"How big is Riley?"

"Sooooo big!" No seriously, SOOOOO BIG! My little baby is one year old.

The year has flown by! I stuck a Christmas cd in last week and started crying because the last time I listened to it I was holding one-month-old Riley and now here I am chasing a one-year-old around the house.

We celebrated his birthday with a family party the night before. The theme was cars and trucks. I made a dump truck cake which he enjoyed imensely and which landed him in the tub.

  

The only hitch in the evening was that we didn't get around to presents until after 7:00 and if you know Riley, you know that's not good. He thrashed and cried all the way through. So off he went to bed and then Annie and the cousins had a grand ol' time playing with all his fabulous new toys! It really worked out well for all involved. He has since had some time to play with his presents, though not much - Annie isn't too thrilled to have to share them with him. Today she ordered me to "put Riley back in his crib!"

Thankfully, he's pretty good at sharing. He'll hand Annie anything she asks for. And he's a cuddler. And a good sleeper and a cheerful riser. He loves music, and cookies (his first word), and wheels. And me.

Thank you, God, for this amazing little boy!!

Tuesday Playgroup

On Tuesday mornings, I load the kids up and head over to my friend Heather's house for playgroup. It's a 25 minute drive each way, not always enjoyable for Riley who is already working his way towards his morning nap, but so worth it once we get there. Fresh coffee, good food, fascinating conversation (about potty-training and deals on creamer and apples), and somebody else's toys to play with (for the kids, that is).  I put Riley down for a snuggle with the giant Elmo they have in their crib, and then I get to sit down and eat food that has just been served and drink coffee while it is still hot!!

Annie with her friend Kaylyn

The magic doesn't last long. Pretty soon somebody hit somebody and somebody else wet their pants (I won't say who, but I have a whole load of wet undies to wash this morning) and there's parenting to do. But even then, there is the relief of being with others who are in the same boat - you know, the one where you feel like all you do all day is bail water. There are no critical glances, no thinly veiled admonishens, nobody telling me that I dressed my kids wrong for the weather that day. None of us have won the "Mother of the Year Award" yet. (It is out there, right?)

But we get together every week and spur one another on towards love and good deals - I mean deeds. Somebody's passing comment or example becomes our motivation for the week. And there's always a panel of experts to answer pressing questions like "Is it too soon to give a one-year-old a dum-dum in order to get through a Walmart trip?" or "What would you do if, say - purely hypothetically, of course, your child got a bean stuck in her nose this morning and it still hasn't come out?"

I am so thankful for this weekly outing and for the friends who make it what it is. And that the kids are exhausted from playing by the time we get home and take good long naps!

Pirate or Carpenter?

It's not like having a baby. There's not a projected due date, but it could come early or it could be late. Halloween is going to be on October 31st every year. So why did there have to be this mad scramble to decide what to dress up as?! I guess it's just a Beck tradition to wait till the very last minute to come up with Halloween costumes and I need to embrace it. Or at least prepare for it.

Our church hosts a family-friendly Halloween alternative, so I signed us up to help with the Trunk-or-Treat. That meant we needed to decorate the trunk, so I started looking around for ideas. I thought we could be pirates and I could use all my shells and decorations we already had. But I could tell Benjy was less than thrilled. So then I tried to choose a theme and costumes based on what he wouldn't mind dressing up in. We could wear his toolbelts and hardhats and be builders. I could put the candy in a toolbox for the trick-or-treaters. So cute! Again, there was no enthusiasm for the idea - no cheers, no pom-poms, nobody doing the wave.

I asked Benjy for his ideas. He didn't really have any. I gave him an ultimatum. It came and went, still nothing. Sunday afternoon I gave up hope of coordinating costumes and car decorations and decided to decorate the car with leftovers from Annie's farm birthday party. I could go as a farmer.

Costumes for Annie and Riley were ready months in advance. Riley was going to be a lion and I borrowed the scarecrow stuff from Serena for Annie to dress up in. So at least Annie and I would fit in with a theme.

So it's now Sunday afternoon, we need to leave in 20 minutes and Benjy is sleeping. And I'm quietly panicking. But he wakes up, shuffles through our assortment of costumes and props left over from camp days, plays with a few things, and finally throws on his favorite costume of all time (see below) which he really wanted to wear all along, and we make it there in time.

So we were: a lion, a scarecrow, a farmer, and a ... well, you decide.

Another highlight of the Halloween season was going trick-or-treating at Grandma and Grandpa Codr's new place on Friday afternoon. Annie dressed up as a clown for that, thanks to a sweet hand-me-down costume from a friend. She made herself right at home, walking into several strangers rooms and admiring their furniture and decorations. She also made sure to pick 2 pieces of candy at each place, one for her and one for Riley. And then she would try to give each piece to Riley. He was a bit frustrated with me for taking them away, so grandma snuck him a couple pieces.

All in all, it was a fun weekend. I tried taking Annie to a couple of houses to trick-or-treat but she lost interest after the 2nd house. And her favorite thing that she got was a little pack of pretzels. What a clown!