Carter is 1!

Carter turned 1 on July 3. That year went by quickly! He also took his first steps on his birthday and has been taking some here and there ever since. When I picked him up from the nursery on Sunday after church, several of the ladies were telling me I had to stop him - walking means moving up to the next nursery and they don't want to lose him because he is always good for lots of snuggling.

My parents, my brother and his family, and our good friends came over for a cookout on the 4th to celebrate his birthday. While he wasn't afraid to touch his cake (like Ava was on her 1st birthday), he took a few bites and was done. No messy baby pics for us!

That evening, Ava got to see fireworks... WAY past her bedtime. The park down the road from our house hosts fireworks every year, and every other year, she's slept right through them, but this year, some of the tests they sent up woke her up and scared her, so she sat with her Pap for a while watching tv and then we decided to walk down to the park so she could see what the big booms were.

The next day, we headed to the zoo. Ava's favorite things were the train (she didn't need to ride it for excitement... simply hearing that it was coming and waving to everyone riding was a blast for her!) and the goats. They let you get in the pen with the goats and she was not shy at all. I think she would have enjoyed Young's Jersey Dairy equally as much.

It was a somewhat tiring weekend, but good. Now we're all fighting with runny noses, though. This weekend, we'll be heading down to visit Mark's side of the family. We haven't been for a LONG time, so we can't wait!