Al's First Birthday Party!

I have so much to blog about right now. Besides the fact that I am exhausted from the party and the day, I'm experiencing a huge high from being so happy.

Today was Al's first birthday party and overall, it was an amazing day. Alex showed off his listening skills today more then he has ever before. Today, while everyone sang "Happy Birthday" to my little boy, I was holding back tears of utter joy and relief. We reached this milestone, finally, and oh boy, is it ever worth it.

The first amazing moment I always want to remember is thanks to a gift from Al's Aunt and Uncle. The gift Alex got a Sock Monkey Jack in the Box. To put lightly, the J-in-th-B was not well received. The first time it popped out, it scared the poop out of him. It was the combination of the slow J-in-the-B song winding down and the straggly sock monkey jumping out so quickly...how could ya not be a little "surprised". Anyway, where the hearing comes in to play was later while Al was playing with other toys, a guest began to wind the crank thus beginning the familiar music. It was amazing, Alex immediately stopped playing with his other toy, looked round suspiciously until he layed eyes on the J-in-the-B and began to crawl away. A frightening moment for him was a wonderful moment for me.

A second moment was when all our guests had left and Al, his grandma Hill and I were playing with his new garage/service station. We showed Alex how to put gas into his tractor and when he put the gas nozzle to an opening in his toy tractor, my mother and I would make a filling up noise "tttttssssssshhhhhhhhh". He learned quickly what noise would happen when he put the nozzle into to hole. He smiled and laughed and became very excited because of the noise, I know because we made sure to hide facial expressions and not make any gestures. So fun to play when sound is involved!

The third moment of the night was right before I got Al ready for bed. I was letting him toss around some Halloween candy bars and he discover a smarties box (the only one in the bowl) and began to shake it like a rattle. Based on the video bellow, it is apparent Alex knew that that particular box made that particular noise when shaken. His eyes reveal so much! Again, what a great day and a big THANKS to all who shared it with us.