What a difference a year makes!!

Last year at this time I was in the midst of my back problems.  In fact, I was actually bed-ridden for the week before my surgery on September 22nd.  We were also awaiting the arrival of our grandson, Garrett, who was due on September 20th.  Perhaps he felt sorry for his poor grandmother because he waited until September 23rd to make his appearance to the world.  We now have 3 birthdays (my son Stephen, Garrett, and Tom) within a two-week time period.

One of my daughter-in-law's good friends offered to host a first birthday party for Garrett here in Cincinnati.  Knowing that our daughter, Carolyn, and her family would also come into town for the party, I decided to take advantage of the situation by having some family photos made. I particularly wanted a professional photo of our two grandsons together. It sounded like a good idea at the time.

Things didn't go quite as planned.  I tried to work around nap times, lunch, and the party, so the only time we could go was 10:30am.  Unfortunately, little Garrett, who is normally very happy and a ham for the camera, got a little bit grumpy because he missed his morning nap.  Then, for a while, Haiden didn't want to cooperate.  He had also refused to wear the outfit our daughter had chosen for him.  (Carolyn and our daughter-in-law, Michelle, had tried hard to coordinate the boys' outfits by emailing photos back and forth.)

I made some collages of some of the photos to show you what we faced.

First is Haiden. What a bevy of faces he made!

Next, here he is with his parents, Carolyn and Greg.

Next is little Garrett, ready for nap time, but what a trooper he was.

And here he is with his parents, Stephen and Michelle.



We tried several times to get photos of just the two boys, but it was impossible to get a decent one of the two of them together as you can see.

We ended up buying individual photos of the boys instead of ones of them together! (I think you can see why.)   Perhaps we can try again next year when they are older.

Then after lunch and an attempted afternoon nap time for the boys, it was off to the birthday party.  The theme was little monsters.  I asked a friend to make the cake.  We were all blown away with the spectacular job she did with the "main" cake.  She also made a "smash" cake just for Garrett.  We were all so surprised that Garrett didn't make a big mess.  Perhaps he was too tired from all the other activities of the day.