Birthday count-down

Posted on March 9, 2012 by Tessa

The count-down to Eve’s birthday has begun. She has been talking about it for months and awhile ago we started making her a birthday chain. The idea she had was time-consuming though and at that time we were 52 days away from her birthday! Needless to say we did not finish the count-down chain. However, we got 24 “cakes” made on the chain so when I realized we were 24 days away from her birthday I “remembered” and got the chain back out! She was excited and we hung it up. Now each morning she cuts off one of the cakes as the count-down continues. She loves waking up and announcing “It’s time to cut a cake!” :) It makes me giggle every morning.

First thing in the morning, cutting a cake. :)

She also made herself a birthday list last month. She hasn’t added anything to it since the original effort, but here it is.

Dog, Flowers, American Girl, Panera Card (she has been practicing her lowercase a, which often looks more like a q)

Last week we started planning her birthday party. It will be a Pet Show party and all of her friends will bring their favorite pet (stuffed animals only!) We’re going to have a pet show with awards (fluffiest pet, most colorful pet, etc.) and pet-themed games and projects. We are expecting quite a crowd! That will be on her birthday morning, then we’ll have a family party (pizza and cake, pets optional) in the afternoon/evening. Then we will all crash! I have lots of great ideas in my head, now I just need to find the motivation (somewhere, somehow!) to get it done!

Party at the bowling alley!

Posted on May 28, 2011 by Tessa

We culminated a week-long birthday celebration with a “class party” at the bowling alley. Fortunately (for me and my wallet!) Lex was happy with just four classmates and not the whole class. Even still, four classmates, plus Lex and Eve made for a hectic party! To make it even more fun I lost my voice on the way in to the bowling alley (seriously!) and then, halfway through the party, a huge crowd of high schoolers came in and they turned on cosmic bowling, which means lights out, disco ball and music on. It was fun, but chaotic! Thankfully we were wrangling just six kids! I think Lex had a great time, but I’m ready to be done with birthday parties for awhile.

The bowling alley provides pizza and I brought some snacks. The kids were all hungry and polished off the snacks pretty quickly!

Alan doling out tokens for the arcade. All the kids say they love bowling, but I think they really mean they love the arcade. I'm pretty sure it's the only arcade in our area.

Lex and his master technique. It payed off for him though because he ended up with the highest score! His friend is trying to explain a better bowling technique.

Boys! Sometimes it hard to tell fighting from fun. I broke this up but they both insisted they were having fun.

Eve got a lot of help :)

The bowling alley also provides a t-shirt the kids can color and the birthday boy gets to keep. I don't expect to see Lex wearing it anytime soon.

They were laughing hysterically at a birthday card. His friend said, "It's a monkey with a cake wearing a hat!" and they both cracked up. Silly kids.

Cake time!

I think they liked it :)

Eve made fast friends with the one other girl there.

This isn't a great photo but I love it because lately Lex has switched from duck-and-hide when he sees the camera's orange glow, to smiling automatically. Here he was drinking and watching people bowl, but when the orange glow hit his face he smiled. I LOVE IT!

I had something else to say here, but I forgot! I’m hoping my voice returns quickly. The boy is throughly six now and has had enough partying and cake to last him through the year!

Today in photos

Posted on May 27, 2011 by Tessa

Lex rode his bike to school this morning. Alan ran along. I took pictures :)

Snack under the "club house"

Chillin' on the swing, waiting for someone to push her :)

We transplanted some flowers the kids brought home from school last week. Lex's is a sunflower and Eve's is unknown. She can't remember. I'm hoping they grow just so we can find out what she planted!

He was really interested (for a few minutes anyway) in learning how to properly transplant a flower.

We decided to decorate the club house with the plants. Lex carefully placed them and watered them.

Looks good to me.

Slide race!

Cake for tomorrow's bowling party!

I rock! :)

Happy 6th Birthday Lex!

Posted on May 25, 2011 by Tessa

I’m filled with emotions today, but I’m going to keep this short and sweet because my thoughts don’t often come out well through my fingers. Instead I’ll just say Happy Birthday (quietly) to the sweetest little boy I know. The boy who made us a family. The boy who changed my world forever. The boy who can make me laugh, cry, yell, and hug, all within the span of six minutes. I love you Lex. Thank you for being you. A strong, confident, silly, smart, loving little boy.

Happy Birthday!

I like to leave a little something for them to find on birthday mornings. I was also going to make a special breakfast, that didn't happen, so instead he had oatmeal with leftover chocolate "dirt" sprinkled on top. He was happy.

It's 6:00am and this is his "put down the camera and let me open presents" face.

A Rubiks cube. It's good to challenge your brain at 6am, right?

Lex had show and tell today and he had to bring in something that starts with the letter X. He chose to draw a xylophone with his fancy new markers. I love this boy!

I uploaded all of the birthday party pictures to Picasa. Check ’em out! (just click on the little picture below)

Lex's 6th birthday party

Tonight we are going out to dinner to celebrate. When I ask about their dinner choices they always choose “out” instead of me cooking for them. I try not to take that personally! Lex threw us a curve ball today by requesting Friendly’s instead of Panera Bread. Assuming he doesn’t change his mind, that’s where we’ll be headed tonight. I can’t wait for him to come home from school!

For school…

Posted on May 24, 2011 by Tessa

A birthday party sneak peek

Posted on May 23, 2011 by Tessa

I’m super tired and about ready to pass out, but I wanted to post a few pics for those who couldn’t be there for Lex’s party this weekend. I’ll post more during quiet time tomorrow. For now…

The birthday monkey testing out the monkey bars. He's good at them!

Eager swingers, patiently waiting (kind of) for the swingbar to be ready.

Ahh... this is what I've been waiting for all these weeks. Swing set up. Children playing happily. Life is good.

Reach for the trees!

Cake time! Can you believe he's almost six?! It makes me want to cry!
In a happy way. Usually.

Bagels for dinner. His choice, of course. Sandwich fixings as well. We did cake first, then presents, then dinner.

Lego love

Hope that will tide you over for now. I promise more pictures soon to come. Thanks to all who attended. We had a fantastic weekend! Those who couldn’t make it were missed. Hopefully we can see you all again soon!

It was hard choosing just a few pictures to post! Also, I have to say, one of my favorite parts of this weekend is that Lex happily smiled for the camera. Many times! He’s so good to me.

Invitations

Posted on May 16, 2011 by Tessa

I can’t find a photo of the invites Lex made for his bowling party (is it possible I didn’t take photos?!?) but it was cute. It had a bowling pin and ball on the front and said Happy Birthday.

Here is the invitation he made for the neighborhood kids.

Happy Birthday. I'm not sure why, but on each of them he made the "day" a the end small and seperate.

I am turning 6!

I love these invitations. I love that he happily made them. I love that the idea was all his. I love that he writes “I am turning 6!” on them. The whole things amazes me and just makes me beam with pride and love. He is turning 6!

Knocking on a neighbor's door.

Happy 4th Birthday to Eve

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Tessa

Happy, happy birthday to my big girl today! Just four short years ago today we welcomed her into this world, forever changing our little family. Lucky, lucky us!

Today she woke to find a little birthday something waiting for her.

Happy Birthday Eve!!

A tiny pink Samuri eraser makes her say "awww"

Ribbon on packages is kind of like torture to small children.

Lex picked out a flashing "Birthday Girl" tiara for her. She loved it :)

Big birthday hugs

The chocolate cupcakes I made for her party this weekend didn’t turn out well (literally, they did not turn out of the wrappers well and made a huge mess) so last night I whipped up a batch of yellow cupcakes (thanks Betty Crocker!) and this morning we put Cool Whip, red sprinkles, and raspberries on top. They were a big success with her friends at school.

Decorating cupcakes

Like my snazzy cupcake transport system? They all made it to school, safe and sound.

After school we decorated a princess mirror, put together her new puzzle, ate lunch, and spent an hour watching videos of her first year. That was fun.

Eve's friend got her a Decorate Your Own princess mirror. Eve loves it.

This was a gift from me, but it ended up being much harder than I had antipcated. We did it though!

This is Eve’s favorite…

This is one of my favorites (it’s hard to choose just one!)…

Now she is napping (which took some effort on my part!) and this afternoon we are off to swimming lessons again and then out to dinner at a restaurant of her choice, which is still undecided. It is a lovely day.

An Almost-Four Year Old Birthday Party!

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Tessa

(I’m not quite ready for her to be four yet. I still get a few more days with my three year old!)

For her birthday this year Eve wanted a “just family” party. Over the past weeks I’ve asked her off and on about inviting others, maybe a few friends, or neighbors, or classmates, but she held firm to her “just family” idea, so this weekend we had a fun “just family” party. Luckily we have more than enough family to fill the room! :) Eve was surrounded by love and duly doted on.

Lex learned how to use the vacuum and did a great job helping us clean for the party.

He was THRILLED that I let him stand on the counter while he dusted the shelves.

After he was done with the shelves he decided to clean the counter. This kept him busy for awhile. It was great.

Eve and Rosy

Mema and Lex.

Eve's idea of birthday heaven is a room full of people ready to play Candy Land with her.

Books are irresistible in this house. If you pick up a book, both kids will immediately appear. Aunt Katie is an excellent book reader.

Eve chose pizza for her birthday dinner. I love her idea of a good party - family and pizza!

Cake! This year Grampy Don convinced Eve that she wanted a Parcey Cake for her birthday. She agreed before she even knew what it was :) Parcey Cake is a Johnson family creation consisting of layer cake with a layer of Jell-O and Cool Whip between the cake layers. Eve chose chocolate (of course!) and raspberry Jell-O. Yum.

Eve liked the cake!

Eve and Grandpa Tom.

Classic.

Eve got wall sticker dress up dolls and a doll house. They were quickly put on the wall and the kids have been having fun with them.

Sunday was beautiful and we got out the bikes!

Lex is going to try and lose the training wheels this year.

Taking a break with Aunt Rose.

Happy Birthday Lex!

Posted on May 25, 2010 by Tessa

Happy 5th Birthday to my boy today! Where does the time go?! There are periods of my life that I have totally forgotten, and then there are days that I remember in full detail. Five years ago today was one of those days. We ended up holding a tiny baby boy that night, a boy that would change our lives, and now here we are, five years later, with a big kid! A sweet, helpful, strong-willed, intelligent, smiley big kid. I feel very fortunate today. (’cause it’s all about me, you know!)

We had pancakes for breakfast and I made him a silly card (crayons and construction paper at 11:30 last night!) to start his day off right. No presents, yet. Alan has a geeky one for him this afternoon. I’ll let Alan tell you all about it some other time. Lex took his “moon rocks” to school and everyone was wishing him a Happy Birthday. He was super proud, and thrilled when his teacher noticed his shorts and t-shirt. Eve and I made cupcakes this morning and we’ll have them at snack time. Alan and Lex are going to an energy meeting tonight. They are both excited. Eve and I are going grocery shopping, and a little less excited :) I need to start planning for the birthday party (non-party) this weekend. I think I’m going to stop at the balloon store while we’re out today. That will make him happy :)

Happy 5th Birthday Lex!

The birthday boy with his proud little sister

A little morning artwork. He drew a house and a tree, then a boy climbing the tree and smiling sun. I love it!

Calm and Chaos: Life with kids

Tag Archives: Birthdays