What does a BIG ONE-YEAR OLD do on his birthday??

Marc took last Monday, May 11th off of work to celebrate our precious baby boy's first birthday! It was so nice to just spend a whole day together, just the 3 of us, after celebrating with all of our family and friends the whole weekend. We got ready and headed up to Bowling Green for Marc to sign some papers at his new work and to do some house-hunting. Mason woke up on Monday in the BEST mood all ready to be a big one-year old! He looked so cute! I dressed him in one of his birthday outfits from his Nana Kay. She loves buying him "big boy" outfits to make him look like a little man. I may be biased, but I think he may be a little heart-breaker some day! :) I sat him in this little rocker next to our bed while I was getting ready. I looked over at him, and he had grabbed one of Marc's Bibles off his nighstand and was flipping through like he was looking for a particular Bible story! It was the sweetest moment. We then perched him up in his high chair and fed him breakfast, but he was more interested in looking up and pointing at his birthday balloons. He had never really been around them before, but we have discovered that he is fascinated by balloons, I'm sure like most babies. They're still all floating around in random areas of our house, slowly deflating. We have to buy him some more to celebrate Memorial's Day or something when these are done!

We decided to go ahead and get his big boy car seat ready to try out on his first birthday. He weighs almost 17 pounds, not nearly enough to have to be out of his infant seat yet, but we thought we would go ahead and try it. Marc is dying for Mason to be able to sit forward-facing, but we still have a while longer for that to happen. We are so blessed by this car seat situation. One of Marc's co-workers (an attending physicial who we love) gave us all this stuff for Mason while we were still pregnant. We didn't realize then how much we would truly need and use every single item she gave us. One of those being a Britax Roundabout car seat! After doing my research, I saw where that is one of the best, safest car seats out there and pretty expensive. She saved us sooo much money! And I just to happen to come across a Britax car seat cover at the Encores & More sale back in March. There was pretty much just one at the whole sale and it happened to fit our car seat and was just $5!!!! I've looked online and the cheapest I've seen for one is around $50. And it's leopard-print!!! One of my fave prints! So, I washed it and got it all ready to put on Mason's "new" seat. It looks really nice all put together and in the car. And of course the little boy riding in it is the icing on the cake! :)

Also, I have to add, Mason loves this book set called "Brainy Baby." My parents bought it for him at Borders Bookstore and it's this little set of 4 books that deals with colors, shapes, and numbers. Maybe it's because they're bigger and thinner hat makes them easier for his little hands to hold, but Mason never puts them down. He migrates towards these books. Out of his one million toys & books, these are his favorite things. He especially loves #8 of the numbers book. He ends up on page 8 every time and stares and talks to the 8 different kinds of dogs that are shown on that page. It is so funny. He holds it so close to his face and moves his head back and forth like he is really studying them. Another part of books he likes to examine is the "Message to parents" section on the back cover of the book, you know, the paragraph explaining to parents how they can help the child be educated through the book! Mason is so concerned with that section, I guess to make sure he knows the job I'm supposed to be doing! Thank you.

Helping Daddy sign his paperwork at his new place of employment; Graves-Gilbert Clinic in Bowling Green. The Executive Secretary lady there kept asking Mason if he wanted all this stuff to eat and drink; things that I had never even considered giving him! BUT, since he IS one now, I have to be more lenient and venture out to try new things. So, Mason ended up eating his very first rice krispie treat. We had to carry it around with us the entire day for him to take random bites. I didn't want to give it to him all at once!

Driving along to meet our real estate agent. The birthday boy was a little worn out by that point.

Back at home that night. We decided to celebrate Mason's real birthday one more time before his first birthday came to an end. I guess I was just sad and wanted to prolong that day as long as I could! So, our child was allowed to stay up until 11 that night celerating. Hey, he's a big boy now, it's okay!! I brought back out some of his birthday decorations & accessories from the big party on Saturday.

Okay, Mom, you know I cannot stand things on my head! They bother me! Please get this off! Well, shoot, you're not fast enough! I'll get it off anyway that I can!

Sharing secrets with his cookie monster/octopus/work thang that his Great-MaMaw Myers got him... We can't figure out what in the world this thang is, but it's so interesting and Mason has bonded with "it."

My beautiful birthday boy sitting up so straight & tall!

Sleepy baby... We're trying to turn him into late-night party-ers like we are! :)

Bringing back the special birthday cupcake... Are we spoiling out son rotten by allowing him to eat this much sugar and have this much fun at 10 at night?!?!?!

I love this one! Mason always has so much fun with his Daddy!

One more dose of Praise Baby before bedtime... Oh, NOW he decides he likes his birthday hat!

Some fun time with his balloons before night-night

Looking at the Shutterfly book Mason & Marc made me for my birthday

Oh, this is the best... Marc and I have this obsession of tying the balloons onto our son and letting him crawl around the house with them following him. He doesn't even let it stop him though. Well, I did tie it on his ear the other day, and he didn't appreciate that too much.

We love you sweet birthday boy! It's been a week until your big day, and I'm still in disbelief that you're already that old! It's so strange not counting your birthday by months anymore, it's moved to the "years" category! We had his one-year check-up on Wednesday, so I'll blog soon about that and his latest milestones soon. We're so blessed by our healthy, energetic Mason Thomas!