Happy 10th Birthday Lex!!

It’s hard to believe, but this little guy is suddenly ten years old!!

Lex’s first birthday. He is so adorable!

My, how time flies! Today we celebrated with presents in the morning, a Memorial Day parade, lunch at Popcube’s house, and a slow, tired afternoon at home. Overall a great day and a great way to celebrate our favorite little boy who is not so little any more.

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He’s a balloon guy! I have a very similar picture from his 4th birthday. I’ll try to find it for a “then and now” post. :)

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A special birthday greeting for our special ten year old.

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Happy Birthday Lex!!

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Morning smiles with the birthday boy.

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I got a little artistic while waiting for him to open presents. He got side tracked a bit with a book. This big box contains the game Clue.

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Waiting for the Memorial Day parade to start. I embarrassed the family by asking a stranger to take a picture for me. Totally worth it! :)

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I think my kids are a bit too big for this toy, but boy did they have fun! I have this same picture from a few years ago. I’ll try to dig it up. They were a bit smaller then. :)

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An ice cream cake for his family birthday party. Cool Whip and chocolate chips make perfectly excellent decorations.

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Lots of birthday Legos. Everything is awesome!

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Happy Birthday Lex! I like his choice of shirts for the day too. :)

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The candles are casting a glow on his sweet face. <3

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Cutting the cake.

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This was an “upcycled” cake using the leftovers from Saturday’s karate cake. Lex wanted an ice cream cake for his family party, so I took layers from the karate cake, relayered them, and added some Fudge Tracks ice cream in the middle. Then I slathered the whole thing in Cool Whip. It came out really tasty!

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The cake was tasty, but frozen pretty hard. Lex had trouble cutting into it with his plastic fork so he resorted to eating it caveman style.

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She’s looking pretty classy. :)

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The photogenic side of the family. :)

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The ride home from Grandpa’s. Proof that she does indeed stop moving, sometimes, even if only for a short ride in the car.

We were all exhausted when we got home so everyone went to their rooms for awhile.  After an hour or so of quiet time we regrouped for a few family games of Clue.  It was fun to teach the kids a new game and they both enjoyed the mystery and secrecy of it.  Then we ordered pizza for dinner and watched the movie Clue!

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Lex got to choose his birthday dinner, so Ziggy sticks it was! I served him on this birthday plate, but he wasn’t happy about it. He transferred everything to a normal plate instead. Oh well. He’s ten now, but still the same boy we know and love!

After the movie, when we were all exhausted and getting ready for bed, I remembered that Lex needs birthday treats for school tomorrow. Birthday treats round three! I think we need to sugar detox again!

I feel pretty fortunate to have such an awesome boy in my world. Lying in bed tonight I said, “Ten years ago right now you were less than one hour old.” Around birthdays we like to talk about “ten years ago” or “eight years ago” and reminisce about their actual birth days so many years ago. He replied with, “Mom, I’ve been wondering, just how exactly do babies come out of the mother’s belly?” Yep, he’s growing up! So we had that conversation tonight, all snuggled up in bed, and we were happy.

Karate Party!!

We held Lex’s friend party this year at their karate dojo. The sempis (teachers) did a wonderful job and the kids had a blast!! The karate studio provides the space, and the table set-up, and I brought the rest.

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Happy Birthday Lex!!

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The cake. Lex wanted a yellow belt on the cake because he has a yellow belt, and the purple patch is similar to the patch on their uniforms.

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The kids started by finding their ninja names (using the letters from their actual names or initials). Some kids had more fun with this than others. Some, I think, thought it was too much work for a birthday party! :)

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Like my birthday banner?

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The dojo also had a birthday banner!

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Goody “bags” (wrapped books, with a cookie attached), cake, and presents in the back row. Fortune cookies, strawberries, gi cookies, Goldfish mix, and carrots in the front row.

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The party favors this year were books. My friend suggested it and I thought it was very appropriate considering the birthday boy and our family. I found two different easy-reader chapter books, both with karate themes, and bought six of each. I taped on a karate gi sugar cookie and wrapped it all up with a “black belt” ribbon. I hope the kids like them. In my opinion it’s better than cheap junk they just throw away anyway.

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Some “human bowling” aka Rolling Bombs.

Once the kids all arrived they went into the main dojo for lots of high energy games led by the sempis.

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The kids all love this game. If you get hit you have to go to the side and do push-ups or jumping jacks.

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Then some actual karate! They started with punches.

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Power punches!

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Then kicks.

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Then flying side kicks! For this they have to run down the blue mat then jump up and kick the pad that the sempi is holding. They were encourage to make loud kung-fu Hollywood style noise while running and jumping. Everyone loved this one!

After awhile of karate and games, the kids came into the small dojo for snacks, presents, and cake.

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The dojo provided free floating balloons and Alan provided the snack time entertainment.

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He is quite entertaining.

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It was a very fun atmosphere. :)

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Present time. Lots of Legos and books! :)

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Right here he’s opening karate nunchuck pens. Super fun! His classmates will have to watch out now!

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One of the kids gave him stick-on mustaches and everyone had fun with them! One kid said the mustache on Alan made him look more manly. :)

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The whole crowd, some with stick-on mustaches, others with balloon mustaches, and everyone full of silliness!

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One happy boy!! (The karate gi cookies with black belts left everyone with black tinted lips and teeth. Not the most attractive look!)

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In a throwback to the sawzal party, Alan decided to cut the cake today with a samari sword! Everyone had a good laugh. Then boring mommy kicked him out and used just a plain old knife to do the job.

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I cut very large pieces. One kid asked what kind it was, referring to brand name, I believe, and commented that the cake is much more dense than usual. I had to explain the whole “made from scratch” thing. :)

When they were done with cake they went right back to the big dojo for more fun! Time to burn off the cake energy!

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Time for some dodge ball, dojo style!

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They finished with an “everyone throw the ball at the birthday boy” game. Like the dojo version of birthday spankings. Lex laughed and laughed.

After two hours everyone was hot and sweaty, and full of sugar and fun! It was a great day! We sent each kid home with a little present and a handful of fortune cookies.

Happy almost birthday Lex!

10?!

Lex’s birthday is coming right up and I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around the number. I don’t know why, but 10 just isn’t sticking in my head. Eve and I were at the party store the other day getting supplies and I had her pick out eight balloons. I even grabbed a “8” balloon to go with the “Happy Birthday” balloon. I was just about to check out when it hit me that he is not turning eight!! Duh! We had to grab different balloons and sadly discovered that they don’t make “10” balloons. :( This double digits thing is going to take some getting used to.

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Lex goes bionic for his birthday! He built himself a bionic arm with a ball shooter on the elbow and various sensors on the fingers. He’s pretty pleased with his creation. :)

Today, the 17th, was actually my due date with him, ten short years ago….. big belly, but no baby. (I love my blog!)

Puzzle repeat

Lex decided to do the Periodic Table puzzle again.  He set it up on his desk and has been working on it for awhile now… maybe a week or two or three.  Eve helped off and on.  They both say it is very calming and relaxing.  I agree!

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All smiles!

Lex lost a tooth, in one day!

Lex came downstairs this morning and told me he had a loose tooth. He was pretty concerned about it because he thought he was done losing teeth. I reassured him that it was all fine and normal and he relaxed.

Eve and I went out for grocery shopping and errands this afternoon and I when I got home Lex told me his tooth fell out. All calm and laid back. I said, “WHAT?! Already?!” He swears he just noticed it being loose this morning, and when I felt it it was definitely loose, but not “hanging by a thread” loose. Then he showed me his mouth.

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Alan told me this is too gross to post, but I’m gonna be a rebel and to do it anyway. It’s my blog and I can post what I want to! :)

 

Look at that other tooth in the hole? Usually you have a bit of time between falling out and growing in, but that tooth in there was halfway in before it knocked out the baby tooth. Craziness! :) For some reason Lex is a little unsettled by the whole thing. He’s not sure what to do with the tooth (no tooth fairy for him) and just seems a little “meh.” I’m not sure he believes me that it’s normal to still be losing teeth. It has been awhile since the last one and he really thought he was done.

HEXBUG Racing

While on vacation Lex found Hexbugs at my parents house. Hexbugs are cool little “bug” toys that move on little rubber legs. Lex decided to take the accompanying track setup and make a Hexbug racing movie using iMovie on the iPad. He worked hard on it for days and here is the result!

The trailer to the movie:

The official Hexbug race movie:

This is his first production, complete from start to finish. He did the job of three people and sometimes it shows, but I love hearing his voice and knowing how much work he put in to this! :)