Our Cooper is ONE!

Cooper-Ba-Booper! I can't believe I've known you a YEAR already! I have to be honest, when I first met you in the hospital, I wasn't sure what to think. I thought you were cute and all, but I didn't know what to make of the tiny, squirmy, delicate, crying creature all wrapped up in blankets. Not long after that I realized I had a talent for making you smile, and you won me over with that toothless grin.

Now I can't imagine our family without you. I am one lucky kid to see my favorite playmate first thing in the morning (even though I am not quite the morning person that you are) and right before I fall asleep at night, especially now that we are sharing a room! I love teaching you how to throw balls, making you laugh (which I am proud to say, I am the BEST at), playing cars with you, chasing you and then tackling you, and watching you learn new things every day. You are already my very best friend in the whole world, and even better than that, you are my brother. Happy birthday, Coopy! I love you so much!

Me and my lovely Aunt Kelly:

Getting some love from Grandmama and Aunt Sara:



Taking a break to read with Bebe:

My sweet birthday spread:

Me and my Daddy:

My Mama sure does love Aunt Kelly!

My favorite family activity - laughing until my tummy hurts:

My favorite person to laugh with:

Hanging out with Christian and teaching him about balloons:

Coop, are you ready for your first taste of cake?

Singing Happy Birthday to Cooper:

I think the look on my face says it all. I am not sure what to make of this?

Okay, once I got used to it I kind of liked it...let me give it another very cautious try...

Dang this is good! Picking up the pace a little...

Big brother is old hat at this, and shows me how to do it right:

What? This is how you pull off looking devastatingly cute even when covered in chocolate icing:

Oh, Cake Coated With Delicious Icing, where have you BEEN all my life?

I loved it so much that I decided to put some in my hair, eyes and even my ear for good measure. What I really wanted was to bathe in it:

Mmmmm. My first sugar high:

Let's just put a little more in my hair. Perfect.

I even shared some of it with Mama:

And I'm back, all clean and ready to work the room and mingle with my guests:

Time for presents!

By the way, Harrison decided he also needed a wardrobe change once he saw that Grandmama brought him Daddy's old soccer jersey. How cool is that!?!

I am getting so much cool stuff at once that I don't even know how to take it all in!

Look at me and my manners - wanting to read the card before tearing into the next present!

Us with one of Daddy's best friends and his son, Christian:

Hanging out with Aunt Kelly some more. I am trying to impress her with my feet:

Here is Harrison breaking in my first tool set. And yes, he fixed the door he is working on!

Soaking up Papa & Bebe:

Enjoying Uncle George & Aunt Marilyn too:

And we got to enjoy Uncle George & Aunt Marilyn even longer than we thought! Uncle George's battery konked out and so I got my tools, put my gloves on and tried to remedy the situation with my expertise and years of experience:

Taking some time to relax inside with Bebe while the other boys are outside sweating it out under the hood of a Jeep. Suckers.

Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Lucy were a little (read: 3 hours) late, so we got to spend the evening with them, and had a blast:

I love you Uncle Jeremy!

Serious Yardwork

Tonight Daddy went out to do some yard cleanup after Cooper went to bed, so I decided to get my Spongebob gloves on, strap on my headlamp, and get to work with him. I helped, but mainly I did what I do best: kept Daddy company and made yardwork an adventure!

Look, I found a worm! Daddy, you keep working back there. I'll be right with you.

Showing Grandmama my new worm friend:

Searching for more treasures:

Alright, enough with the playing! I've got my shovel slung over my shoulder coal-miner style, and I'm ready to get serious:

CHOA Visit

Today wasn't really how we all envisioned spending Cooper's 1st birthday, but what can you do when a very, very painful stomach ache starts? Well, when the on-call doctor heard me screaming and heard the symptoms, he told Mama and Daddy that we needed to go to the kid's ER. Turns out it was just a stomach bug, but boy did it hurt! The good thing is that the doctors at CHOA are terrific and even gave me a cool blue balloon and a popsicle. Ahhh, that hit the spot. And Cooper got to spend the evening with Grandmama - so he had a great birthday regardless!

Papa's 60th Surprise Party

Our Papa turned a very youthful 60 years old on May 11th, and so Bebe decided this was a perfect opportunity to surprise the socks off of him with a big party! Mama's job was to get him out of the house for the afternoon, so they went on a date to dinner and a movie. Once they were done, they walked into a house full of family and friends waiting to surprise him. It was so much fun! Happy Birthday Papa! We sure do love you!!!

Papa is surprised! And a little overwhelmed...

So he leaves....

And finally comes back in:

Now he is ready to party!

Bebe worked hard to make lots of yummy food for everyone:

Papa had a good time visiting with all of his friends and spent a lot of the night laughing and talking:

Papa sure can be a silly goose!

I had a huge plate of food already, but when I spotted more mashed potatoes on Mama's plate, I crawled myself right over to help her finish them off! I still don't know what the word "full" means...

What? I am a growing boy!

A Love of Hats

Thank goodness for cropping, else this would be an R-rated post! I was buck-naked, except for the hat on my head, because I said I didn't want my ears to be cold! Made sense to me at the time. Plus I think Mama and Daddy thought it was cute, so there you go!

And here I am after the firemen came to visit us at school to show us their cool fire trucks and to practice Stop-Drop-and Rolling. They even gave us these sweet hats. To really complete this picture, I asked to wear Mama's sunglasses and put the fireman hat on backwards. And I managed to look completely serious.

Mother's Day: Part II

Me, Cooper and Daddy decided to make Mama's day extra special today, and I think we did a pretty outstanding job! Cooper was still not feeling good, so we had to change our plans a little, but we still had a really great day together.

We started by letting Mama sleep in (her favorite) and then surprised her with a brand new duvet, duvet cover and pillows for her bed! She loved it! Then we made her a huge breakfast with eggs, bacon, cheese biscuits, complete with pretty flowers on the table and cards from all of us. After we were all stuffed, we headed over to Fernbank so we could check out the dinosaurs and play in the nice air-conditioned museum.

Cooper was pretty worn out by the time we were done at Fernbank, so we went to get some Checker's and I sat with Mama in the front yard and ate my cheeseburger while Cooper took a nap. After that, we spent a fun, relaxing night together and made sure to love on Mama even more than usual, which I think was her favorite part of the day. Happy Mother's Day Mama!

Okay, so Coop wasn't really feeling this picture and all I wanted was to ride a dinosaur:

But he was a little happier once we got inside:

Making bubbles so big that I could have fit inside them:

This ball was so cool. These purple lasers followed my hands wherever I put them:

So naturally I wanted to climb on top of it to see what lasers thought of that!

One last picture before we go:

Mother's Day: Part I

We got to celebrate our wonderful Grandmothers today and what better way to celebrate them than to spend time with them? So we headed up to Papa & Bebe's house, played, napped, watched a guy put up new gutters, ate Chinese food and then played at the park. It was a beautiful, fun day!

After we got home, we walked up to Ted's Montana Grill to share a special dinner with Grandmama and Great-Grandmama. Unfortunately, Cooper started feeling pretty bad and was running a fever, so he just slept on Grandmama the whole time while Mama fed Grandmama her steak. But we had a great evening together to round out a wonderful day!

We love our Grandmothers!!!

Cooper lovees to swing and his socks will never stay on his feet:

Cooper snoozing on Grandmama:

Me and Mama reading books while Uncle Zach hung on every word: