We spent the entire weekend celebrating Leighton’s 1st birthday… as it should be, right? Friday was spent outside at Zoo Atlanta, and I think Leighton had almost as much fun as we did. 🙂 She pointed to lots of animals, calling them all “dut” or “dird”… so we have some work to do on identifying animals, but we’ll give her a break since she’s only 1.

I think our favorite animals were the pandas. The mama panda came right over to the glass where we’d parked Leighton’s stroller and just sat there looking at her for a solid couple minutes. Then she did a forward roll and walked off – ha!

Leighton was correct in her “DIRD!!!” exclamation when we got to feed birdseed to a parakeet.

And I definitely had a nightmare that night about a giant snake being on my pillow. I wonder why.

The birthday girl in her adorable donut jammies::

Girlfriend looks excited here, but we soon found out that she clearly prefers frozen store-bought pancakes to my homemade blueberry ones. #moreforme

Saturday night was spent celebrating with our families, my childhood best friend, and one of her boys at my parents’ house. Craig smoked a brisket, mom cooked, and we had the best ever mac n cheese from a local restaurant, Dave Poe’s. Nicole and her family drove up for the weekend, as I’d mentioned in L’s birthday party recap, and we were so happy to have them here with us. We don’t see each other often, but when we do, it’s like no time has passed. Friends who are like family are simply one of life’s best gifts!

Smash cake #2 was a big hit!

Birthday party day!

After the last party-goer left, family presents were opened, and most of the house was cleaned up, we ended the weekend with Mexican at one of our favorite local places with Craig’s brother, his girlfriend, and Nicole’s family. Leighton ate practically an entire dish of black beans (in addition to her whole dinner that we brought for her)… I’m pretty sure she thinks that beans are a facial-quality material. I thought we might have to hose her off in the kitchen sink before leaving the restaurant. She was clearly pleased with the situation, though!

What a wonderful weekend we had celebrating our baby girl with many of those we love most! We couldn’t have asked for a better 3 days together for this special milestone birthday. Here’s looking forward to this coming year as we move into toddlerhood! Wish us luck!