Birthday Boy!

Big, bad Lucas turned one year!

We can hardly believe it.

Grandma Vicky and Grandpa Wally planned to come to Chicago to celebrate his birthday, but instead offered their plane tickets to us so that we could go to Idaho and celebrate with more family and friends.

Aunt Gina, Uncle Paul, Dino and Carrie left 80 degree weather in Arizona only to arrive in shin-deep snow and frigid conditions (relatively-speaking) in Pocatello.

Dino and Carrie took to the snow like fish to water and played outside the entire time!

Lucas handled the pressure of the first birthday like a rockstar - all eyes on him, expectations to unwrap and momentarily enjoy each gift before moving on to the next, smile, laugh, remain sociable the entire time, and finish things off by smearing cake all over his face.

(No, his parents' expectations were not too high!)

He did great, but he didn't take to unwrapping the presents and tried hard to crawl away each time we wrangled him in to open another. He also was much more interested in using a fork and trying to grab my knife while I cut the cake than eating it himself.

We had a great time. It felt like Christmas all over again but even better because we had more family and friends together. In fact, we were so distracted that we didn't take many pictures. We don't even have one of him eating his cake!

Opening presents

Oh ya...breakfast at Butter Burrs in Pocatello.

This is where I met Chad 18 years ago...I was a server and he was a bus boy!

It was also the place that his sister and my sister worked as well as many other friends.

Thanks for the hook up, Britt.

Here's a family pic.

Unfortunately we didn't get one with the Vinci's :(

(This lack of pictures for a first birthday really is pathetic. I'll try to get more from my mom. Possibly more to come....)