Birthday Boy!

     It's been a whirlwind of a past couple of weeks, and Ace turned one right in the middle of it. He's one, I can't believe it!
    Mom came up to visit and spend a few days on Wednesday before Ace's birthday. We really enjoyed  her visit. Thursday we went to Graham to pick up a few things and stopped at Whataburger for lunch. Cooper was pretty excited about his burger.

     While Mom was visiting we found out that Paw wasn't doing very well, so Friday we went to Fort Worth to spend the day at the hospital with the family. Even though the circumstances weren't so great, we enjoyed having the day to be with family, especially Nana. Mom stayed home and watched the kids.

     Sadly, Paw passed away the day before Ace's birthday. It was a big loss because he was such a loving, caring and important man, besides being the center of the Pitcock family. I  was so very blessed to get to know him like I did. Due to the circumstances we cancelled Ace's party and just celebrated with the 4 of us and Mom. It was the total opposite of Cooper's first birthday…..second children.

Birthday breakfast pancake.

 Ready to party!

     Dalton visited his family most of the day while Mom and I played with the birthday boy and got 'party ready.' It was a little comical because knowing there were no extra guests made it a little awkward to figure out how much to decorate. But we knew we'd have cameras so we put up a few things and dressed pretty. When Dalton got home we grilled hamburgers and ate a quick dinner.

 Talking things over with GG

   Then it was time for the highlight of the day; the cake, of course. After Cooper's amazing display at his 1st birthday we just really didn't know what to expect. 

 Cooper thought he could attack the big cake…

Going in

 Cooper's helping him get started

Now he has the hang of it!

     Ace was more tentative than Cooper was. And really Cooper helped him at first. Then he started to get into the smashing and finally demolished the cake totally, by raking his hand back and forth across his tray. Unlike Cooper, he ate very little of the cake. He was more interested in squishing and dropping it.

 He's had enough!

Right after this, Ace got both Cooper and me with his cake hands

     Finally he'd had enough. We took the cake away and he wanted more food, so we ate another helping of hamburger and baked beans. Apparently he's the meat and potatoes type. After the cake smash we pulled out the gifts. GG and Papa got him a fun water station with a tunnel for balls to roll down. I think it'll be a hit this summer.

     We got him a ball pit and balls and Cooper was really excited to try it out. They rolled around and played together for a while as we watched and videoed. Overall, it was a low key but nice birthday for the little guy. I think he all of a sudden looks older too.

      Later in the week Ace got to open boots from Mere Mere and Popsey, which will be very handy this summer.

"Be joyful always. Pray continually. Give thanks in all circumstances for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus." 2 Thess 5:17