Rudy's Birthday in Pictures

(Mostly.  There will be a few words but i can't guarantee their quality as i really am rather tired!)

 We baked a cake (and licked the spoon)

Presents were wrapped and the living room 'prepped'

And then it was The Big Day!

The inflatable rabbit bouncer is a present from Chris's sister Emma, Toby has rather randomly named it "Nibbles" which i can only assume is inspired somehow by the name of Charlie and Lola's pet rat that they have for like, 2 episodes before it dies?!

We had pancakes with maple syrup for breakfast

Presents were unwrapped and played with

Some faster than others. This gadget set from ELC had about ninety plastic threads holding each item in place, i swear you'd think they were ACTUAL car keys and ACTUAL smart phone, they so badly wanted to prevent anyone from stealing them.  I snapped this shot of Chris exasperated, trying to remove all the tags while Toby repeated "Open it Daddy, Daddy open it, Open it Daddy" over and over and Rudy waaaaailed!  Then Chris yelled at me and told me to put my phone down and be helpful instead *pout*

We weren't going to do the whole "sibling gets a present on the other one's birthday" thing, but then changed our minds at the last minute and wrapped up a Doctors Kit we bought for Toby a few weeks back...

You'll notice i went to great lengths to look the part of an actual sick person, with the lank hair, dull spotty skin, dark circles around my eyes and old dressing gown and PJs combo.  Method Acting, that's what it was.

(After a shower) we used self-timer and my new gorilla-pod thingy to take this family portrait, which is my new favourite photo :)

 Then we went to our local soft play area, Anchors Away in Reddish for lunch and to play for a couple of hours, which both boys loved.

They spent ages in this little 'house' in the baby area, opening and closing the door, ringing the door 'bell' (squeaker) and posting imaginary mail and playing peekaboo through the letterbox.

We went back home for brief nap for Rudy and drinks for the rest of us and then went back out to Rudy's Aquababies lesson, where he got dunked and had "Happy Birthday" sang to him for the first time :)

And the day ended with chocolate cake, as all good birthdays should ;)

Rudy is 1!

:o