Happy Birthday To Our Sweet Little OWEN

On December 29 Owen turned the BIG 1! And what a fun and special day that was. I always had mixed feelings about having a baby so close to Christmas, but sometimes that just happens, and I was actually really happy with how much it felt like Owen's special day and not just another day looped in with all the holidays. We started off the day with a laid back morning so we could party hard later in the day. For lunch my parents treated us to some yummy Red Robin (ya I like to start em' young), and we even had the waiters sing to Owen! It was so cute. Then after lunch was met up with Cory's dad, sister, and three of Owen's cousins at Monkey Joe's. This is a super fun play place that has huge blow-up slides and bouncy things that Owen has in heaven with. He LOVED the slides, and we even let him go down by himself! He would just giggle all the way down. Owen was probably the youngest one crawling around and going down the slides, which made it a little difficult, but we all still had a lot of fun! Owen's oldest cousin Colby (10) really loves taking care of and playing with Owen. He helped me out the whole time we were there and would take Owen up and down the slides over and over again. It was so sweet. Owen is truly blessed with AWESOME cousins on both sides!! Then it was back home for a quick afternoon nap before the party started. For his party we had all of our family in the area come over to my parents house, where we ate some yummy food, opened lots of fun presents, and watched Owen dig in to his very own cake, which is pretty much the main event at all 1 year old birthday parties. :) We really felt so blessed and lucky to have so many family members their to help celebrate Owen's birthday. It wasn't until we got back home to Battle Creek, after New Years, when everything started to sink in and I got emotional thinking about how fast the time has gone from when Owen was born. How quickly that first year goes by, and how much our little one had changed. Just one of many of my sappy mom moments.
Happy Birthday to our sweet sweet Owen!! You have made our lives the happiest they have ever been! We love you so much and are blessed beyond words to have you as our little boy. Love, Mama and Dada

Christmas 2010

We had such a wonderful Christmas spent with family back in Crystal Lake. This year we were at Cory's parents house, but were able to see my parents on both Christmas Eve and Day for a little bit. Thats the joy of having both our parents live only 10 minutes apart, we get to see them both every time we go home for a visit! This was actually Owen's very first Christmas, which you wouldn't think by looking at him. But thats what happens I guess when you have a baby 4 days after Christmas. :) Cory and I had a lot of fun being "Santa" for the first time as parents, and watching Owen having fun with all of his new stuff. At Cory's parents house they have some fun traditions they do every year for Christmas such as playing out the nativity (and its been video taped for YEARS), nice big Christmas Eve feast, walking down the stairs Christmas morning from youngest to oldest, Monkey Bread breakfast after seeing what Santa brought, and then FINALLY after breakfast we get to open our presents!! This was probably the first Christmas that I didn't open my presents right after waking up! Oh and they also have you open your presents one by one until they are all gone. At my house growing up it was not so organized and pretty much all the presents were open after ten minutes of being awake! hahaha It was a lot of fun though and I enjoyed every minute of it, even if I had to wait til 11 to open my presents. :) This was actually our first Christmas as a married couple spent with the Evans, and it was so fun to be with them and enjoy the Christmas Spirit together. This Christmas we got to speak to our favorite missionaries too! Cory and I both have younger brothers on missions and LOVED talking and listening to them on the phone. Probably the BEST Christmas present. :) Well, I hope you all have wonderful and special Christmas' spent with the ones you love most.

Anxiously awaiting to open there one Christmas Eve present!

Our family gift this year was a Cam-corder! Yay for making memories caught on tape!

Owen opening his Christmas Eve present, with a little help from mom.

Christmas Morning, looking out the window to see if Santa had come...

Waiting patiently for Grandpa to give the A-okay to come down.


Alright, lets go get some presents!

New toys

Enjoying a little ring pop from his stocking.

Testing out his new stroller/bike!

Just checking out what Santa had brought. :)

Drum stick or sucker? hmmm...

Favorite picture/memory: seeing Owen with his cousins all around the Christmas tree, watching Grandpa's train. So Sweet. Owen loves his cousins!

Dressed in his new Christmas shirt for church the next day.

My sweet boy.

Merry Christmas! Love, the Evans Family

SANTA

Owen was born four days after Christmas last year (2009) so it was weird to think that this was really his FIRST Christmas. So that meant meeting Santa for the first time too! It was kind of a last minute thing we decided to do one night, and when I saw all the other kids in line I thought "oh I probably could have dressed Owen up a little...oh well!" He did great and was more interested in the big chair than the cute old man with the white beard. However. this Santa wasn't very jolly. Actually he was silent the whole time Owen sat on his lap. I had a good laugh after thinking about the whole thing. Crazy parents trying to get their kid to smile, silent Santa awkwardly sitting there, and one oblivious little boy who had no clue what was going on. haha I am glad he did so well for his first time though. Ho Ho Ho!

cheerio anyone?

So by the look of Owen's appearance I hope you know that this is in the morning. Missing sock, crazy hair...he's just a wild sleeper I guess! Well that's not really the reason for my post, though that picture is pretty darn cute. I want you all to notice the next to pictures of Owen's bum. Would you like a snack? hahaha I hadn't really noticed how messy his high chair had gotten until after I got him out of his chair and watched a bum full of cheerios crawl away! Poor guy. Who knows how long he's been eating in such uncomfortable conditions. Needless to say, I cleaned his chair later that day! :) Is he not the cutest or what??

Happy Happy Birthday CORY Dear

This past Wednesday, on Dec. 15th we celebrated Cory's 25th birthday. Now that we're getting older and Cory's working full time, celebrating his birthday had to wait til after he got off work. This was the first time since we've been married that we weren't able to spend the whole day together. So that kind of stunk, but I tried to make him fell special even though we were apart for most of the day. I wanted him to at least go to work with something yummy to share so we stopped off at the near by donut shop in town and picked up some for him to share. Well, Cory only works with two other people right now and one of them didn't work that day so between Cory and his boss they ate all the donuts! hehe Hey I say on your birthday you can do whatever you like! It's your day to ENJOY! When the work day was finally over, me and Owen picked him up and we went to one of our favorite places for ribs, Ruby Tuesdays. I don't know if I haven't been cooking very good dinners lately or what but man I thought that was the best meal I had ever had! I kept talking about it even days after. What can I say, I love good food! So then after dinner we came home had cake, ice cream, and opened presents. Owen wasn't the biggest fan of the party hats, but we were still able to get a couple good shots before he destroyed his. Lucky Owen got to practice for his own birthday thats at the end of the month by digging into his own slice of cake. And I pretty sure he'll do the same with his own birthday cake.

Cory I hope you had a fun birthday, even though you had to work. Owen and I are so very lucky to have you in our lives and we just love you so so much! Here's to the next 25 years and then some!!!