Happy Birthday Daniel Kai!

What an adventure this year has been! Looking back, the year has gone by so quickly (with the exception of some really LONG, challenging days/nights!)
My parents had originally planned a traditional baby luau for Daniel at Goleta Beach to celebrate his first birthday. The plans were to have a roast pig, but then swine flu hit and although it doesn't pass through food, we thought we should skip the pig this year. We had lots of friends and family from out-of-town coming to Daniel's party which was supposed to be the Saturday before his birthday. But come Friday, the Jesusita Fire was a major threat and my parents were in an evacuation warning zone (and two blocks away from a mandatory evac zone). So with smoke and ashes filling the air and nearly 30,000 people evacuated from their homes we decided to cancel the party. All the other weekends were already filled with prior committments so we ended up celebrating three days later on Daniel's actual birthday (May 12th). Since it was a Tuesday night, not as many people could make it but there was a good turn out and we still had a great time. Daniel still got to celebrate with both sets of grandparents and all of his great-grandparents. My parents and family cooked up tri-tip, chicken and we served "long-life" noodles. While everyone else had cake, Daniel got to dig into a mini angel food cake with fresh whipped cream and strawberries.
Daniel was so exhausted and fell asleep in his carseat on the way home. He didn't even wake up when we took him out and just crashed on his changing pad. (See last photo!) Happy Birthday to our sweet little boy!