Happy birthday to you, "baby" Luke!

I can't believe our sweet little Luke is officially one! People weren't kidding when they said time would go by in the blink of an eye! As much as I miss our tiny baby boy who struggled to gain weight his first 4 months of life, I am completely in love with the one year old little boy he has become. 

For Luke's 1st birthday we decided to have family over for his party. As much as we really wanted to have our friends and their little ones, it was probably better we just had the 20 family members we invited. I don't know where anyone else would have sat, stood, ate, etc. in our house! Luke is pretty lucky to have most of his family members living so close to us that we are able to get together throughout the year, rather than just as Thanksgiving and Christmas. 

I promised myself, well, Jeremy, that I would not go too crazy getting ready for Luke's birthday. I realize he is only one and doesn't really get the concept of a birthday party or decorations, but I also love planning, organizing, and creating. So, it is what it is. I had fun making banners and signs and pulling together decorations for his monkey-themed first birthday. (We chose a monkey theme because the little guy loves his monkey paci. He really only uses it at nap time and bedtime. It's going to be a sad day when monkey goes away...which should be sometime soon. Luke lights up and gets so excited when we bring monkey out at night.)

Here is a peek at the decorations I made for Luke's birthday...

1st birthday banner

above the food table

chips and queso were on the counter, too

homemade cupcakes with monkey toppers

My dad insisted we have party hats...a few people embraced them!

Luke's smash cake my dad had made.

Other than dropping the entire bowl of banana pudding right in front of Luke 30 minutes before the party started, everything else went well! I was so worried that the bowl had hit Luke, but thankfully, it didn't! My in-laws saved the day by going to the store to get some more pudding to recreate what we lost.

Oooo, cake!

Someone could have cared less about taking our family picture...he was ready to dig in!

Yummm!

Destruction! I've been told Luke is the neatest eater in his class...

Luke and his grandparents...look who's still eating!

presents, galore

Where is all of this stuff going to go???

Luke's birthday loot!

Once the party was over, we had family nap time. We were all exhausted! We did find time to take a stroll to the park. Check out Luke's new ride!

Thanks, Mom and Dad, for my new wagon!

I think he likes it!

Happy birthday, sweet Luke! We love you!