Birthday Post (A little delayed...)

This is just a random pic in one of his Beatles shirts.


This was on Brendan's birthday. We took him and my friend Jamie's little girl Ellie to Moody Gardens to see the Aquarium Pyramid.


A pic of Brendan, Ellie, Jamie, Shannon, and me.


Brendan and Daddy

I thought this was adorable!

Our sweet kiddos practicing walking.

In case you were curious, Brendan is the same height as a Macaroni Penguin. Of course now I think he's closer to the Gentoo. He's reaching for doorknobs now (yikes!).

This was a little tank that had some coral and stuff. Brendan decided it was his own personal tap dancing floor. Silly boy!

Confined to the strollers again, poor kids!

There's a part in the aquarium where you get to walk through a tunnel and Brent took this amazing picture of the Stingray. So pretty!

"Look at the penguin Mommy"

The penguins were definitely Brendan's favorite. Which is funny, cause if you remember my post from last May when Brent and I went to aquarium when I was still pregnant, Brendan was kicking when we were watching the penguins :-)

That night Nana and Papaw took us to Pappasito's to celebrate. Brendan got dessert to go.

And since it was a Mexican restaurant, we had to take the birthday sombrero picture. It was a little big for him, hehe.

Cute pic in his Old Navy Hawaiian shirt. I love Hawaiian shirts.

The birthday party! Just some pics of the decor.

Cookie cake! Had to start him young. I wanted a Mickey Mouse but a certain cookie cake company can't do Mickey cause he's copyrighted. So we got a froggy instead.

We had enough people invited that we got a second cake just in case. Good thing we did! Though there was plenty for us to enjoy well into my birthday.

The Mickey decor.

Lighted candle!

Tired baby boy. He didn't have a nap all day before the party. So once he got the sugar of the cookie cake and ice cream AND sherbet punch, he started to have a sugar crash.

More sleepy boy.

Gotta love birthday hats!

So it's a tradition, apparently, to let 1 year olds have a cake to smash separate from the cake that everyone eats. So we just bought a litle ready-made cake at Walmart for that.

At first he just kind of looked at it wondering what he was supposed to do. Then, after a little help from Brent's cousin, he started playing with it more.

The aftermath! It took a while to clean him up. But he managed to keep his shirt clean! After clean-up we opened presents and he got sleepier and sleepier but never fussy. When everyone except for the adult-kids (those of us who are grown-ups but not yet 30 so we're not ready to admit it yet) stayed around putting together toys for Brendan. He actually stayed awake through all of that and then when I started feeding him dinner, he fell asleep. He had a great birthday and he loves all of his new toys, books, and clothes!

And if you thought that was all to the birthday week... Sunday was Parent Dedication Sunday because it was also Father's Day. Our church dedicates the new babies on Mother's Day and Father's Day each year. Brendan was born after Father's Day last year so we ended up having the oldest baby this day. He was so cute in his little suit! And just like every good toddler should, he made noises at the appropriate moments to make everyone laugh.

Another picture of the happy family.

So now I should probably change the name of the blog because once Brendan turned 1 the emails I get from BabyCenter.com changed to My Toddler. Hard to believe how fast this year has gone by. It has been a wonderfully fun year and I am so proud of our baby boy!

STEPS!!!!

So I worked from home today because I had to stay with Brendan. Lol, that made it sound like I didn't want to. Not true! I had a great time today. We've been walking with Brendan while he holds onto one or both of our hands and he's been doing really well. Today I held his hands and then let go and he was taking a step or so but nothing major. I tell Brent this when he gets home and he's like ooh, get down on the floor and let's see if he'll do it again. So we sit on the floor Brent holds Brendan up and lets go... Brendan takes 5 steps! We were so excited. So we try again and again and again and he keeps taking steps between us. Then he got tired the instant we took out the camera to tape him doing it. We call everyone of course. Shannon comes over later and we show her. I got out the camera and here it is ladies and gentlemen... the video of Brendan taking steps! Enjoy!

Oh, and sorry about the switching back and forth from sideways to upright on the video. I was trying to tape and watch and catch the baby boy, hehe.

Aunt Krystal's Wedding and other cuteness

Our Piano Man, hehe.


I thought I'd let him play in a diaper box and he did this and decided he didn't like boxes.


Playing in the entryway


These next few photos are all ones Brent took of sleepy Brendan

3 generations of Beans in tuxes.

Silly Brendan

Mommy and Brendan

Grandma and Brendan

Brendan has some big shoes to fill!

Brendan was getting sleepy before the wedding started. This is Brent's cousin Brian.

Great Uncle Ronnie brought Papaw a talking birthday card which quickly became Brendan's toy. He kept opening and closing it so we heard the first 2 words over and over and over...

Brendan finally crashed after the ceremony. We had been there since Noon and this was about 3 o'clock.

Uncle Pat is holding Brendan for the garter toss, hehe.

Brendan found a friend.

Then he chased her around the reception hall.

Video 1 is our Piano Man in action, 2 is our little drummer boy, 3 is practicing waving, and 4 is Brendan the Lion Tamer.

Brendan has no desire to walk right now. He does really well when you hold his hands and will sometimes walk when you hold just one hand. He's getting better and standing without support too. And if you push something he can hang onto, he'll walk along. No words yet either but lots of sounds. And he has his first cold right now :-( I hope he gets over it before his party next weekend. I cannot believe a) that he's almost a year old and b) that we almost made it a year without a cold. I'm hoping that means that he got his Daddy's immune system! That's about it for now. I'm hoping to do a post soon to catch up on all of the professional pics.

Warning... this post will be long

Brendan and his Great-Mamaw.



Brendan with Grandma and me and Grandpa in the background at Brendan's first car show!

A big toothless grin. Man... I really am behind with posting these!

Sitting in a truck with Grandpa.

This was one of the neatest cars we saw that day.

Brendan passed out in his playpen.

Playing with his piano. Which by the way, he's gotten very good at since Uncle Matthew showed him how to play a real one recently!

Playing with Jordan on our new couch (new in January that is). Jordan was not amused.

I thought this was a funny face. We are doing much better without our pacifier these days. He really only needs it for sleeping but if he sees it during the day he grabs for it immediately.

Soon after this picture, I decided to retire this toy. It's really sad... he's getting so big!

Our son likes to lick our walls...

Brendan in another one of Daddy's baby outfits. This one says Little Slugger on it.

I keep trying to get Brendan to swing the bat at his baseball toy. We're almost there!

Too cute. And the blur in the front is Jordan, the kitty.

What did I do?! (I have a feeling this will be the theme of pics of Brendan for the next, oh, 17 years!

I think this was taken in February or March... he can't stand under the table anymore.

Ooo... TV. He was probably watching Mickey.

Brendan's first Easter! Isn't he cute?! I was proud I got us both ready for church since Daddy was working. But Aunt Shannon did spend the night so she helped us out a lot!

Playing at Grandma's house on Easter Sunday.

Another of Daddy's VERY 80's outfits. Actually, this one could've passed for 70's I think.

Another Daddy shirt and a great toothy grin.

Daddy was playing dress-up with Brendan this day... can ya tell? This was one of Daddy's sweaters.

Brendan fell asleep shortly after this was taken.

Playing with his car at Grandma's house. We were cracking up because he'll put both hands on the wheel, he'll play with the "mirrors", put his hand on the gear shift, and talk on his cell phone. The things toys teach our children...

Having fun with Uncle Matthew! The Rockets were playing one night when we were over and Brendan was playing. All of a sudden everyone cheered at something (I wasn't paying attention... not a basketball fan) and Matthew tends to be quite loud when he cheers. It startled Brendan and he just stared at Matthew. He went to pick Brendan up and Brendan started bawling. Poor baby... Uncle Matthew scared him. It was pretty funny though :-)

Okay, now the videos! These first 3 are attempts to show Brendan pulling up to standing. Note that the old couch is there so this is late December or early January. The next video is Brendan laughing histerically at the kitty. He loves animals! And finally, a much more recent video, is Brendan clapping! Our future drum major.

Brendan has 6 teeth now, at least that's all I can see. He is also getting so close to standing without support. He will for a few seconds sometimes but it's usually when he is mad or frustrated or after something he really wants. He's getting his 10 month pictures taken today. I need to post 8 and 9. We counted his pictures with his cousins (once removed? I keep forgetting to check... but my cousin's daughters) as his 9 month ones cause we were VERY busy that month. June is going to be a crazy month. Brent's sister is getting married June 6th, Brendan's birthday is the 18th, mine is the 24th, there's a possible trip to Corpus one weekend, and of course Father's Day is in there too. I will TRY to keep this more up-to-date. Though I would expect the same lack of posts next tax season. When you're working close to 60 hours per week, that's just what happens. I think that's all for now!