Birthday week!

We celebrated Grant's first birthday while spending the week in Kimberling City, MO with Shannon's family. Shannon's Grandma, Mimi, has a time share in Kimberling City, which is close to Branson and right off Table Rock Lake. We took a lot of pictures, so like last time, I'll write less and show more.

Here's the view from the condo

Tuesday, June 29th was Son-in-law day (a holiday that even Hallmark hasn't started selling cards on yet), so naturally we celebrated with everything that I love. That meant lots of games, Reese's, cashews and steak.

Grant and I showing Mimi, Val, and Jeremy's how it is done

Yes that is steak, brats, and turkey tenderloin (Yum!)

Wednesday was Grant's actual birthday and also the busiest day for us. We filled the day with Go-Kart racing, the Cirque Montage show, and of course celebrated the big 1!

B-day boy around some of his presents

After the first race, notice who's in first. I didn't see what happened behind me,
either Valerie can't drive or her dad spun her out. Either one is possible...

The best picture that Shannon could get of all 4 us. Once again, notice who is in front.

The Cirque Montage show was very cool. For the entire two hours, Grant was glued to the acrobats and was dancing or clapping to the music. Afterwards, we were able to get a picture with some of the performers. Grant showed off how much he was paying attention when one of the acrobats held him up in the air with one hand. Grant immediately threw his arms straight up. The performers loved it. And a star was born.



That night we celebrated Grant's birthday with some angel food cake. We thought that he might like it and were hoping that we would not strike out again since he didn't like the chocolate cake that Shannon made for him the previous weekend. Unfortunately (I guess), we are 0 for 2 in the cake department.



Thursday we rented a boat and tried out some water skiing and tubing. Grant went out on the lake with us for a little bit and really seemed to like it. He kept rocking his head forward wanting us to go faster when we would slow down.

The good news: those pasty white arms didn't get sunburned.
The bad news: those arms are still pasty white.

Here's semi-pro water skier, Shannon, showing us all how it is done

Here's me in between curses right after I got dragged through the water, not on the water.

I got to captain the boat while Jim was showboatin'

It was a perfect week with family and away from work. It's crazy to think that Grant is now a year old. I guess time really does fly when you're having fun.

1st Birthday Party!

Sorry Erin, I meant to post the pictures from Grant's 1st birthday party before we left for our trip to Kimberling City, MO, but we got too busy packing for our 6am flight Monday morning (what were we thinking booking a 6am flight?!). Hopefully I can post the pictures from his actual birthday sometime early this week.

Since we were going to be out of town the week of Grant's birthday and this weekend is July 4th, we decided to have some people over to celebrate the big event, last weekend. It was somewhat stressful planning a party right before going out of town, but it was definitely worth it. Shannon and I went back and forth on what exactly we wanted to serve at the party. We both thought that it would be good to fire up the grill (brats, sliders and sweet potato fries), but couldn't decide on what kind of dessert to have. I wanted homemade ice cream with different toppings and Shannon wanted to make a special cake for his birthday... so we compromised and had both! It was a great decision in my opinion. Shannon made a fantastic looking monkey cake and I prepared a ridiculous amount of ice cream toppings (but the best topping by far was the Reese's syrup!).

A delicious layered chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, donut ears, sprinkles for hair and peppermint patty eyes.

Grant with his girls, Mich, Casey, and Erica

Party people

Singing 'Happy Birthday'

Grant staring at his cake (he did not dig right in)

Shannon offering him some (he did not want any part of it)

Grant finally trying a little bit (he still didn't really want it)

Still doesn't want to eat the cake, but he's having fun anyway

...it sure was fun to play with at least

Grant with his buddy Andrew and his dad, Chris

Even though we've already shown quite a few pictures in this post, we wanted to share some from Grant's last swimming lesson. He is now a graduate of his first parent-tot swimming class!

Grant playing on the swimming mat

Before going under water

Just after coming out of the water (he usually does pretty good with that)

For the finale, Shannon and Grant had to go down the slide

P.S. Happy 4th of July from our family to yours!