1 year

Firstly:

Sorry to disappoint, friends, but this post is strictly dedicated to Liam's -actual- birthday. I am still waiting to gather all the images from his party, so that I have the full *set* to share. After I get the pictures from my dad and my mother-in-law, I'll post all about his party. I suppose I could break it up into a few different posts, but why don't we just wait and do one big post when everything can be posted together? Sorry, again!!

Sweet friends: if you have pictures from Saturday's festivities, please do not hesitate to post them! I'll just link up to you in my eventual post (and perhaps steal a few pics as well!).

xoxo

Liam, I believe, had a good first birthday. We woke up fairly early for him, got ready and headed into Houston to visit the zoo.

{first picture as a 1 year old!}

:::: aside: yes, he's wet. yes, he wet himself. yes, that is the empty bottle from the middle of the night before. our carbon monoxide alarm went of at 1 in the morning, and woke him up. this was the only solution to soothe our frightened child.::::

Before we left for the zoo, we gave the birthday boy his big present from us. He' still not so sure he's keen on his R2-D2 chair, but we sure love it, and know he will in the future. Cause he's going to have it a long time. Yep.

We got to the zoo around 9:30, before it got so hot that most of the animals were hiding away. Liam was a champ in his stroller, we turned the seat around to be facing away from us so that he could see everything that was going on.

{kookaburras. i *love* these-- lauren, these remind me of the pair that nested in the chapel at school and used to sing during service.}

{the shoe-billed stork. seriously, so friggin' cool.}

{poor grizzly trying to keep cool.}

{daddy showing liam the elephants}

{baby elephant!}

{mommy & liam in front of the giraffe pen.}

{birthday boy.}

{dory!!}

{LOVING the aquarium}

{trying on a mask in the gift shop.}

After we left the zoo- around 11:30-- because it got stinkin' hot!-- we headed to Highland Village (hi Jess!) to get lunch and run over to Sprinkles so that Liam could have a cupcake for his birthday.

{at p.f. chang's for lunch.}

After lunch, we headed home. We figured, honestly, that Liam had already had one heck of an exciting day, so we'd go home and let the little man hang out and take a nap.

{cheesin' with mommy.}

{after nap: grandma brought a present!!}

{playing with his turtle he got at the zoo}

{birthday boy's right: doing what he wants. pulling every dvd of his out of the cabinet and throwing it on the floor.}

We had a lot of fun on Mr. Man's birthday. It was nice to get to spend the day together- and during nap time I was able to get a lot of baking and decorating done. Liam was a complete joy all day- as he should be! Of course, he was super tired by the end of the day, but that was to be expected.

And to answer some of your questions about how well Liam handled the zoo: He liked it a lot, or so it seemed. We've talked about when we'll go back and we think we'll wait until later in the year, we're thinking October or November because it's going to be a lot cooler, the animals will be out and more active, and Liam won't be too steamy sitting in his stroller. In general, he spotted the large, flashy, stand-out animals, or the animals that moved a lot. He had a hard time spotting the birds, or the animals that just laid around, but he enjoyed the elephants, giraffes, the aquarium, the white alligator, and the flamingoes. Contrast, you know?

That's that for the birthday recap!