Celebrating Emmett's 2nd Birthday!

We had my parents over this evening to celebrate Emmet's second birthday a day early since my dad is scheduled to have shoulder surgery tomorrow.  Plus, since I am busy half of the day now with homeschool responsibilities, it is much easier for me to bake and decorate a cake and make a dinner on Sunday instead of a school day.  We spent a pleasant evening tonight celebrating our favorite, little baby and the two years of life that he has spent with us.  I know that I have said this many times before, but I just cannot believe how fast these past two years have gone.  They have simply been a blur both before and after the pandemic hit.  I have tried to treasure every day with Emmett during these "baby years" of his life and now that he has moved on to the toddler stage, I feel like I barely remember anything.  However, I can say with 100% surety that I am so grateful that this special boy of ours came into our family two years ago.  Within a matter of days after arriving, he became the center of our little universe.  Everyone just adores him to pieces and still finds joy every day in watching him discover new things and say and do funny things.  The kids never mind when they are asked to watch him (which is a lot these days) and are so protective and careful around him for the most part.  I honestly cannot imagine our lives without him and it is really hard to remember what life was like before he joined our family.  But, I digress....

So, although we only invited my parents to join us for Emmett's birthday party, there was still plenty of noise and energy as Ella was so excited all evening long that she was practically bouncing off the walls before hand, during dinner, gift opening, and dessert, and even while getting ready for bed.  The poor thing kept on getting in trouble by her dad, but we all survived.  Emmett really was fascinated by his Elmo cake and kept on saying "Elmo" every time we wished him a happy birthday.  He also really enjoyed playing with his train and car toys that he got as presents and loved eating every bite of his cake and ice cream.  Although he really had no idea what was going on, he seemed to enjoy himself and understand that something special was happening tonight that centered around him.  Here are a few pictures of our evening...

The group gathered around the dining room table at the beginning of dinner.  We feasted on pot roast, garlic mashed potatoes, asparagus, rolls, and tossed salad.  Since Emmett is too young to request a dinner, I enjoyed planning and preparing my own dinner of choice. :-)

Our sweet Emmett getting ready to open up his gifts.

Emmett getting grandma's and Ella's help opening up his first gift--a few packs of new ya-yas that Ella wrapped herself!

Emmett looking over one of the three "Little Owl" books that he opened.  We fell in love with this board book series when we got one of these books as a baby gift for Ella.  It wasn't until years later, after Emmett was born, that I discovered the author has written several more.  We all just love the pictures and the stories in these books.

Lia and Ella helping Emmett open up a new, Elmo DVD.

Emmett trying to open up his new Elmo movie with a very excited Ella hanging all over him.

Emmett enjoyed ripping out the pieces of tissue paper from his gift bags after his sisters showed him how to do this.  Here he is working on opening up one of his gift bags with Lia's help.

Emmett got a few plastic plates, cups, and silverware with sport balls, sharks, or construction themes on them.  Here he is trying to drink from his new cup covered in all sorts of balls (which he LOVES at the current moment).

Emmett received several more wooden train cars to go with his expanding train set that he got for Christmas.  Since Ron had already set up the track around the coffee table, Emmett loved adding more trains to it and pushing them along throughout the evening.

Emmett moved away from the train tracks to push his Bertie the Bus on the outside of the stairs.  I just had a get a picture of this as I thought it was so cute.

Logan and Emmett playing with the trains while we finished opening up gifts.

We headed back to the dining room to sing "Happy Birthday" to Emmett and to enjoy eating cake and ice cream.  Here is a picture of the Elmo cake that I made freehand.  I thought it turned out pretty cute.

A somewhat confused and happy Emmett half smiling while we sang "Happy Birthday" to him.

Mama helping Emmett blow out his two candles.

Taking a picture before cutting into the cake.

Another pic of the birthday boy with his cake, his mama, and his siblings.

Emmett thoroughly enjoying his birthday cake.

Emmett using both his fork and his fingers to eat!

Emmett enjoyed playing with Logan and Ella in the foyer after dessert with his new push toy cars.

This is an action shot of Logan sending off all four of the cars while Emmett looks on with amazement.

A group photo that we managed to take with grandma and grandpa before they headed home at bedtime.

Lastly, before I went to bed, I had to sneak into Emmett's room to take one last picture of my baby boy while he was officially one year old.  Here he is sleeping away on the green, Girl Scout pillow that Ella put in his bed a few days ago while they were playing.  I can never get over how angelic and sweet my children look while they are sleeping--especially when they are still babies and toddlers.  I have loved having Emmet as my baby and part of me is sad to say 'goodbye' to this phase of his life forever, but I know that I can't stop him from growing, and so I will try to enjoy and treasure this next toddler phase that he is entering as much as possible.  Happy Birthday, baby boy!  I love you to the moon and back!