joshua's first birthday!

I know it's so cliche... but I seriously can't believe Joshua is already one year old! It's been a year filled with a lot less sleep but a lot more joy. So thankful for this baby!

Since Brett has Mondays off, we were able to spend the day together as a family. We decided to take advantage of the fact that we live on an island... and went to the beach for a little while after Joshua woke up from his morning nap.

Joshua loves the ocean! I guess it shouldn't come as much of a surprise--he loves baths and at this time of the year, the ocean feels pretty much like bathwater. :) We found a little baby floatie on a craigslist-type site in Cayman, and were excited to see that Joshua liked the independence of floating around (rather than being held by Mom or Dad). He liked to reach over the side and splash in the water, but he mostly enjoyed watching all the other beach-goers! There was a family nearby with a young boy (maybe 9 or 10?) that Joshua watched almost the whole time. (I guess babies don't realize it's impolite to stare). 

After the beach we went home, scarfed down a quick lunch, and got Joshua down for his afternoon nap. When he woke from that, we got him ready for his one-year Pediatrician check-up. (Hopefully he won't remember that we made him get shots on his first birthday!) He actually did really well with the whole appointment (including the shots) and we finished wayyy earlier than we expected. We walked around the book store (one of Brett's favorite spots on the island), and ran a few errands on our way home.

We had a few small presents for Joshua, and a dear friend from the island dropped off a gift for him, too, so we helped him open the gifts. I started to make dinner while Brett read Joshua some of his new books. We were eager to get dinner made and eaten because at 6:00 we were going to have a group video chat (Google Hangouts, holla!) with our families! My dad was on a business trip in Brazil, so we even had three countries represented! 

I know Joshua won't remember any of it... but I'm so thankful we had such a good time celebrating his birthday. I was a little nervous about how I would feel about having his first birthday soon after we moved away from all of our family, so it was such a blessing to be able to "see" many of our family members.

Happy birthday, Joshua!