Happy birthday to the big man today! We had to do some math to figure out his age this morning. He says he keeps track because he knows if it’s an even year he turns an even number. It’s good to have a system. We eliminated 36 and 40, and settled on 38. I get to call him old man for the next 10 months, then I’m right there with him. Eeek! He celebrated by taking the day off from work, exercising really hard (yes, this is how he celebrates), getting a massage, eating massive quantities of Indian food and watching five hours of TV. Then we came home with cookies and cuddles.
Birthday hugs!
Happy Birthday Alan! We’re lucky to have such an amazing hubby and daddy!
Today was a busy day, just like all the other days. I’m embarrassed to admit that I was up and showered and dressed and checking Facebook before I remembered it was my birthday. That’s just how old I am! Good thing FB reminded people to wish me a happy birthday, otherwise I might have forgotten completely! Kidding, of course, Alan and the kids had sweet birthday wishes for me when they got up.
I spent the day at UVEI, running errands on lunch break and afterwards, picking up the kids from daycare along the way. I got a little carrot cake from the grocery store, so we had a little birthday dessert. Alan was at a meeting late tonight, so no birthday dinner out. Instead he brought me home wine and delicious take out! So I had cake first, and dinner is ready as soon as Lex is in bed. :)
I got home to wonderful birthday cards and a present from a mother who can read my mind! She asked last week what I wanted and I said nothing (I’m never any help!). Today at UVEI I was admiring other people’s oversized bags and thinking that I really should put something like that on my Chirstmas list. I’m always lugging around books and notebooks and the ipad and lunch and and and… Guess what one of my presents was?! A beautiful, over-sized Vera Bradley tote!! Thanks Mom! I was admiring it aloud and Lex added sweetly, “Yes, it’s every woman’s dream.” His words and his tone and the comment in general made me laugh so hard.
Happy Birthday to Me! (photo by Lex)
Eve made me several beautiful cards today, but she got my age wrong on every one. She wrote 30 on her card this morning and I told her I was 37 now. She made two more cards, one at school and one at daycare, and put 38 on both of them! I think I’ll take the 30 back! :)
On Sunday we had a little family party for Lex’s birthday. Family parties feel little these days with all of my siblings away and Grandma no longer with us. It was nice, but we were definitely missing some of the big personalities! :)
We had a quiet morning with just the four of us, then Mema and Grandpa Tom came over at lunch time. When the kids were getting too bouncy and Lex was barely able to contain the excitement of another day of presents, my mom had the great idea to take them out to fly kites. The sky was dark and the wind was whipping, but we had fun for awhile. Mema brought them each a new kite and they are very pretty. Lex managed to get his up in the air, but then he couldn’t get it down again! How’s that for an unusual kite problem. :)
Eve and her owl kite
Lex flying his space shuttle kite high in the sky!
It’s time for this space shuttle to come in for a landing!
“Mom, I can’t get my kite down!!”
Eve was SUPER proud that she had a great idea and was able to help get the kite down. She’s a smartie!
Back at the house Amanda and Rachel arrived, then Grandpa and Katie, and THEN the moment he was waiting for… presents! (yep, he’s reached that age!)
They both crack me up in this picture. Eve looks like she’s ready to dive in, and Lex looks a little disgusted at the books he just opened. As if he’s not going to have them read by morning! :)
Laser pegs! Always a good time!
It’s hard to let Lex choose his birthday dinner since his diet is sooo limited. We settled on pizza, garlic bread (which he loves), and salad for dinner.
Yummy dinner.
Then, of course, cake!!! This was a chocolate peanut butter cake. Not as fancy as the basketball cake from Saturday, but sooo much tastier!
Time for cake!
Did you notice the birthday banner on the wall behind him? Eve made it just for for Lex. She also bought him two presents with her own money. They are so sweet to each other.
One happy eight year old!
We ended the evening with a multi-generational game of Monopoly. Lex got a new version with gold pieces. Oh-la-la! It was fun!!
Lex was very excited for his big day, of course. He brought cupcakes to school yesterday and was eager for his friend party today.
Cupcakes for school on Friday. They were a big hit!
He woke bright and early, as usual, and got the rest of us up as well for an early morning birthday celebration.
I was surprised and pleased that Lex mentioned the birthday morning table last night. He said he couldn’t wait to fall asleep so he could wake up and see the beautiful presents on the table at his place in the morning. I love to hear that my traditions are taking hold in their minds. :)
It’s 6:04am, time to open presents!
Me and Eve, when Alan has the camera. :)
I got him Twister for a present and we had a GREAT time playing!!
It’s fun when big and little people play together.
We took turns being the spinner and photographer.
Eve is in there somewhere!
Lex got creative with the photography.
When we were all done and laughing on the floor, Lex suggested a family picture on the Twister mat. What a great idea!!
Then Mema and Grandpa Tom came over with bagels and coffee. After awhile we packed up and headed to the Competition Complex for Lex’s friend party. He had five friends, plus he and Eve, and we had a great time!!
First things first, climb that rock wall… all the way to the top!
They have a mechanical bull that the kids all love. I think it’s a little weird looking, especially here with no horns (the kids kept pulling them off). Eve enjoyed her turn.
Happy Birthday Lex!! Not only did he endure the birthday song this year, I think he may have even enjoyed it a bit. :)
Blowing out the candles! (the candles are huge and the cake is small. funny.)
Party people
Cake smile! :)
It’s hard to take good “opening presents” pictures, but I love this one because of Eve in the background.
They played many rounds of mini-golf. This place has tons to do!
This is a blurry picture, but I loved the scene of the boys playing mini-golf while Mema and Grandpa Tom sat on the bench, waiting their turn.
We got home a little after 4pm and crashed! Lex immediately went to work on his new Lego sets. Eve and Alan settled onto the couch for some TV time. Mema invited us out to dinner but we ended up having dinner in the living room, watching Bill Nye the Science Guy instead. Bath, stories, bed. The usual.
I had the good fortune to be cuddling with Lex at exactly 7:41pm, so we chatted about his actual day of birth for a bit. He said, “I can’t believe I waited eight years and right now I’m finally eight!!” He’s so funny.
I can’t believe he is suddenly eight. I am so fortunate to have been blessed with such a smart, funny, friendly, caring, rambunctious, sometimes obnoxious, always amazing little boy! Not a day goes by that he doesn’t make me smile. I am in awe of the person he has become and so proud to call him my son.
I completely forgot to hang up Eve’s birthday collages this year! Oops! I was just cleaning off the mountain of junk piled on my desk and came across them. Sigh. I guess I’ll add “make 6yr collage” to my to-do list and try to remember to hang them next year!
Today Eve is 6 years and 6 days and we are officially done celebrating this birthday!
We had a fun and exhausting day today. I was talked into entering a cardboard box boat competition at the aquatic center. It was part of their annual Spring Fling to celebrate their 4th anniversary. It sounded like fun and I hoped the kids would enjoy it. We got to the aquatic center at 9am and were given a plastic garbage bag, a box cutter, scissors, packing tape, and a long list of rules. Oh, and plenty of cardboard boxes! Off and on over the next few hours we built a cardboard boat! We took breaks for snacks and for rubber duck racing.
The whole project wasn’t quite as exciting for the kids as I was hoping. They did a lot of waiting around while engineer daddy did his engineering.
Trying the boat on for size.
They didn’t provide us with any measuring devices (and we weren’t allowed to bring anything of our own!) so we did the best we could. Fortunately Eve just had her well child visit and we knew just how many inches tall she is!
As usual I didn’t know the schedule of events, so the kids had about one minute to decorate their ducks before the big race!
There were lots of ducks racing so they did them in groups. Lex and Eve’s ducks were in the final group. We had no winners in our family.
The boat is coming along nicely.
First cake of the day. They had three different cakes, so Alan and both kids got a piece and we all shared.
We decided to give our boat higher sides. Alan did some calculations about displacing water and such and the short sides were a little too short for comfort.
Now, for the moment she’s been waiting for, time to decorate!
Look how closely they are paying to Alan’s attempt at giving them rowing instructions. It was loud and busy in there. We were all tired by this point!
Smiley kids.
After we got the boat done we had about 45 minutes left until race time, so Alan and the kids changed into bathing suits and went swimming. I stayed dry. I don’t enjoy swimming when it’s so crowded.
Suited up and ready for a dry run.
Listening for final instructions.
I really need to test the video settings before making movies. I don’t know why they keep changing and I never think to check them before starting the video, right at the moment I want to capture! Sorry for the blue tint and extremely low quality. If the aquatic center posts any better videos I’ll link to them later. What you can’t see well in this video is Eve completely panicking when the boat rocks and disolving into tears. She didn’t crying stop until about 10 minutes after she got out of the water.
This is the final picture before they went under. If you zoom in you’ll see Lex looking a little nervous and Eve completely in tears.
Alan jumped in and rescued the boat.
Two happy boys, one wet boat.
So, a few lessons learned here. First, the kids are not very good rowers. Second, they were so excited about winning that the idea of NOT winning didn’t even occur to them. You can see right from the beginning that they got off to a slow start and were immediately distracted by the other teams. Third, Eve apparently didn’t think our boat was sinkable and when it started taking on water she panicked and it was all over from there. Maybe we should have spent some time discussing what to do if/when water gets into the boat.
With their young age, lack of rowing abilities, and complete lack of focus they didn’t stand a chance! Oh well. Lex had fun (though he also cried a bit because he was sad the boat sank) and I suspect if you ask Eve next week she’ll tell you it was fun too. Give her time to recover. :)
After that excitement we rushed home, inhaled bagels for lunch, grabbed the castle cake and party supplies and rushed out the door again. We were barely home for 15 minutes before leaving for her birthday party.
Gymnastic was fun. We had seven of her pre-K classmates, plus Lex and Eve. They bounced around like crazy people for awhile, then went down on the floor and did the routine for an hour, then back up for cake and presents. It was over before we knew it!
My lovely princess castle cake! I won’t go into details on my thoughts on this cake as I know I’ve mentioned it before and everyone tells me it was wonderful so I’m going to be ok with that.
Side view.
It’s impossible to take a good photo in this place!
Happy Birthday dear Eve!!
Alan entertained the crowd with jokes. They were all amused. :)
Presents!
The gymnastics place is fun, but it’s not my ideal location for a party because there is very little time or space for the kids to just play together. It’s also a very rushed party. You get one hour of gymnastics and half hour for cake and presents. They had parties back to back today too, so as we were arriving the party before us was leaving, and we were rushing out the door at the end to allow room for the next party. Most of the kids didn’t have time to finish their cake and Eve rushed right through the presents. That said, she has been asking for a gymnastics party for a few years now and I was happy to not have to clean for and plan another birthday party! An hour and a half, in and out, and we’re done celebrating Eve’s birthday!! I’m done party planning and cake baking… until next month!
Tomorrow morning we have brunch plans with another family, and then we can rest. Monday it’s back to school!
Today was a big day! I normally leave little piles of presents on the table for the kids on their birthday, and the Easter bunny leaves their baskets on the table, so we had quite a full table this morning.
Easter morning. They started with the Easter baskets. And the chocolate.
Then she moved on to birthday presents.
Because it was her birthday, Lex agreed to read her new book out loud at breakfast. She loves when Lex reads to her.
Stylish little girl with her headband on backwards. :)
Ring pops at 7am? Why not!? Thanks Aunt Rosy!
After plenty of candy and a few chores we began the first of many Easter egg hunts for the day. I think we did six Easter egg hunts today!
This was the third hunt, where the boys did the hiding and the girls did the seeking.
Alan hid them high up!
Umm… yeah.
I got Eve a Jr. Scientist kit because she’s always telling people that she’s a scientist. She was pretty excited about it.
Eve helped me put the finishing touches on her birthday cake.
Eve waiting for Lex to hid the eggs outside. Not to complain about the weather, but 55° isn’t very warm if there’s no sun and lots of wind!
I love this girl!
We all had fun with ‘Fraidy Egg :)
While looking for eggs, Eve and I discovered a little bit of spring!!!
We came back inside to warm up and play some more. More company came and we began the official family party. :)
Lex got a 3D puzzle in his Easter basket this morning. It was a group effort, but we got it done. Lex put the final two pieces in and then ran around bragging like he solved the whole puzzle. :)
Time for presents!
Minnie Mouse love.
All decked out in jewels from Aunt Mandy. Eve wanted pizza for dinner, but due to the holiday none of the delivery places were open. Fortunately Mema thought of this ahead of time and bought frozen pizza from KAF. It was ok, but not as good as the fresh stuff.
An Easter basket cake
An Easter basket birthday cake!
Eve, a very happy six year old!
Aunt Katie gave Eve a big drawing pad and new markers. Eve promptly drew a picture of Katie on a horse. Then she wrote, “Dear Kadey. I love you. Love ges hoo.”
Let’s just say I AM EXHAUSTED. There, I said it. I am tired and I am ready to not celebrate a birthday tomorrow! :)
Today we had Lex’s friend party. He invited nine friends (plus Lex and Eve equals 11!) One girl didn’t make it so we ended up with 10 kids total. I had the party mapped out and it went somewhat according to my plan. The glitch was that not all of them are as in to Legos as Lex is, so my “free play with Legos” time ended up being “run around like wild men” time. They all had fun though, and no one got hurt or cried (much) so I’m going to call this one a success!
Eve fell asleep at 6:30 and Lex went to bed quite easily at 7pm, though he just now told us he can’t sleep so I let him sit in bed and read for awhile. I am going to finish this post, drink some tea, and go to bed!
Setting up the table. My birthday boy is so cute!
Alan and I debated for awhile on the best way to play with Legos outside. I thought the back deck, but I was worried about the kids sitting in the direct sun. We agreed on sheets in the shade on the front lawn. It went fairly well.
I thought the kids could color a Lego man coloring page that I printed while they waited for everyone to arrive. The kids thought otherwise and headed directly for the swingset.
Once everyone had arrived we did a Lego relay.
They had to run to the bucket, scoop out a Lego (the big Lego Quattro blocks), and carry it in a spoon back to their team's bucket. All without using hands, just the spoon.
The kids all had a great time with this game! Lex's team agreed that since he was the birthday boy he should be able to use his hands. :)
She did great! (only cheated a little! :) )
This guy was fast!
After the relay was over they all headed for drinks and snacks, then settled on the lego sheets to build.
It was peaceful for a bit.
Guess who's been eating the blue and green Lego block cookies? :)
Cake time! The cake was a bit anticlimatic because Lex doesn't like candles or singing. I brought it out, asked who wants cake, and got only a mild interest. I don't think they realized it was a cake! A few kids appreciated my hard work before I cut it into pieces. Everyone happily ate it.
Three Lego cake blocks with cake "bumps" and covered in fondant. I had a little trouble keeping it all pretty while stacking, but Lex was happy with it and therefore I was too!
I had lots of Lego games planned, but it was hard to keep them focused. Some of the kids wanted to play with Legos the entire time, but many others just wanted to run and be more physical.
This game was popular. They divided up into teams of two and had to build the tallest free-standing tower within a given period of time. They all quickly figured out the tall pieces, but struggled with balance and stability. Everyone (almost) had a great time with this game.
Working hard. Their tower fell over right before the time ran out.
Guess what Lex got for presents? Legos! Somehow he managed to get through this whole Lego birthday without getting any duplicate sets.
What? Caption this.
The crowd was getting out of control. I scrambled for ideas. I wanted to find another bandana or two and do a three-legged race, but I could only find two, so we did a blind-fold building challenge. This settled about half the kids. The other half grabbed a football and ran around.
Kids were loosing their shirts and shoes everywhere! We agreed that we're doing ok as long as none of the KIDS get lost!
I had a great clean-up crew today (and yesterday!) Eve had a rather unfortunate incident in the bathroom that resulted in me bathing her quickly, so Alan took point on clean up. He proudly announced that he finally found a body for the giant Lego head!
All in all a good day. Turns out bedtime will be a bit later than expected. This post took forever (maybe because I was doing three other things at the same time?) and Lex is having trouble falling asleep so he is downstairs with us again, reading with Alan.
Day two of celebrating Lex’s 7th birthday, family party! Family trickled in throughout the day and some joined us for an afternoon trip to a local Safety Day event. There we got kid ID kits (finger prints, vintage Polaroid photos, and a high-tech DNA swab kit!) The kids climbed bouncy things and checked out emergency vehicles, did craft projects, made buttons, and we all enjoyed a great K9 Unit demonstration.
A beautiful day at the safety fair.
Eve loved this inflatable obstacle course.
The big slide at the end. That's Eve on the way down and Molly at the top.
My dear kids getting finger printed by the cops.
This was the most well behaved dog I've ever seen. Once he did not obey the officer's command so the officer said "In the car." and the dog ran over, jumped through the open window, and sat still until the officer told him to come out again. Doggie time-out. I love it! I wish my kids ever did time-outs that well.
After that we were all tired and sweaty so we came home. Lex headed straight inside to play with the presents he’d gotten so far, while the girls played outside for awhile. Lex opened presents on an as-arrived basis, so there was always something new and interesting for him to play with. He got tons of Legos, of course, and cool origami books and papers, and an awesome microscope kit, and many other fun things. He is a very, very fortunate boy!
Back home the girls headed straight for the swings and sandbox, while Lex headed straight for the new toys inside. :)
Ouch, you're biting my head! (This little girl was so cuddly with me all afternoon. Lucky me!)
Hugs with Mema.
For dinner we had an oatmeal bar. Like a salad bar, or an ice cream bar, but with Lex’s favorite dinner of all time. The dinner he has every night. Oatmeal! We cooked a big pot of oatmeal and put out tons of fixings. The kids had fun! Several grown-ups grumbled, but Lex was happy and it’s his birthday. As we heard earlier, “You get what you get and you don’t get upset,” right?! :)
Our oatmeal bar. Lex and I love oatmeal and eat it daily, often twice daily for him!
Eve added some of everything to her oatmeal! Including the fruit salad! Not surprisingly, she didn't eat much of it.
Then, because it was getting late, we washed down our creative bowls of oatmeal with a giant, three-layer, bright yellow cake! Lex decided to brave the candle thing as long as there was no singing. Alan started singing something else, not Happy Birthday, and I’m totally blanking on it now, and the crowd joined in. Lex wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. When I put the cake with lit candles on the table the crying won out. He opted to let Eve and Molly blow out the candles while he scooted down to the floor. Silly boy. He happily jumped back up to help us eat the cake. I just now ate a big piece of it (Alan went out for an errand and I’m home alone with a cake… DANGEROUS!) and I can feel the sugar eroding my teeth and hurting my brain. Ahh… I treat myself well.
Cake time! The fondant covering was a last minute idea because I ran out of buttercream frosting and conveniently had lots of extra fondant from tomorrow's Lego cake.
This is the moment he decides he can't handle the situation. His face looks so sweet.
Luckily we had these girls around, always ready to help with candle-blowing-out jobs! (photos of my life are always marred by those darn water bottles!)
There he is! Ready to help eat the cake! As requested, a three layer cake with french vanilla, chocolate fudge, and raspberry layers. Covered in bright yellow fondant. It says HAPPY BIRTHDAY LEX around the side and a big 7 on top.
What's a family party without stories with Aunt Katie?
I got the kids in bed easily enough and Lex fell asleep dreaming of how much fun he’s going to have playing with Legos tomorrow. He is getting really quick at following directions and building the sets. For tomorrows’s Lego party (with his friends) we are going to stick to the big buckets of colored Legos and let the kids get creative. I’m getting a bit excited for that party too, but first I need to fold laundry and have a good long (ha!) night’s sleep.
Thanks to those who came today and big eHugs to those who couldn’t make it. We have a pretty amazing family!
