Ethan's One Year Photo Shoot

So as you can probably tell by my lack of updates recently, I have been super busy with some work assignments the past two weeks. I think things are going to be slowing down here for awhile (which is both good and bad) so I am going to focus on the positives of this and catch up on all of things that I have let fall painfully behind as of late. On that note, as promised, here are some family pics and Ethan's cake smash from his official one year photo shoot. He had so much fun, and we realized that he isn't much of a cake smasher (much more of a cake eater!) He did manage to get his foot in the cake while crawling around though, so I think that counts! These are just a few from our morning with Erin...enjoy!!

Ethan's First Beach Trip

Last weekend we took Ethan to the beach for the very first time. He loved it!!!! It was an awesome week spent with friends and several of our neighbors who were down there as well, and Ethan had a great time with Faith (who is only 2 days older than Ethan!) and he met a new friend Eli (who is only a month younger.) I wasn't able to take tons of pictures since I was on my own with Ethan a bit (while Patrick was golfing with the guys) and taking pictures while keeping up with a one year old who loves to crawl straight into the ocean (no joke!) is slightly difficult but here are a few pics for you:

Ethan helping us get packed!

Is there anything cuter than toes in the sand?

Checking out the sand for the first time

Our little beach boy

Checking out the waves with daddy

Crawling straight into the water

He loved the ocean...he wasn't afraid of the waves at all!

Off he goes, straight into the ocean again!

Playing with mommy

He's on the move

Off he goes

Cuddling with daddy

A visit with Miss Morgan

As promised, here are a few pictures of my most adorable goddaughter, Morgan. I feel so blessed that Ethan has Morgan as his godsister, and here are a few pictures of their time together, as well as a couple from her latest visit to Charlotte:

NKOTBSB - Oh What a Night!

So as most of you are probably already well aware, I love New Kids on the Block. I mean, I LOVE them! When I turned 10, my birthday cake read "Happy Birthday to a New 10 Year Old Kid on the Block" and when my family threw me a surprise 30th birthday party the cake read "Happy Birthday to a New 30 Year Old Kid on the Block" (complete with Joey McIntyre's face screened on the cake - now I personally wouldn't have gone that far, but it was hilarious!) I had a Joey poster in my room that I said goodnight to every night, I wrote out pretend wedding invitations (hey, I was 9!) and my sister, neighbor and I even started our own fan club. My mom even saved some of the Bop (yes, the magazine was called Bop!) magazines that we bought because of all the NKOTB coverage. And let me tell you, those magazines are HILARIOUS to read back through now. Do you know that kids used to write in looking for pen pals and use their home addresses...in a national publication?!?! Yes, I think times have changed just a bit! But I digress....

Two years ago when New Kids finally reunited after a very long 20 year wait, Carolyn and I had the best time finally getting to go to their concert. We were not allowed to go when we were younger because my mom said that there might be teenagers there, and they might be (gasp) smoking cigarettes. Maybe my mom knew what she was doing because I have never once so much as tried a cigarette, but not being able to see our idols left two little girls extremely heartbroken. Seeing them in concert two years ago was literally one of the best nights of my life! I never thought we would get to see them again, so when we heard they were touring again (this time with the Backstreet Boys...my youngest sister was a huge BSB fan but I was a little past the boy band stage by the time they came around. I did take her to a BSB concert one summer when I was in college as her birthday present though) of course we had to be there. It was awesome!!!! The highlight of this show was the guys actually walking through the audience several times. Jordan Knight was literally just a few rows over from us at one point. I tried to film it on my camera, and I might share some of my video clips when I actually get the time to upload them all, but it is so funny because you can tell that I am jumping up and down screaming the video is so shaky! One of the Backstreet Boys was right by us at one point too, and I have great footage of him (we think it was Nick, but we weren't 100 percent sure on that point) because I guess I was calm enough to not jump around like a little girl when we saw him. Anyway, here are just a few pics from our fabulous night with our guys:

Who knew that over twenty years later we would still love them this much?!

The finale...Hangin Tough, of course!

You can't see it in this picture, but I was wearing my "Property of Joey" shirt and Carolyn was wearing her "Property of Jordan" shirt...yes, we own such shirts! When Jordan was walking through our section, Carolyn jumped up and down pointing to her shirt and I was pointing to her shirt, and I swear I made eye contact with him. I'm so ready to go again...I sure hope there's another tour in our future!