Happy Birthday, Isaac

So, my darling wonderful baby boy officially turned 2 last month. We are so lucky to have this boy in our lives. He makes us laugh every day, and he makes our lives just so much better than they were before. We are so blessed.

We put off celebrating his birthday, since August was such a busy month, and we threw his big birthday bash yesterday. It was a great time, and we're only sad we couldn't have shared it with more of you. Here are a few pictures and highlights of the day:

Here's the invitation, created on Picnik.

Some of the decorations. This was the "photo booth."

Balloons

Ruffled streamers

All the kids enjoying the swing set. Thanks, Yia Yia and Papa!

Opening gifts. Isaac sure was spoiled -

he got trains, and cars, and books, and a superhero cape, and tools, and a puzzle, and he just loves it all.

The pinata. We did a pull string one - the kids take turns pulling various strings until one opens a trap door. At least that's how it's supposed to work. But we always have some kind of mishap...

So, first it fell out of the tree.

 Then, I began to suspect that the trap-door-pulling string had actually broken, rather than opening the trap door when it was pulled. See, that's my suspicious face.

And my suspicious checking. Running low on ribbons here...

Yep, all the ribbons are gone, and still no candy.

Good thing I had a back-up plan.

Candy chaos!

Isaac's like, dude, I'm outta here.



Playing with toys.

Constance, aka Y-Girl, playing with Isaac's awesome Y banner he received from the Connellys.

Cake time!

Not quite tall enough.

A candle for each month (ok, really, Isaac just likes blowing out candles and I felt like 2 would just be a disappointment for him.)

All the kids eating the shavings off the sides.

Cutting the cake.

All in all, a very fun birthday party. Isaac loved it and is still having all sorts of fun playing with his presents and of course the balloons! :)

Swingset!

Yia Yia and Papa very generously pitched in to buy Isaac a swing set for his birthday present this year. James and I searched long and hard before finding the perfect set at a good price before we settled on the Flexible Flyer Big Adventure swing set from Wal-Mart. We put in our order, waited anxiously patiently for two whole weeks and then it came! It very conveniently arrived on a Friday afternoon, so we had the weekend to set it up. James and I spent most of the afternoon on Friday trying to figure it out - the instructions were not super clear and the parts were not the best labeled, so we put the thing together wrong about 6 times, then later had to take things apart, turn them around, put them in the right place, etc. We were also hampered  helped along by several eager neighbor children who very much wanted to play on the swings and prove just how savvy they were at building. Anyway, once we got rid of the neighbor children and Isaac (the kind neighbor parents took them all to their house), it went much faster, but by then we were losing light, so we only had the frame and the slide up before we called it quits. All the kids from the neighborhood came over to play on it, though, so even in its skeleton state it was a big hit.

Here's Isaac playing on the slide on Saturday morning.

Saturday afternoon, the rest of it went much faster, just hooking up the swings and attaching the see-saw. It was a big hit with Isaac and all his friends. 

Our Summer

This summer just flew by! We are excited for fall, but I thought I ought to take a second hour or two to recap all that has gone on this summer. When last we left you (unfaithful bloggers that we are), James had just finished his marathon. That was in June. So, here's July and August for you:

July brought visits from Yia Yia and Papa, which were very much enjoyed but very little photographed. We did get a few pictures during all the fourth of July festivities.

The balloons at the Kiwanis club breakfast.

Isaac getting some snuggles from Aunt Allison.

Isaac loves his "Sallison"

Isaac and Daddy

Yia Yia and Papa at the Brick Oven

Yia Yia with Isaac at the parade

A little later in July, we also enjoyed a wonderful trip to Nebraska to visit with Anthony and Heidi, and then to Nauvoo to spend a little Johansen time.

Isaac playing with all of cousin Tristen's toys in Heidi and AJ's new house.

Helping sand the walls

Such helpful little dudes.

Isaac and Tristen - they played so well together. I think they are going to grow up to be best buds.

Isaac with his cousin Beck at Nauvoo.

Isaac learns rope making skills.

This little girl built an awesome Nauvoo temple out of blocks.

Then she kindly allowed Isaac to knock it all over. What a sport!

Beck, Eli, Ainsley, and Isaac riding a wagon.

Happy cousins. Not pictured: sweltering heat. Is it terrible to think I'm glad the saints had to leave Nauvoo and settle in Utah? We just have it so much better here...

Isaac and uncle Christian

Back in Nebraska, visiting the zoo with Aunt Heidi, Tristen, and Natalya

Sharing juice boxes with the cousin.

Tristen and Isaac milking a fake cow. The dairy education center was air conditioned, hallelujah. You can see how hot it was - look how sweaty those boys are!

One last picture before leaving the zoo.

August was family reunion time! First the Johansens - Yia Yia, Papa, Cyndi, and Mila all came out for the Smith family reunion and my Grandpa Smith's 80th birthday celebration. I didn't get any good pictures at all :( Guess I was having too much fun.

Grandpa Smith - 80 years!

Dad and his brothers.

Later that month, we enjoyed a West family reunion. James and I were responsible for games, and we did a couple minute to win it games, with hilarious results.

Get the oreo from your forehead to your mouth without moving anything but your facial muscles.

I think everyone enjoyed this one.

There was also a water fight, which Isaac loooooved.

Ready to go.

Isaac loves this.

Here he is with his pants so soggy they are falling off him. After this we let him run around in his diaper - only to see him climb out of the bouncy castle with nothing on at all! The diaper had come off in the castle. Thank goodness there were no accidents!

While Grandma and Grandpa West were here for the reunion, Isaac turned 2. I can't believe my baby is so big! Grandpa and Grandma took Isaac shopping for a birthday present (he chose a car and a laptop) and also bought him a cake. Apparently he was so excited about the cake, he ignored the other presents - He just wanted to hold his cake. He also wanted to eat it as soon as they got back to the house, so that's why a chunk is missing. We shared the cake later that evening with Grandma and Grandpa and Allison and Michael. Isaac had a blast blowing out the candles over and over again.

And those were the big moments in July and August! 

Running Man

Earlier this month, June 11 to be exact, James accomplished something awesome - he ran a marathon! He had been training for this marathon for months and months. He was very diligent, waking up in the wee hours of the morning to get to his office early and run on the treadmill so that he could still get home at a decent hour and take care of his family. As the day grew closer, his normally calm demeanor became noticeably more nervous. I actually thought it was cute, since it really takes a lot to disrupt James's calm.

The evening before the marathon, James's cousin Rick (who was also running the marathon - his 5th one) and his family came over to share a pasta dinner. We had a lot of fun with them, and I think it helped James relax a bit - though it didn't last long. Rick spent the night and the two of them woke up very early in the morning to get on the bus that would take them way way way up the canyon where the race would start. They had to be up at 3 for a race that started at 6 - can you believe it? James had a really rough night, too nervous to sleep, poor guy.

Anyway, since there was no way I was getting up at 3, I expressed my support after James had gone to bed by putting signs in strategic places where I thought they would see them - "You're awesome!" and "You can do it" on the bathroom mirrors, "26.2" on the door, "Have a great run" by the dining room table. James said that made him feel pretty good as he prepared to leave.

Interesting note - part of the preparations for the race included rubbing Vaseline in various places to avoid chafing - between the toes, the insides of the arms (where they hit the body), the chest, and the insides of the thighs. I don't know, for some reason I found that really funny, but James did actually get much fewer blisters running his marathon than he did running the half last year, so I guess it worked!

Anyway, James accomplished his goal - he finished! He wasn't trying for a great time, but I think he did pretty well, coming in at 5 hours and about 30 minutes. He actually improved his pace from when he did the half, so I think that's something to be proud of. He had some issues with cramping - his legs just seized up and he had to run-walk for a lot of the end of the race. He ran the last little way once he got into the "chute" where all the people are watching the finishers and cheering - when they're cheering you it's hard not to run. But poor guy was so shot and in so much pain! He said that as he ran that last bit to the finish line he was planning just to lie down and sob, but then he realized he probably wouldn't be able to get up again, so he decided against it. If you want more details of his agony, you'll have to ask James, but let's just say he's not eager to do it again.

Here are some of the pictures from the event:

 Here's Rick greeting his family after he finished. I showed up at the finish line just in time to catch them. They had to leave before James finished, but they kindly lent me their oldest child to help with Isaac. So nice!

 Isaac had a great time cheering the runners. He loved lifting his hands up and shouting Whoo-hoo! Although it came out more like Hoo-hoo! which I thought was adorable, of course.

 You can't really see him, but this was my first glimpse of James. He's out there somewhere.

 Here he is doggedly running to the finish line.

 The clock time is a little more than his actual time, since they correct the time for when he actually got to the starting line - you know, since there's so many people they don't all actually start the race at the same time.

 Yay! He's done!

 He said he was pretty close to tears as he caught sight of us. Poor guy!

This is after we walked to the car and he'd had a bit of time to recover. :)