Fabulous Four ~ Part 1

Here we are, 5 days away from Harrison's 4th birthday! Hard to believe I've been blessed with him in my life that long already! Seems like only yesterday I found out I was pregnant, now here he is, a real little boy getting ready for preschool in Sept! How the time does fly by. To pay tribute to his 4 yrs here, I thought I'd take a look back and write about each year of his life with pictures of some of the important milestones from each year. I have divided it up into a four part series, that I will post over the next week, leading up to his big day of course!

Harrison Michael Smith was born on Father's Day Sunday June 16, 2002 at 10:57AM at Rockyview General Hospital in Calgary AB. He weighed 6lbs 11oz and was only 19 inches long. He had a full (but not long) head of blond hair and dark blue eyes. He was beautiful!

He was the first grandchild born on both sides and was welcomed by a large and loving family! My grandparents from Chilliwack BC came out to visit when he was 8 wks old to see their new great-grandson for the first time. When he was 8 weeks old his daddy went up north to work in Fort McMurray and came home every other weekend for 3 short days at a time, before returning to work. He was gone all winter, for 8 long months and returned when Harrison was 10 mos old. I always looked forward to those visits and having daddy home with us. At first Harrison was too young to notice he was gone, or remember him when he came back. However it didn't take long before he'd have a big huge smile for daddy when he got off the airplane, which always made daddy feel good!

Besides all the regular firsts in a baby's life, Harrison had his first airplane ride at 3 months old to go and visit Daddy up north in Fort McMurray for a few days. He was baptized at 6 months on Christmas morning, which was extra special to us. He took swimming lessons with Mommy when he was 6 mos old and loved the water! We also enjoyed ourselves by attending Kindermusik classes starting when he was 7 months old and he loved the music and movement. We returned to Fort McMurray when he was 7 months old, and he got the sickest he's ever been with a very high fever that we could not bring down, so he had his first trip to the hospital while we were there...twice, poor little guy! We made lots of good friends through a Mommy & Baby class that we took in the community and met with them on a regular basis for playdates over the winter. He was a late bloomer and finally started crawling at 10 months, but didn't walk before his 1st birthday. He only had one word by the time he turned 1, and that was "pup" for puppy of course!

We ended his first year of life with a big Winnie The Pooh birthday party at our house, with so many wonderful family members and friends, and he was spoiled rotten! He was lucky enough to have all of his Grandparents and 4 Great-Grandparents at his 1st Birthday party. It was such a special day that I will always look back on with fond memories and will never forget! What an amazing year getting to know my little angel. Have fun being one honey!