Cooper's Birthday Part 1

I don't know who decided it was okay to speed up time, but I absolutely cannot believe a year has gone by since Cooper was born. A year ago, I was recovering from an emergency c-section after a badly botched epidural left me unable to move, swallow, or stay awake and caused mine and Cooper's heart rates to drop dangerously low. Poor Jeff- I can't imagine what he was going through. Thankfully, all's well that ends well, and when I regained consciousness, this is the beautiful face that was brought to me:


As Jimmy Buffett says: "I've had good days, and bad days, and going half-mad days..." and that's exactly what this year has been like. There were times Jeff and I thought we'd never be able to handle everything, but even though parenthood is much more challenging that we imagined, we're very thankful and lucky to have our sweet Cooper.

Cooper has been celebrating his birthday for a few days. We had his family party this past Sunday. We went with a farm theme:

Cooper's smash cake


Cooper's birthday cake


Westie cookies from YaYa and Mallie

Jeff and I had plans to make the backyard look slightly like a farm in autumn without going crazy. We were going to get hay bales for seating and lots of pumpkins and mums to decorate. Yeah, that didn't exactly happen. We couldn't find hay bales big enough for people to sit on (stand, maybe; sit, no) and Jeff and I had a little miscommunication about how many pumpkins and mums we were going to need. So...we enlisted our parents to bring whatever folding and lawn chairs they had to the party, we put out our lawn furniture, and I sped (and by sped, I mean driving carefully without the slightest bit of road rage or anxiety) through Germantown after picking up Cooper's cakes and balloons, arriving home 1 hour before the party starts. Did I mention I hadn't showered?

Anyway, the party starts and I'm only 20 minutes late showing up to my own backyard for the festivities. I figure that's pretty good. I plan on being at least 45 minutes late to my own funeral. Cooper was passed around to just about every family member in attendance, although all he really wanted was to get down and play.


Playing on Daddy's tractor with a little help from Aunt Mimi Jane.


Trying to figure out this whole cake thing...


Checking out balloons with Erin


A pirate ship water table from Mama and Dada!!


Being pulled around by Frannie in his wagon from Nana and Hondo

We were all exhausted by the end of the afternoon. Cooper got a bath, had dinner and a bottle, and was out and Jeff and I weren't far behind. We almost overslept Monday morning!

Stay tuned for Cooper's Birthday Part 2- his actual birthday!