After that, came his actual birthday. Since it fell on a Wednesday this year, Greg and I took off of work and took Cooper to Galveston to the Rainforest Cafe and to the aquarium at Moody Gardens. It was such a fun day. It was extremely cold, but fun. We took several pictures, but the lighting was so dark they didn't come out really well. Cooper loved the aquarium. He kept leaning on the tanks and watching the seals and penguins. We just had so much fun with him that day. Here is a picture of him standing beside a painting of a macaroni penguin. We had to take this picture because Cooper loves the "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" book series. And in one of them it says "Macaroni penguin, Macaroni penguin, what do you see? "
And then, the following Saturday was his birthday party. Of course we woke up to several rain showers that morning. I was starting to panic because we rented one of those giant moonwalks for the older kids to play in. I would go outside and in between rains I would dry the entire moonwalk off with towels until I was soaked. But it FINALLY stopped raining just as the party started so the kids eventually got to play. I think the party went really well. Cooper had fun visiting with all his cousins and friends. He even ate his birthday cake! It was a really good day. And from the bottom picture you can see that Cooper was one pooped little boy. He actually fell asleep in mid-bite in his high chair! It was hilarious!
And finally, just this past week, Cooper has started walking everywhere! He has been taking a few steps here and there for a while now. But all the sudden he just decided that it was time to walk permanently. He even gets up by himself without pulling up on anything. It is just amazing! One minute he was crawling and the next he was walking! He is so proud of himself. If he takes a particularly long stroll across the living room, he expects applause whenever he gets to his destination. This kid just makes my world go 'round!