First Birthday!

The twins are one! We celebrated by having over family and friends who were especially involved in getting us through the last year and a half. I think we counted over 50 people who brought us meals during the pregnancy and first couple of months after they were born, and some of those 50 brought meals more than once. We also had friends come twice a week to clean for me. One friend came every week, and other friends did every other week, with an occasionally other volunteers jumping in. C's parents also came and lived on our property for 6 weeks, and my mom stayed with us almost 3 weeks. We are just SO grateful for such a wonderful support our church and family were and still are! Of course the day of the party dawned VERY rainy and lasted up until about an hour before the party started. So God was still gracious and we were able to send the kids outside to play and have it available to escape the crowd inside. When Christian was designed and putting in the patio, his main goal was to be able to use it for this party. So we were VERY grateful that the rain stopped! Anyway, here are some pictures and I may perhaps gets inspired to add a couple videos at the end...

Tirzah greets guests

We gave Peter my old camera- he has been loving it! I'll have to post some of his pictures sometime. He and A and E all wanted to make "party shirts", so we did that a couple days ago and that's what he's wearing. :)

They got matching lamb coats from Marmie and Boppa- oh so cute!

...and Curious George books that I appear to be giddy about. :) The girls had to stay in their high chairs while their older siblings opened their presents for them. They were messy from dinner and we had to do presents before cake because people had to start leaving... Anyway.

The older kids also blew out the candles for them... But they like to look at them at least! 

"Oooh, this feels niiiiiice." -B.

"Tastes good, too!" -B.

"Let's do it again!!!" -T.

Tirzah the sheep. She loved wearing her coat, whereas Berea was much happier snuggling with hers. :)

Following are a few yard/garden pictures while I'm at it...

Our basil went crazy this year! Our first time trying to grow it outside!

Our squash appears to be taking over the world (on the right)- we just picked a 2 foot zucchini the other day that had been hiding.

My peach tree! C got me fruit trees for my birthday and they're all still alive! That's a wattle behind it, by the way- flood prevention measure.

Front yard

Our tomatoes love the side of the house!

And last but not least, Christian made this slide show of the twins' first year for the party...