happy thanksgiving

We had a busy weekend filled with many fun family activities. On Wednesday we hung around the house with Aunt Keri and Aunt Lori and helped Grandma prep for our Thanksgiving feast. Of course and as karma would have it, Jackson came down with a cold for the holiday. We decided to not spend the night at my parent's house, but drove back down to Toms River on Thanksgiving day. It was a good thing too-Jackson was up all night! We helped Grandma prepare the food and celebrated with the family and Aunt Peggy and Uncle Leighton. Later in the evening we got to see Nana and PopPop. On Saturday, Aunt Keri & Aunt Lori, Grandma, & Grandpa took Jackson to pick out their family Christmas tree. Aunt Lori made sure to teach Jackson that the best Christmas tree is one with lots of room underneath for presents :)

my baby is ONE!

I CANNOT believe that a whole year has gone by and Jackson is now ONE! CRAZY, CRAZY, CRAZY!!! He's gotten so big and is soo active. It makes me sad when I go through his clothes and know that he'll never wear them again.

For his birthday party we went with a sock monkey theme, and I even went as far as dressing Jackson accordingly....in a sock monkey hat and color coordinating clothes, of course! ha! We invited family and friends over to celebrate Jackson's first year, and boy was our house crowded. Thankfully I was wise and arranged to have a bounce house in the backyward for the kids and they all LOVED playing outside & jumping around. And by kids I mean Keri, Lori, Bill, and Becky :)

where did october go??!!

So October was kind of a crazy month, and was over before I knew it! Between celebrating my birthday (glad that one quickly passed by!), going to Disney for Meghan & Mark's wedding, and then heading out to California, we spent the majority of the month on an airplane. Of course, we had the camera with us, but didn't take many pictures. So here's a verbal highlight of the month :) We had a blast spending a long weekend in Disney with my girlfriends from high school. It was fun to get away and be in warm, sunny weather. We never made it to the Magic Kingdom, but we figured Jackson, one, doesn't even know what it is, and two, wouldn't even remember it. We'll take a trip to Disney when he's older and it's worth it. From there, we headed out to California. While Bill attended a conference in LA, Jackson and I hung out in Santa Monica. We spent the day(s) running and walking/strolling around an outdoor shopping mall. We then had the opportunity to visit Bill's aunt & uncle's house in Malibu. What a beautiful house right on the ocean! It was amazing to be able to sleep with the windows/doors open and hear the waves crashing on the beach. It was great to be able to spend some quality family time with just the 3 of us. Once we landed back in NJ, it was back to reality and prepping for.....JACKSON'S FIRST BIRTHDAY!!!