Scott's birthday

We celebrated Scott's birthday in almost as many places as Andrew's. The first stop...school. Here is Scott enjoying cupcakes with classmates.


Scott's birthday started on a great note when he requested sausage for dinner. It was great for two reasons. First, about four months ago, he had his heart set on lobster tails for his birthday. For some reason, he seems to have forgotten this request. When I asked what he wanted and he replied "sausage," I was thrilled.

Derrick made brats that were amazing. Thanks, Scott, for requesting such a great dinner!!


Because his birthday is so close to Nana's, he settled for leftover birthday cake for dessert. I just could not justify baking another cake when we had so many leftovers on our counter. It was a good cake and he did not mind.

The package from grandma was a great hit. It was taunting him all week and he was so excited to finally be able to open it.



A favorite gift was a Ninjago Lego set. It was the first time that I've really seen Scott able to follow the directions for a Lego building project independently.

Nana's 65th Birthday

Nana had a big birthday this year...Medicare! She requested just to spend it with family. But, you know that can be as chaotic as a party. It was fun.

Our family...



My brother and family...

The whole crew of grandchildren helped blow out the candles.


My cousin Katie also joined us. It was a wonderful meal!

Andrew birthday #3 - The party!

A week after Andrew's actual birthday, we celebrated with a party with friends. Perhaps I've been slow to post this because it just wasn't my most favorite party that I've given. My great ideas on paper didn't really work with 6 five year olds (and siblings.) But, I think Andrew had a great time, so that is what counts.

We had a Star Wars party, complete with costumes, light sabers and Jedi training. But, what I didn't account for was this: five-year old + light saber + birthday party = CHAOS. There was not much training of these young Jedi warriors. But they did love swinging their light sabers.












We finally went outside, where we captured this picture just before...


the Death Star landed in our carport. Those boys really knew how to pound it. Who knew that Darth Vader carried candy in his battle station?

I loved the cake (and it tasted really good also - our favorite cookie recipe with the rest of the Italian Meringue Chocolate frosting.)

Andrew birthday #1

March was a full month of birthdays (as it always is). Andrew was first at the beginning of the month. Scott wondered, Why does Andrew get to celebrate his birthday three times?" How short his memory is...everyone always gets at least two or three celebrations. I'm such a sucker for candles and a song.

His first celebration was the Wednesday before his Sunday birthday at preschool. His teachers make a big deal about birthdays and he sure was having fun on his special day.



Amanda joined us and fit right in in the classroom.


She almost could be mistaken as a member of the class while she waited with everyone to wash hands.

Here is Andrew's classroom. I love this picture because it is such a snapshot of the preschool classroom. Most of the kids are quietly waiting for their snack. The lead teacher, Ms Lisa is busy capturing the moment for Andrew's memory book. And, Ms Chris is busy tending to some poor child who bumped his head on the way to the table.



Good cupcakes...really just OK cupcakes. I used a box mix and canned icing that were gifted to us. I almost never make cupcakes this way, since my family is rather picky about the icing they eat. I think they are weird in that way because all the kids in Andrew's class scarfed them down.

(Oh, and Amanda isn't my picky cupcake eater. She isn't picky about much when it comes to sugar.)

Andrew's Birthday #2

Andrew began his birthday morning by opening the present from Grandma that had been sitting on the counter for three days. What a long time for a little boy to wait to open a present!


We had his first celebration at church that day. He has a sweet little class and they certainly enjoyed the cupcakes. (All I provided were the cupcakes...the teacher put out the rest.)

These cupcakes were quite good. I made an Italian Meringue icing by beating egg whites and cooking a syrup to the soft ball stage and pouring it over the egg whites and mixing until it came together to form an icing. You complete it with three sticks of butter and some melted chocolate...heavenly...yum.

Grandma's gift was a hit. It included a dot-to-dot book that Andrew loves.

We at Chicken Pot Pie for dessert. It is his favorite.



Some favorite gifts from us:

New Postings!

My Mom is visiting (yeah!!) and I have some extra time this afternoon, so I'm catching up on photos for the past month. Check out these links for new postings below.

OCAF Art Show

Teeth

The Cat in the Hat

Pinewood Derby

Little Bit of Snow

Farley's Birthday

Amanda Where Are You?

Other events

I often take pictures with a blog posting in mind and never get around to posting them. Here are a few and the stories that go with them.

Amanda asked me last week, "Where's my iTouch?" I had no idea what she was talking about. A few minutes later, with squeals of delight, I hear, "Here it is!!" It turns out that her iTouch is my old Mary Kay make up case. It has a mirror in it, so Amanda thinks there are pictures of herself in her iTouch. She spends hours looking at it, opening and closing it, using it as a phone and putting it in her "Bye Bye bag" and taking it out again.

And when she was dancing with it this weekend, I just couldn't help but take a picture. You'll notice that her "Strawberry-cake" bandaid matches her diaper...not on purpose, but very cute.



In Scott's world, he is mastering cooking. He loves to help in the kitchen. Last weekend, he actually made the pancakes. The first batch were more like scrambled pancakes, but he quickly got the hang of it and flipped perfect pancakes for our meal.

Here is a picture of Andrew with his full knight outfit on and riding our horse, Pedro.


And this is a new hobby of the crew...looking at pictures. And I wonder why the clean laundry doesn't get folded...it's hard to fold when they are sitting on it. :)

OCAF Art Show

We received a surprise notification last month from Scott's art teacher that his artwork was selected to show in the County Youth Art Month show. I was so surprised and so proud of him. It is the first time that he has earned something based solely on his own hard work. And he didn't even know that his hard work would pay off. We viewed the art at the opening reception.

teeth - some gone, some coming in

I'm having trouble with the teeth math these days. As soon as one is gone, another appears in a different location. It's hard to figure out how many Scott has at any given time. Currently, he has lost five and has 17 and two halves (do two half teeth = one whole tooth?)

The pictures are so cute!! I just love a kid who is missing both front teeth. It makes me laugh every time I see him. And, it also reminds me that he is growing up so quickly.

...after he lost the first front tooth.

...this weekend after he lost the second front tooth.