Our ONEderful Little Ladybug

Thank you all for your sweet feedback surrounding my previous post about our gardening adventures!  Between that and birthday celebrations, the summer really flew by.  I'm realizing only just now that I never posted about Jacob's birthday festivities - woops!  Will try to do so soon.  Speaking of his birthday - I looked back at his first bday post when deciding what to title this one, and apparently, we have a "bug" theme going...haha.

There are so many things I could write a blog post about, right now.  Everything in the world just feels heavy; I can feel it all in the pit of my stomach as I write this.  We have experienced things on both personal and global levels that leave us feeling helpless, discouraged, anxious...the list goes on.  It probably doesn't help that we just visited the Auschwitz exhibit at Union Station (I would highly recommend taking the opportunity to experience this, if you're able).  I have not been able to collect my swarming thoughts enough to talk about it all, much less write about it, at this point.  So, instead, I'd like to share something that has brought us joy in the recent past: Lydia's first birthday!

Our sweet baby girl has been such a light in our lives, as well as the lives of those around us - including you, perhaps!  While I am (mostly) saddened by the end of the newborn and baby phases, it is thrilling to watch her personality continue to blossom.  She is learning and trying and showing us new things every day, and it's just so fun!  It's especially sweet to be able to watch it all unfold through Jacob's eyes, as well, and bear witness to their ever-strengthening relationship.

As you likely (safely) assumed if you saw my Facebook post about the celebration, the "ladybug" theme was Pinterest-inspired, and it was executed with the help of Dollar Tree and my Cricut.  I have found I truly enjoy putting together a theme party - not only for the "awe"/"aww" it evokes in guests, but also for the creative processes that go into creating the various elements.  Admittedly, when it comes to crunch time, I can become slightly high-strung and one little thing going awry may send me over the edge.  When I can remember to relax and enjoy the process and the event, however, it truly is a joy.  (It helps, of course, when kiddos nap and/or go to bed on time, so I have ample windows of opportunity to do all this.  Shoutout and huge thanks to my ever-helpful and patient husband who creates space for this, regardless of how the kids' sleeping schedules pan out.)  I have tried to pinpoint who exactly I "do it all" for, and I've had a hard time doing so, because I think I can honestly answer, "Everyone involved."  I thought about the very real possibility of the celebration having only been our little immediate family, and even then, I would have done most all of what I did.  Not only for Lydia's sake, but also for Jacob's, for my own, and for the sake of sharing it virtually with those who couldn't be there.  While that wasn't completely the case, I'm still happy to share with you!  ☺

It all came together even better than I'd imagined.
(Of course, I already had that polka-dot wrapping paper and red bows in my collection.)

♥
Yes, I painted her toes for the occasion.  You're not surprised.

This was a variation on a couple ideas I'd seen, and one guest immediately recognized them for what they were supposed to represent.  Perhaps, given the context, you do, as well.  ;)

Perfect way to use up some of our countless cherry tomatoes!
(Headless ladybugs for those guests who "don't do" olives.)

The cake and cupcakes were an end-of-the-night project, and I'm just "ok" with how they turned out.

There was way more frosting on her smash cake (which Jacob called a "smoosh" cake all week - haha) than I originally intended, but at that point, I thought, "It is what it is," and just went with it.

This is as close as I got to getting a full table-scape picture - haha.
(I'm not sure how to feel admitting that I didn't purchase any of the paper/plasticware for this party, but rather, shopped my stash of clearance purchases...many of which were made years ago.  I'm not the only one who collects these things for "such a time as this," right?)

♥

We tried to get a picture of her with the cake...

...and even though she likely had no idea what it actually was, she was very upset when we took it away to put in a candle.

She was fine once we started singing and even more fine when she got to dig in.

It didn't even occur to me to think about the color contrast drawing her to the black dots, but it did.  She tried one of those first, and reached for every one after that...completely bypassing the red frosting - haha.

I was so tickled by how our guests embraced the theme!
(Those are ladybug crayons!)

Hand-drawn/colored wrapping paper! ♥

I came across these bookmarks in my Amazon search for party favors.  Pretty sure I had one as a kid...

We saved back one present for her to open on her actual birthday.
Needless to say, the gifts were gifts that kept on giving, as Jacob was even more excited than the birthday girl about all the new toys...and this mama was appreciative of the independent playtime it took to explore them all!  ;)

COVID necessitated multiple small celebrations of our birthday girl (still more to come!), and we are totally ok with prolonging the festivities!  One particular additional celebration included an adorable shirt and card made by Nanny Byers and a beautiful (and delicious!) strawberry cake from The Laughing Place Bakery.  (KC locals, be sure to check them out - soooo many yummy things!  They sure make it easy to support local!)

☺

Does this make you drool, or what?!  It was really yummy (and gluten free!).

Thanks, as always, for making it this far!  I hope this has provided a welcome respite from the less-happy content in your feed, in your mind, and in your heart.  We work hard to recognize and embrace the joy around us...and thankfully, there are many times we don't have to look too far for it.

I pray we can all find ways to be a little more like Jesus each day; to spread more love and joy; to eliminate division; to see and consider and have compassion on one another.  May the Lord have mercy on our broken world - past, present, and future - and may we allow Him to use us to mend it.

As joyfully as possible,

Kensy

Favorites of the day:

Ted Lasso

stamping weekend

This snack Jacob left for me to enjoy while I taught piano lessons the other day.

I was excited to put up this birthday banner as birthday month kicked off!
The monthly-pictures-with-corresponding-headbands (in rainbow order, of course) was my own original idea. ☺

Our Very Hungry Caterpillar

As of a month ago, we have a one-year-old in the house!  So hard to believe.  I still don't know how to feel about it.  BUT, I thought I’d share some pictures of his Pinterest-inspired (though not Pinterest-worthy) party! ☺

Bryant's mom made the super cute birthday shirt (GreatStitch), and his mom and sister made the awesome quilt!
(These are for sure Pinterest-worthy, for the record.)

Thank you, Amazon, for having the perfect plain, colored, non-glitter b-day hats that happened to match the "Happy Birthday" banner I've had for years!

Hooray for free online printables and bamboo skewers I always knew I was saving for a reason!

These were his monthly "milestone" pictures!

Never did I ever expect to have a "photo booth" at our one-year-old's birthday party, but it just kind-of happened. 
The caterpillar ended up on the empty spot we usually take pictures in front of, and it ended up being a nice way to commemorate the decoration.

More monthly pics (he had almost exactly the same few poses each month, so I couldn't help but print them all out).

The "spread!"

(Cucumbers and mint fresh from the garden!)

My 4-H cake decorating training/materials came in handy!

His very first cake (or treat of any kind) experience!

He commonly eats with just one hand, so this method wasn't out of the ordinary. 
He took bites a little faster than normal, though. ☺

When they take the cake away...

Made a pretty good dent in it!

This party was a little more involved than I'd originally thought it would be, but when you have all the materials to just keep decorating (thanks to my card-making hobby/materials), you just keep decorating!  haha.  I kept telling myself that because I wasn't planning to make all the food the caterpillar eats in the book, and I also wasn't planning to poke little holes in all the food, I wasn't going completely overboard.  I did, however, put up more decorations than I'd thought I would, and just generally did more than serve a meal and some cake.  It was enjoyable, though, and really fun to make it special.

...

I considered leaving this post at that; a fun DIY party that was enjoyable all around.  In the interest of transparency and sharing life lessons learned, however, I’m going to tell another part of this story.

There were tears involved.   Unnecessary-stress induced tears.  Unnecessary stress-induced tears.

There were a few causes for these tears (including, but not limited to, the fact that our baby was turning ONE), but the unnecessary stress I brought upon myself to put on this super-casual, low-key first birthday party caused me to reach a breaking point.

In an effort to try to help my sweet, patient husband understand what was contributing to my inner turmoil and unrest over this gathering (for which we didn’t even send out formal invitations), I did some serious self-reflection (that I've already shared and talked through with him, for the record). Here’s what I figured out:

I felt alone. Felt is the key word, here. I knew then, and I still know now, that I wasn’t, but for some reason, that didn’t stop me from feeling alone and unsupported in the planning process.  We had a lot going on in the time leading up to this milestone, so yes, I may have been the only one making the specific plans (both necessary and unnecessary ones, mind you).  That doesn’t mean, however, that my husband and pretty much everyone who was going to attend the event didn't offer to help.  As it turns out, I’m just terrible at accepting help and even more terrible at asking for it.  This wasn't the first time this has been an issue for me.  I’ve even been know to rescind a request for help because I felt guilty/bad/burdensome for asking in the first place.  Some would probably say it's a matter of control.  At times, it very well may be, but only in part.  More-so, I just really don't want to inconvenience others, especially when I am fully capable of doing what I'm asking them to do...or when I don't think the task I'd be asking them to do is completely necessary in the first place (i.e. hole-punching pieces for a homemade banner that I wasn't even planning to make).

The other, less-prevalent-in-my-life, thing I realized is that I did more decorating than I'd planned because it was really the only thing I could do in advance.  I couldn't make food more than a couple days ahead of time.  My biggest fear was the cake frosting "melting," so I wanted to wait till the night before to do the cupcakes/cake.  I could only clean so far in advance before things would need cleaning again.  So, since all the plans were made, but I felt like I couldn't do anything in the couple weeks leading up to the party, I just kept making decorations.  I don't regret it (esp. since I didn't really spend money on them - I already had all the materials in my stamping stash...and it's something I enjoy doing), but I do regret the time it took away and stress I allowed it to add to everything else life entailed at the time.

As I was writing this (because goodness knows this wasn't written all in one sitting (#allthenaptimes)), I was listening to a podcast during which they discussed the fear of failing in front of others and the need to have emotions/hurts/feelings/"wrestle points"/circumstances known.  It was my desire for this party to go off without a hitch and be enjoyable for all who attended.  It was also my desire to creatively and economically make it special, which meant several DIY projects.  My fear of it all not getting done, the cake melting, the food not being enough, etc., etc. was real.  If I failed in any of these areas, it would be very evident to those attending the party (who would not have cared/judged at ALL, for the record).  I kept all this fear bottled up inside of me until it came spilling out of my eyeballs in the form of ugly-cry-tears.  I (finally) expressed these fears, took a deep breath, and realized how irrational I was being.  This may have all been a silly reason to come to some of these realizations, but I'm so glad to have come to the realizations, period, regardless of the reason.

Something else that was mentioned on the podcast put into words something I've been trying to explain (to myself and others), but hadn't quite been able to figure out how to do so: "Recreation causes disappearance."  When someone can recreate our feelings/situation in a way we feel completely heard, then that can cause our situation to disappear in a way that no longer bears weight on our life.  I've heard the quote before, but had to look up who said it first: Timothy Keller said (wrote?), "To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything."  Bottom line: God is enough.  He's more than enough, in fact.  He both knows AND loves us, and He's all that matters.  Why, oh why, is this simple, simple truth so difficult to remember, sometimes?  I've been writing (in my head, that is) pieces of a whole other blog post about my desire to be known in my still-fairly-new community and stage of life (outside of marriage), but I'm deciding right at this moment that I'm not going to do so.  Writing the post itself would've been a cry out to be known by others besides the Lord, and it's just not necessary.

So, anyway...here I am, writing to you in an effort to put my fears/failures/mistakes/emotions out in the open; not for sympathy, but in an effort to bring some light and solidarity to some issues I'm sure I'm not the only one struggling with (speaking of struggling, I'm struggling to leave that sentence ending with a preposition, but I'm going to, anyway...choosing my battles...or something like that...).  I hope to become better at seeking and accepting help, as well as failing in front of others.  My pride, perfectionism, and own sense of control are not worth the expense of the stress it all can sometimes create in my life and the lives of those with whom I'm closest.

Phew.  Ironically, I wrote far more than I expected to about a party I decorated for far more than I expected to.  Ha!  If you made it this far, thank you.  I appreciate the time and interest you took in my pictures, ideas, and thoughts.  As always, questions and comments are more than welcome.  Happy to chat about any of it in person, too!  ☺

Transparently,
Kensy

P.S.  An added benefit to all the decoration efforts: since there isn't a holiday for a while after the 4th of July, I just left the b-day decorations up for a couple of weeks!  It was kind-of fun to feel like we continued the celebration.

Favorites of the day:

quality time with others

garden-fresh produce

brunch 

more specifically: this pancake "flight"