Ryan's 1st Birthday Party

How fun to celebrate one year of life! We had a great day celebrating our little blessing. Here are some highlights:


He opened his very first gift from my sweet Aunt Patrice in Arizona. She didn't tape the paper, so it was easy for him to open, he LOVES books right now, so he was very excited to get a new book. :)

During his afternoon nap, I finished frosting and decorating the his cake. I made a non-sugar carrot cake. I wasn't sure about it, but I knew that I since he hasn't had any sugar, I didn't want to overload him right before bed time. :) I found the recipe on wholesomebabyfood.com, a blog that I have loved and used a lot when I was introducing Ryan to new pureed foods. It was great, a little heavy, and it was more like a carrot bread rather than cake, but he seemed to enjoy it. :) The cream cheese frosting did have a little bit of powdered sugar in it, so he got a little taste :)

I also had fun with a bit of decorating:

 

Since it was a Wednesday night, we invited some of our sweet San Diego friends to come and have dinner and celebrate with us. Having people over was such a blessing to me because the transition from Fresno to San Diego has been hard, but these past few months we have seen that we are forming friendships here, and God is faithful. He does know the desires of our hearts and desires to give us community. We treasure our new friendships. The people who joined us were; the Hiltons:  Jason grew up as a missionary kid with Ann, and when we moved down here, Ann and her husband Michael have been amazing at inviting us over for dinner, to Bible Study and to do things together. They have a sweet little two year old and new baby boy. We are thankful for the times we have with them. We get along with them very well and know that with three little ones, it's always an adventure! :) We also had Derrick and Laurel Miller over. They are our one friends that we knew from Fresno. Laurel has been one of my closest friends since college and she is a treasure in my life, someone who I know I will always be close with. :) Derrick is the Pastor (and our friend from college) of Mosaic, where we are really connecting and loving. Our other new friends are Trevor, Carolyn and their 10 month old daughter Shylah. We are the only ones with babies at Mosaic, so we had an instant connection. We are really enjoying getting to know our new friends and have a great time when we are together.
 

We had a great time and are thankful that we were able to celebrate with friends. Here are a few more pictures of the night: 

The night ended with a fun bath with Ryan's girl: Shylah!

Happy Birthday to our sweet boy! Looking forward to watching you grow into the man that God has created you to be! We love you more than the world!