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First Birthday Party Part II

{All photography is by Stacey Downey Photography, editing by The Art of Making a Baby}

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This has been one of the most requested posts and I have been dreading writing it, because I am just not sure what to say.

I mean I WAS NOT sure.

I am writing it now because after a whole year, we are finally starting to find our place together, our new relationship. That’s right – it took us a year to get into an equilibrium!

So I will finally put a complete mess of my thoughts into a post in an attempt to make some semblance of it.

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As I am slowly and painfully trying to design/fill/create Alexis’ playroom I am finding absolutely zero guides online as to how best to do it.

The truth is, while it is very personal as to what kind of playroom you design for your children, it is also important to make sure that you’ve got all your educational and creative basis covered, as well as make it a comfortable, safe and inviting environment.

So I decided to put together my own guide. It’s not a guide for OTHER people, it’s MY guide, though you can definitely use it to help you define your baby’s playroom areas, as well. I’ll be sure to put in a few finds for you guys, too.

PLAYROOM {in progress} GUIDE

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Oh what a change this Easter was from our last year’s Easter.

I cannot get over how much fun it is to have a toddler. To see all the experiences?through?their curious eyes.

We had two egg hunts this year, but at the moment I will only be posting one. The second one has 748 photos to go through. And is more of a baby photoshoot than an egg hunt. Gorgeous inspired photoshoot.

On Saturday we were invited to a neighborhood egg hunt and boy, was I surprised.

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Don’t you sometimes wish that you could get a month or two uninterrupted by anything and anyone without responsibilities so that you could catch up with all the things you don’t have time to do that are lacking in your life? I am sure mothers specifically feel the pain.

I remember being young, carefree and childless and thinking that I had no time to do anything cuz I worked. Bwwahahahahahahahaa! I don’t think you understand the meaning of lack of time until you have kids ( adding a full time job or work at home job, part time job and hobbies on top of that is a plus).

My schedule has turned into “go to bed at 1-2 am, wake up at 7-8am”  just so that I could possibly make a dent in everything.

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The first giveaway in the 50 Days of Giveaways!

Yes, you read it right! The 50 Days of Giveaways on Daily Mom have begun and I have the honor to kick them off with our first giveaway!

I probably don’t need to repeat myself on here  but if you haven’t already become a reader of Daily Mom, you should really check it out. It’s a new website that I launched a month ago with a group of girls.  It’s an amazing resource of posts and articles for the modern woman and mom. Imagine Pinterest worthy posts with useful information about all aspects of life – from parenting to beauty, fashion, green living, health, fitness, and more.  No fluff whatsoever.

We’ve been preparing for our launch celebration, a fabulous event, called 50 Days of Giveaways, for months now and we’re finally there! For 50 days, we will be giving away one awesome prize a day to thank our new readers.

So today I am proud to present to you, our first giveaway!

This one is for all of you, TTCing folk!

While it seems like neons ago, I remember the time spent preparing for the conception of  Alexis. It was exciting, scary, wonderful!

If you’re currently trying to conceive or are planning to in the future, this giveaway is for you!

Today’s giveaway

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This post makes me officially caught up on Instagram posts, so the next one will be month of March! YAY!

I find this segment refreshing, because if you really care to take the time to look through the collages I put together, you can catch a glimpse of our normal life and what it looks like ( the highlights of it, of course)

In February we visited Disney for the last time till the fall, since the crowds start coming in right after that. It was one of the hardest trips I’ve ever taken with Lexi. I sure do hope I get a chance to post photos and describe the trip, but in the meantime, you can see a glimpse of it in my Instagram photos.

Top:

Biergarten, one of our favorite Epcot restaurants since forever, due to the fun atmosphere and its laid back feel. One of the highlights of the trip was Lexi going out onto the dance floor to listen to the Musikanten (spelling?)  and dance. Lexitwin soon followed and they completely melted the whole audience.

Bottom:

Beach trip, infrequent due to the most horrible winter. The gulf can’t warm up since we keep having cold nights and often cold days. So when we do get a chance to go to the beach, it’s a treat.  Lexi is a bit unruly and unstoppable about the water and runs right in, which is makes it hard to take beach trips during colder days.

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I was editing pictures to post on here and then decided to group them by outfits instead.

When it comes to clothing, Alexis has more of it than she can wear ( damn you, sale sites), and mostly they are all of different random brands, but there are a few companies that keep a constant presence in her wardrobe.

One of the is NununuBaby. I think I mentioned it a million times. It is alternative style clothing that is like nothing you’d expect a girl to wear. Skulls, stars, alphabet and funny toddler sayings is what you’ll see on it and only a few colors: light pink, white, black, grey and neon green. I think they are super cool! Definitely standout in the crowd of bright pink and ruffles ( not that I don’t like that, I very much do, but I also enjoy variety and contrasts in my life).

Since this has been a super cold winter by Florida standards, we’ve been wearing a lot of NununuBaby, since we had some cute stuff from their winter line. I was even excited to have Alexis wear a size 2 dress that was CLEARLY too big for her, but it was cold and the dress is so cute, we still put it on. It will be a while till it doesn’t look like a nightgown on her… That’s what I like about NununuBaby, their sizing is generous,so the pieces last longer.

If you’re interested in checking out the brand, you can visit their website here. I usually buy most of their clothing on end of season MyHabit sales, since they discount it almost 50% and I occasionally get sent a few pieces to try them out for the blog.

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This year will be the first time that we put together an Easter basket and do an egg hunt. Last year was a bit stressful, even though we did attempt to go out.

I just finished putting together and ordering items for Alexis’ Easter basket so I figured I’d share, in case someone is searching for ideas that aren’t candy or cheap toxic toys.

We are about to embark on a potty learning (I do not like using  the term training, but I occasionally do use it because it’s an accepted term) journey so I thought it’d be a great opportunity to get her some potty books and training undies for it in her Easter basket.

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First Birthday Party Part I

If you missed the Planning and Decor Post, click here.

PHOTOGRAPHY

One of the best decision I made for Alexis’ party was to hire a photographer.

I am a do-it-all myself (except for things I don’t like) kind of person. I always take my own self-portraits, our family photos, Lexi’s photos. I feel that I know our best angles better and that I can take as much time as I need to and do whatever I want to. So clearly, that was the plan for Alexis’ birthday all along.

When I was almost done with all the planning and purchasing, I started rethinking doing it all myself. I just imagined being the only one to really organize the party, keep it going and then to make sure that I take a zillion pictures of everyone, Lexi, the three of us, guests, decor…

I figured Andrew could help out with some photo taking. When in a good mood, he can take a great photograph. But sometimes I look at the photos and just shake my head ( in his defense, I make him use manual mode, after setting everything up, and it can be hard). So then I imagined him not getting the shots I wanted and me stressing out. And then I thought of the reality of things and that most likely with the commotion we wouldn’t have any pictures together as a family if there’s always one of us shooting. Sigh!