Brantley,
Happy two years of life, little man!
You are so cool. Way cooler than me and your dad. Let’s just get that out of the way now. You’re also pretty hilarious and you have quite the personality!
Moving on though…
Your speech therapist Mama is so excited to announce that while we’ve noticed a language delay of a few months for a while, we’re happy to report that your language continues to explode and it makes me so proud for all the hard work. I constantly tell people that you didn’t stand a chance because of my professional position but in all reality, it was a lot of work to get to this point. We’re still not up to the level that’s considered “age appropriate” by professional standards but when I turn my SLP brain off, I try to relish in your cute little sentences that come out as simple as “I sit!” and “I splashing!” In those moments, you’re so happy and proud of yourself to have accomplished whatever mundane task it is that you’ve accomplished by yourself and you’re just absolutely thrilled to be able to tell us about it!
This month we had to say goodbye to our favorite neighbors and your girlfriend, “C”. They lived in the house next to ours for about a year and this summer we spent nearly every day outside with them, the grown ups sitting in lawn chairs on the driveway and you two running around kicking a ball, chasing bubbles, and pushing each other in C’s cozy coop car.
Your Mama may have cried a LOT when we were taking these last photos but mostly because I know how rare it is to have neighbors next door who are so amazing and the friendship you shared with C was just precious. Not to mention, C’s mom had just given birth to a baby boy and with our second on the way, these two would only be a few months apart in age. It broke my heart that I would have to say goodbye to this time in our lives and I knew the day would come – sooner rather than later – when you would ask to go over to C’s house and we would have to tell you that she wasn’t there. I knew that you wouldn’t understand and that it would probably happen over and over (and it has) but change is just a part of life and we never know what plans God has for us that may be even better! So we said our goodbyes and wished them luck in their new home in Georgia and Mama went home and cleaned up her face after a good hard pregnant cry.
We may have had to say goodbye to one friend but just a week later God brought us a new one! There’s a new paramedic working at Daddy’s station and his wife came to Sunday Dinner with their son Aiden and you two hit it off immediately. We always love our Sunday Dinner tradition but it sure doesn’t hurt to have another friend there with us.
At the end of June, the beach house was available for a whole week so we capitalized on the opportunity and drove down to enjoy an impromptu family vacation! With Mama’s school schedule, I was off for the entire week so we were able to relax and spend long days playing on the beach, napping on the couch, and relaxing in the “morning room” sunroom – Mommy’s favorite room in the house.
Every morning we ate breakfast out on the deck then wandered down to the beach before any of our neighbors arrived and had the beach all to ourselves for the first few hours of every day.
It was a great time for us to spend as a family before the whole family joined us just a few weeks later for our annual Beach Week!
The day before we left for Beach Week, we had one more very important event – our gender reveal party to find out if you were going to have a little brother or sister!
We had our friends Blair and Ty order pink and blue pinata and then order paint powder in the right color. Your Daddy and I were both convinced we were having a baby girl so we both wore pink that morning and had been talking about different baby names for a girl. When I was pregnant with you everyone told me I was having a boy, and this time around everyone said it was a girl so I guess we just believed them!
We had a big party with all of our friends and family and then went outside to pull the trap door on the pinata and surprise – it’s a BOY!
Blair made us a cake to celebrate our newest little boy and Mama cried when she saw what the cake said. I guess it wasn’t until that moment that I really realized what it would mean to have two boys in the house and I was exponentially more excited to raise two boys!
Beach Week was incredible, as always. Here are the highlights from our week!
Celebrating Fourth of July: You were obsessed with the flags that G-Daddy dropped off at our house before we left for the OBX and since this was our first day at the beach house, the flags were a common toy throughout the rest of the week.
We spent ALL DAY at the beach with the exception of your nap times, getting out early again before the rest of the beach filled up so we could enjoy the quiet mornings alone on the sand. Once we got you in the ocean you never wanted to leave so we obviously spent a lot of time in the water. You even got on a paddleboard with Daddy for the first time!
And everyone enjoyed playing with you, reading books with you, and snuggling up on the couch with their cutest little family member.
When we got home, we had one week to prepare before celebrating your 2nd birthday with all of our friends and family and Nanny and PaPa’s house! The theme was a “Splash Bash” and other than playing in the pool all afternoon, we also had a few sprinklers set up for you kids to run through, little pools to splash in, and big bins of water toys that seemed to be the biggest hit of the day. The grown ups didn’t seem to mind a day at the pool either.
Overall, your party was a hit!
The things I want to remember about this time of your life:
- You sing all the time. You don’t know any words yet but you just hum along by yourself to whatever tune happens to be in your head and it’s so sweet to hear you coming up with your own music if that’s what we can call it right now.
- You still feed Shadow every morning and evening but you know that he has to go into his crate before we feed him so first you’ll ask us if you can feed Shadow and then you immediately turn to the dog and yell at him “Shadow dit!” (sit) and you’ll just keep yelling at him over and over until we intervene and say “sit” so Shadow understands why you’re hollering.
- You’re learning how to catch a ball and Daddy is thrilled that you’re living up to his expectation of growing a “highly tuned athletic machine” as he’s been calling you since the day we found out we were pregnant.
- One day there was a thunderstorm and you were afraid of the thunder so I explained to you that maybe it was PaPa just playing drums in heaven. All of a sudden, your expression softened and you ran away from the door to your toy bin. You brought back your drumsticks as if you wanted to play along. It was the sweetest thing and brought me immediately to tears.
I love you, Brantley.
Love, Mama
LifeasMeghan.com 
You started my day with sweet thoughts on this first anniversary of Dad’s death. God has blessed us so extravagantly. This circle of life is so sweet. Thanks for sharing and taking the time to document your child’s big and little moments. You’ll treasure these forever.