Happy Birthday, Mary!

Well, I can't believe it's been a year, can you? Our little Squish is ONE. To celebrate her birthday this year, I mowed the lawn. That's what put me into labor last year, so it was only fitting that I mow every year on her birthday. This year, the job seemed a LOT easier....and I managed to mow the whole lawn without needing a gas refill. I guess I was a bit slower last year when I tried to mow the thing while overdue and quite giant...

In honor of Mary's love for all creatures with fur or feathers, we took a very spontaneous trip to the Lake Superior Zoo. Squishy LOVES animals. Every time she hears a dog barking, she does this bouncing up and down thing and laughs...and shouts, "Puppa, Puppa!" Well, we thought the zoo was only fitting. We had to teach her the difference between a "puppa" and a "kangaroo", "polar bear," "monkey," and "goat," among other animals. Julia had a great time, too.

Here's the kangaroo!

Julia made friends with a hideous scary snake sculpture...

They had a little kids park in the zoo. The girls tried out the plastic bumble bee.

Ride em' cowboy!

Our little Mary is almost walking!

Later, Holly and Luke came over and brought some presents.

Mary had about three seconds with each present before Julia "helped" her by opening them up and confiscating them immediately. You can see Julia swooping in for the kill in the picture below.

Hey...can I see my present?

Two exhausted, but happy parents. We had all these grand plans to go to Menards and buy stuff for a piece of furniture we were working on...and the later I would make homemade something for dinnern in honor of Squishy...I was going to find some matching napkins and birthday hats....and blow up balloons....no wait...find a helium tank and have real balloons!....but instead we ended up cancelling Menards, the hats, and the balloons. And my gourmet dinner? Chicken nuggets and mac and cheese. Julia and Mary's verdict? Yum. The cake? Fan-diggly-tastic.

Here they are, the play by play pics of the first cake. Yup...she had the run of it. And what fun she had!

I think I'll touch it to make sure it's real...

Ooooh! sticky! mmmm.

Come here, mama...lemme grab your nice clean sweater!

Don't bug me...I'm CONCENTRATING.

One satisfied customer...