Happy 1st Birthday!!!

On Friday we got to open an early birthday present - a picnic basket from our cousins and Uncle Brad and Aunt Alison. We love it! But we were definitely more interested in the box than the food for awhile.

It was warm enough to go outside and play on our castle. Alex is the King of the Castle

Helen loves her cup and her egg. She takes the egg out and puts it back in over and over again. I'm assured that this is a developmental milestone for this age!

Our friend Freddy gave us a McDonald's drive through along with lots of food to play with. Here's Ella eating my order.

Alex is trying to figure out why it looks like food but it does not taste like food

Alex and Ella are working the drive through

"Would you like fries with that?"

Our outside play area

Grandma made Christmas cookies and Alex is ready to dive right in

Ella is a little skeptical

Helen is not sure that she likes cookies

On our birthday we went for a walk with mom and dad in our spiffy new triple jogger!

The calm before the storm

Alex and Chace at our party

Having our pre-cake bottles

Daddy videotaping the event

Distracting Alex until his sisters are done with their bottles

Ella looks a little bored and is waiting for the action to start

Singing Happy Birthday

Helen is not really interested in her cake

Alex quickly decimates his cake and starts shoving handfuls of cake into his mouth

Ella decides to start putting cake in her hat

Smearing cake around everywhere looks fun too

Alex is still living high on his cake

Helen digs in a little bit but really does not like getting her hands dirty

Ella and Kim getting ready to open presents

Mommy helping Ella open her first present

Helen opening her presents

Ella's hair is completely matted with icing - it took a full bath and lots of shampoo to get it all out

Helen is a little overwhelmed with all the new toys

Birthday present carnage

Alex is learning how to tear off the wrapping

Helen and Sophie

Ella and Helen in their new birthday dresses from Aunt Cathy