6:17

The minute I became a Mama

Every year for 5 years I've snapped a pic of him at his birth moment. 

And I hope to do it every year for a long long time.

6:17pm January 25, 2006 Wright Patterson AFB Medical Center, Ohio

6:17pm January 25, 2007 at Mema and Pop's house, Pittsburgh, PA

 6:17pm January 25, 2008 Milano's Pizza with Mema and Pop Dayton, Ohio

 6:17pm January 25th, 2009 at home in Dayton, Ohio

 6:17pm January 25th, 2010 at Grandma and Grandpa's house Dayton, Ohio

 And at 6:17pm, the five year old, on January 25th, 2011 at Maggie Moo's in Annapolis, MD

Five years.  Five years of being a Mama.  Five years that I cannot sum up in words. 

Gosh, we love him.

Happy 5th Birthday Brady Bear.

the birthday party

Wow, another year has gone by.  I'm speechless.  Our little son is (almost) 5.  Oh sweet boy....

His Mickey Mouse cake that Mike and I worked on together....more Mike than me...I obtained the adorable cake topper (thank you etsy) and baked the cake, Mike iced/decorated it.  It is supposed to be Mickey Mouse's pants, what do you think?

 The pinata.  By the way, this picture reminds me that we were all wearing Mickey/Minnie clothing!

 Cake time!

 In the middle of his two best friends, Peyton and Nora. 

 This one makes me laugh, I was trying to get a pic of the 3 of them together sporting Mickey/Minnie clothing and this was the best I could do!  Lucy did at one point have leggings on but who knows what happened to them!

More birthday celebration pictures to come, his official day is on Tuesday where we will continue to let him know what a joy he is in our life.  5 wonderful, precious years.

alike.

so I'd say they are definitely sisters, what do you think?

Have a good weekend.

a wonderful surprise

I was going through some pictures from Christmas and I came across this one. 

I remember the moment well.  It was Christmas Day.  And this picture above that I will cherish always was taken by a world renowned photographer.

Brady.

He also took this self-portrait. 

Thank you little Bud.  I am forever grateful.  

The Essex Steam Train

Blogging, sadly, has taken a backseat to the daily grind of life.  I'm determined to get caught up though because all of these Christmas memories must be preserved.

We traveled to Connecticut on December 28th to visit Laura, Ben, Mckenna and Elly.  Grandma and Grandpa Zollars drove to Connecticut from Ohio.  On our first night there we rode the Essex Steam Train and once you see the pictures, you'll know that the kids had a magical, delightful time.

 Macy

 Elly and Laura

 Mckenna

 Mckenna and Lucy dancing...lots and lots of dancing on this train thanks to Reindeer Casey who appears in a picture later...

 Grandma (or Gram Gram if you ask Lucy what her name is) and Macy

 Santa delivering a fantastic ornament to each of the children.

Matching outfits.

 I was there.

 Elly

 I adore this picture of Brady.  He was having a blast dancing in the aisles.  And yes, that's Reindeer Casey in the background, he was awesome.

 Dancing in the aisles.

 I think they were learning the "sprinkler" dance or maybe the "shopping cart dance" in these pictures, you can see Brady and Lucy are doing the same move!

We had such a great night with the family, lots of laughter and smiles.  Great memories that we will cherish always.

just one

of an amazing train ride we took while in Connecticut.

His face says it all.