Good-bye 2013!

The last day of the year is here and I have to say 2013 treated us very well, but it went by way too fast!

• We celebrated Ethan's 1st New Years, Valentine's Day and Easter
• We celebrated our little prince's 1st year with a Mickey-themed party
• We went on our first family vacation to Marco Island, FL
• We celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary
• We completed one home improvement project this year by adding a craft desk for me
• I opened an Etsy store
• We got to witness Ethan's first steps 
• We got to enjoy an amazing Summer with lots of adventures
• I started running and trained and completed my first 5K race and a second
• We enjoyed lots of fun holiday activities like apple picking, pumpkin picking, pumpkin painting, playing in the leaves, Thanksgiving and Christmas

We are so blessed and have so much to be thankful for. 2013 is going to be a tough act to follow, but I look forward to seeing what 2014 will bring! I hope everyone has a safe and happy New Year's Eve. Happy New Year everyone!

2013: The Year in Review

2013 was a fantastic year for our family. We watched our little boy grow from a baby to a toddler, hear his first words, crawl for the first time, and watched him take his first steps. We did many fun things as a family and I will cherish those memories forever, but I don't want to forget them so here is a recap of all our exciting moments from 2013!

January

We celebrated Ethan's first New Year's with friends and family.

Our little man turned 8 months

February

We hosted a Super Bowl party for our family and friends

Ethan went in the snow for the first time and was not amused

Our little angel turned 9 months

We celebrated Ethan's first Valentine's Day

Ethan rode Bubba!

March

Our little bunny turned 10 months

Ethan met the Easter Bunny

We decorated Easter eggs with Ethan for the first time

Ethan opened his first Easter basket

We had a wonderful first Easter with Ethan

April

Ethan experienced bubbles for the first time and loved them!

First time on a swing!

Ethan turned 11 months

May

We celebrated Ethan's amazing first year with a Mickey-themed party

Ethan went to Disney World for the first time

We discovered Ethan is a total water baby on our first family vacation to Marco Island

I celebrated my 2nd Mother's Day in paradise!

Ethan was a total road warrior on our drive to and from Florida. He traveled through 6 states and survived more than 40 hours in the car!

We celebrated 5 wonderful years of marriage

June

Daddy surprised Ethan with a new play kitchen for our little chef!

Ethan turned 13 months

We celebrated Michael's 2nd Father's Day!

Michael and his Dad built me a beautiful new craft desk

We made our first trip to the zoo!

We visited the Morton Arboretum for the first time and became members we loved it so much. We visited almost weekly the rest of the summer and into October.

July

We celebrated the 4th of July with our little patriot

We took Ethan to the movies for the first time to see Despicable Me 2!

Ethan turned 14 months

We continued our weekly visits to the Arboretum

Our big boy took his first steps and became a full time walker!

August

We visited the Children's Museum for the first time and Ethan loved it!

We introduced Ethan to one of our favorite places, Lake Geneva!

We took Ethan to touch-a-truck

Ethan turned 15 months

We spent every Friday at the Morton Arboretum

We discovered our favorite new park, Northside in Wheaton

We took Ethan to the Chicago Botanic Garden for the first time and he loved it!

We discovered a choo choo restaurant super close to our house and Ethan was obsessed

Ethan went to a splash park for the first time and loved it!

September

Ethan and I started taking weekly hikes at the Morton Arboretum

I started doing a weekly craft with Ethan 

Ethan turned 16 months

We had so much fun apple picking

I trained all Summer to run my first 5K and I did it!

We took Ethan to the fire department for an open house

October

We kicked off the Halloween season by making some fun crafts

Ethan turned 17 months

We had so much fun on our annual pumpkin patch visit

We had so much fun playing in the leaves this year

Ethan had so much fun painting pumpkins this year

We had an awesome Halloween trick or treating with our little minion!

November

We continued to have lots of fun in the leaves

Ethan turned 18 months

We set up our tree a little early so we could set up Ethan's new train and he is obsessed!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with our families

Ethan got to help put up Grandma and Papa's great tree this year

December

Our little boy is officially in love with Christmas!

We took Ethan to Winter Wonderland to look at all of the lights

We continued our tradition of making a family ornament

Ethan was not a fan of Santa

We made up for the Santa visit with a train ride

We visited Illumination at the Morton Arboretum and Ethan's favorite part was the trains, not the lights!

I ran my second 5K in -5 degree weather!

We had our first snow and Ethan wasn't too sure what to make of it

Ethan turned 19 months

We built our first family gingerbread house

We sent out our second Christmas card as a family

We started a new annual tradition with our nieces and nephew hosting the 1st ever Cousins Christmas Camp Out

We made fun Christmas crafts

Michael and I went to our first Chicago Blackhawks game together

We baked lots of delicious Christmas treats

We had wonderful Christmas celebrations with our little man and our families

We went to Holiday Magic at the Brookfield Zoo and saw a lot of animals, pretty lights and some choo choos!