celebrating two

it already feels like ages ago that we celebrated carter's second birthday. it has felt like he was 2 for about 6 months. i know this is because starting in august, when you asked carter his age he would respond saying, "two!" i would correct him every time but to no avail. then two weeks before his birthday, he was back to saying one. i think he was really confused on his birthday whether he was 2 or 1 which totally cracked me up.

daron and i woke up early on the morning of his birthday so we could hang a few decorations, blow up balloons and make carter daron's family recipe of swedish pancakes. once carter was up, we videoed him seeing all the balloons for the first time, me and daron singing happy birthday to him and his first attempt at blowing out a candle. {we had been practicing for a week how to blow out candles. he caught on in the knick of time!} after that, he played with his balloons for about an hour straight. he was so content; i thought to myself how we should have given him the balloons and called it a day!

just before lunch time, daron's parents and two sisters came into town! they were in hawai and made a quick stop on their way home to see carter for his birthday. this made the day pretty special. daron also took a half day at work so he was able to see his family and hang out with carter. i knew having extra dad time was the best present we could give to our birthday boy. 

carter had two requests for his birthday: 

fries and an "i-ceam-cone" 

so of course we had some fries as part of our lunch and got an ice cream cone after for our first dessert. after that, we headed off to the tide pools at la jolla. we got crazy close to a seal and carter had a ball chasing the birds. 

that night, we all headed back to mine and daron's place to meet up with some members of my family and do the whole dinner, dessert and presents shebang. carter was thrilled to have another dark-chocolate cupcake again as his birthday dessert and could hardly wait to dig his face into it. sometimes it's alarming how happy chocolate makes carter, but then i realize, he totally gets it from me! woops!
   

present time was a little overwhelming. the first present carter saw had a two suckers wrapped into the bow. carter snatched one for himself and then shared the other one with his cousin ellie. i couldn't believe it. i had serious heart throb and was so proud! throughout the night, there was a death grip on the sucker. we couldn't open the presents or enjoy them without the sucker in our mouth at all times. next time, we will hide the suckers inside! 

^^ carter was a little less quick to share the new scooter he got.

baby steps!

carter's birthday was wonderful because of all the family that was able to be a part of it. that really made the day. carter also makes it really fun because he is absolutely hilarious when he gets excited. it's so funny to me because that is something he has had since he was a tiny baby. one time, i wrote about it in this post when he was 10 months old. i have about a bizillion videos of carter during his first year capturing {what i called} his "i-can't-take-it-anymore" laugh/scream. 

gosh i love him.

last year's birthday celebration here, because that face with that chocolate is just too good.