been elsewhere on a holiday weekend, but it was really special to have so many of our family and friends all together to celebrate our little angel's special day!




Uncle Ryan, Aunt Amanda and Justin ready to go to the party!!!













Justin getting the party started right :)




















Aunt Michelle & Uncle Tom













Me and my little angel....











Our happy family!













Everyone eating up yummy appetizers!














Uncle Jeff, Justin and Aunt Buzzy














Opening his first set of Legos that he got from Daddy!













Ooops...this is from Saturday :)



















So is this one...I know that you're not intentionally flipping me the bird little man!












Both of Justin's Grandpas.....














Aunt Connie and Uncle Dave - so cute!!!












The Metzler Family - started out with 5 and now we're up to 9!!! I love this picture :)














Uncle Mikey and Sandra...

Hurry up! Who's going to be the first one to change their facebook/myspace profile pic??? :)











Justin's cakes - more on these to follow!

We could not find an animal cake (to match the party theme), so we bought these wooden animals at a craft store and super-glued toothpicks to the feet and made our own...I think it turned out pretty cute!














Justin's Great Grandpa and Grandpa....they are both GREAT though :) Love you both!














Uncle Ryan and Aunt Amanda - again...hurry up; who's going to be the first to use this pic??? :)













Justin's Great Grandpa and Great Grandma Metzler














Megan, Morgan and Sandra













Grandpa Brooks and Great Grandma Metzler














Justin playing with his 1st birthday balloon.













Uncle Ryan, Aunt Amanda, Uncle Mikey and Sandra got Ryan his first power wheels toy - he likes to push it around though more than ride on it so far :)












I think that Justin is telling Alec that he doesn't care how it runs on power - he wants to push!!!

He actually got two 4-wheelers for his birthday! What a lucky one year old :)












The Brooks clan hanging out at the party!

Random fun times with family!

Sorry - slowly but surely I'll get up all of the pictures from this past weekend. When me and my mom are together it seems like we have 100's of pictures...oh wait; we do!

Here are some random shots from just hanging out at our house with our family. I loved just having everyone there when we got up. We have no cable at our house (since we don't live there anymore!), so we played Wii most of the weekend. Justin loves to mimick what we do as you will see in a few pics below!





Megan and Justin playing in the backyard.













Uncle Mikey and Justin being goofy!













Justint thinking he's really playing Wii :)






















I want to be just like my daddy!!!!

Justin's 1st Haircut!

I know that I said I didn't want his hair cut before his 1st birthday, but it was getting so scraggly looking! We took him on Friday afternoon - 5 of us (Me, Rob, Justin, Grandma Metzler and Megan) walked in for one hair cut :)



He was really good! It was right before his nap time so he was pretty tired and just sat there the whole time...much better than I expected!













Okay Grandma - enough with the camera :)













I'm not going to smile!!!













Okay; if I smile will you put the camera away??

Start of a fun weekend!!!

Rob and I left for Elgin on Thursday after work. We got there around 8:30pm and then Grandpa and Grandma Metzler got there around 10pm. It was SO NICE to be able to just hang out, relax and play with Justin!

On Friday afternoon we went to BW's for lunch...this was Justin's last lunch with long hair :)







Grandma Metzler and Justin













Justin being goofy :)














The crew!

Video-fest

Here are a couple of videos from the last week...

He loves drinking his bath water :( It grosses me out, but he'll find any way he can to do it - frisbee, Loons mini helmet, squish ball, etc. Here's his latest fun....








He is also becoming quite the little walker!!!

Hair loss...

Well, unless he does something really cute tonight, this is the last time you will see Justin with long hair! Last night in the bath tub we saw how long it really is when it's wet....I could dress him in pink and call him Justina :)

Tomorrow morning we are going to Chicago for his 1st birthday party (we're having it on Sunday - a little early, but taking advantage of the long weekend). We are going to find somewhere around there so he can look nice and clean cut for his party!

We are SO EXCITED to see everyone this weekend :) Yeah!!!!!

Sunday Evening Report

We had a great weekend! As you can see from the last two posts, Saturday was pretty busy. Sunday we took things easy and didn't have a schedule at all - it was nice! We were up at 6:30am and out the door to go grocery shopping by 7:30am. If you would have told me 5 years ago that I'd be at Kroger at 7:30am on a Sunday morning I would have told you that you were crazy :) We also went shopping for plates/napkins/cups/etc for Justin's 1st Birthday Party!!!! I can NOT believe that he is almost one already. We are having his party this coming Sunday since it's a long weekend. I am so excited to see everyone!!!!




Justin styling in his new shirt and Nike Shox.....


















Ignore the drool all over his chin - he's been drooling a lot; maybe getting more teeth to add to the 10 he already has!













Justin got really, really bad diaper rash on Thursday night. Friday it got worse and I got a prescription cream from the doctor. She told us to leave his diaper off as much as we could to get air on it - so here he is loving life without a diaper! He did pee on the floor once...oh well; it's apartment carpet :)










The dogs kept walking in front of me, but I love how he's giggling in this one...




The next Tiger Woods???

Fun afternoon with the girls....

On Saturday afternoon, I met Katie, Britta, Sandy and Erin at the nail salon for pedicures and then it was off to Kickapoo Creek Winery. It was a fun mini-bachelorette party afternoon for Katie who is getting married September 1st.

Rob and I wish you all the love & happiness in the world Katie and Josh!!! Have fun on your big day :)

Dinner with the Gibsons

On Saturday evening we went to dinner at Rob's bosses house. Russ (his boss) and his wife Denise have an 18 month old son Luke. It was really fun to get to know them better and it was really nice that their house is already child proof and full of age appropriate toys!!!!




Justin playing on Luke's play set. I really wish we had a yard so we could get one for Justin!!!


















He LOVED the swing....again - wishing we had a yard!!!!


















Everytime we let him wander he went right to the stairs. He was getting pretty fast at making it to the top!!!



















Russ and Justin














Daddy and Justin

Operation Get Fit!!!

I am tired of feeling fat. I finally realized that I am the only one who can do something about it too.... so I am going to try!!!

I bought a pair of Nike Shox Remix yesterday that I can use with my iPod. For those of you who don't know how it works there is a chip in the bottom of my left shoe that talks to a reciever that I plug into my iPod. Then it tracks my workouts as I run. I put a little tracker on the side of the blog too, that way if I slack off everyone will know it - motivation :)

Please ignore the time it takes me to do these miles for now...I have not run unless being chased since high school track 9 years ago! Plus the way I went today was really hilly and it was windy. Next time I am going to take Quincy and Tucker with me - they can pull me up the hills!

Have a great weekend! I am off to a bachelorette fun afternoon with Katie and the girls and then we are having dinner at Rob's bosses house. Nothing like packing on quadruple the calories I burned this morning!!!