What a Happy NEW YEAR

Wow! I cannot believe we have already said good-bye to 2008 and welcomed in 2009! What an amazing year we had! I am anxious to see what 2009 has in store for us and I am determined to create as many memories as I can!!! My new years resolution is to maintain a cleaner and more efficient house....if it is not used everyday, it needs a "home"....I desire be more organized and know where everything is. Organization does not come to me as natural as it does my dear friend Sarah...she is probably the most organized person I know, so I might be borrowing her quite often to help me out!!! While that is my resolution for the year, I also desire to get a little healthier, eat better, exercise more and I am determined to let Maddox play outside as much as physically possible when the weather is nicer and RSV season is long gone (that is April-ish)

Well, now on to the FUN stuff!!! We celebrated Maddox's first birthday on Sunday, January 4th at my mom's house! We had a great time....Brad's parents (Grandmom and Grandpa Voda), his sister Kim and her boyfriend Austin came to visit and celebrate with us...it was so great to have them here and I felt so blessed to have them at our son's birthday party. My mom (Grammie), Step dad (Papa), Carol (CiCi), Jason (Uncle J), Kameron (Aunt Kam), My dad (PopPop), step mom (Nanny), my Granny, and best friends Dusty and Sarah all came to the big celebration. It was very laid back, I made a DVD of Maddox's first year and we watched that, ate chips and queso, little sandwiches, fruit and the best of all my mom's homemade sugar cookies and ice cream!! Saturday afternoon, Kim, Carol, my mom and I got together and made the cookies for the party....I found big alphabet cookie cutters so I spelled Maddox's name out in cookies and made the number 1 for him, and the rest were all 'M' they were super cute and Maddox did great eating his first taste of sugar!!!! I let him eat the number 1 because it was the easiest and smallest for him to old on to and he did great!!!

We had a wonderful time!!! I sat out a picture with a large mat around it (you know the ones you usually see at weddings and stuff, where people sign it for the Bride and Groom) I had everyone write something for Maddox, one of their favorite memories of him this year....oh I am so glad we did that, it will be so fun to look back at throughout the years!!! Thank you so much for all of you who came to spend time with us and help make that day so special for Brad and I!!!

Here are the Pictures!!!!

Here is the invitation I made and mailed out! It has a picture for every month of this little-man's first year!!! I loved how they turned out!

Here are the cookies that spelled out Maddox (he was currently eating his 1 while we took this pic)

Maddox attempting to figure out what he was about the eat!!!

Here is Sarah me and Maddox (maddox is telling Daddy that he is 1)

What a big boy, sitting with his presents!!

Maddox is clapping after he took his first bite!! oh it was precious!! It was almost as though he was telling me "good job mom...these cookies are great"

Still clapping

Here is the Madd-man walking up a storm!!

Eating away!!