Happy Birthday Uncle Scott

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Birthdays, Uncle Scott

October Birthdays

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Abby, Birthdays, Sam

It’s birthday season again. October brings us Sam and Abby’s birthdays- a week apart. Here are the highlights from both. Sam went with a Batman theme again. He did this a couple of years ago. This time Sam chose a family party.

Abby decided to have slumber party. Her first one. There was a lot of giggles and they certainly stayed up late. Abby went with a girly theme for this party.

Abby also got her ears pierced for her birthday. She was thrilled. She made it sound like she was the last girl in her class without her ears pierced. I was 11 when I got mine pierced. I wanted to wait until she wanted to have it done and was old enough to take care of earrings- without loosing them. What age do you think is appropriate for girls to pierce their ears?

Compared to last year, these birthday parties seem low-key. I’m not complaining about that. You can see their parties last year here and here.

One Crazy Summer: Birthdays

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Birthdays, Cousins, Kaitlyn, summer

We are just starting to recover from our crazy summer of moving and other activities. Now that we are mostly unpacked, kids started school, and Mike has started back to work at his new job, I will try to post the events from the summer. I’ll start with birthdays since we seem to have quite a few in the summer. Mine was first on the 16th of July. Then Grandma W had a birthday just 4 days later. She came to our house to help us pack boxes for her birthday. I don’t think the cheesecake we got for her was enough to say thank you.

Soon after we arrived in Orem we celebrated Mike’s birthday. This picture shows how Sam usually shows his love to his Dad.

Finally just 6 days after Mike’s birthday, we had a party for Kaitlyn, who turned 4 on August 12th. When her birthday came along the house was filled with cousins, aunts, and uncles. Kaitlyn had a “yellow birthday” in honor of her favorite color. Here are the highlights:

Kaitlyn wanted a Rainbow cake. Thank you Costco for making cheap big rainbow cakes! It was yummy.

After cake and presents the kids put on swimsuits and we headed off to Highland City where they have a fun splash pad. It was the perfect way to end the the party.

More crazy summer posts to come.

Abby’s Spooktacular Birthday Party

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Abby, Autumn, Birthdays, yard

Abby’s Halloween party started out with dinner, cake and ice cream, and presents. Once we got through all of that, it was just after 7p.m. and fairly dark so we headed outside for night games in the haunted backyard.

 When we were talking about playing flashlight tag outside, I just thought we would put out some pumpkins. Mike had a different vision. While I was busy making cupcakes, carmel popcorn, and decorating inside, he was creating a forest in the backyard and a cemetary in the front yard. Here is what it looked like before it got dark.

Mike bought 24 yard stakes. He came home and planted them all over the yard. Then he tied dead branches to all the stakes to make dead trees. He even took the neighbors old corn stalks from their garden.

Then Mike brought home professional lighting, a fog machine, and a sound system. You can see how it looked after dark and you will have to imagine the spooky sound effects that were playing while all of the kids were running around.

Everyone played flashlight tag, ghost in the graveyard, and capture the flag. Some of the effects were too good. At some point we had to turn off the sound effects because a couple of the kids were too scared. I told Mike he outdid himself on this one. It seemed too good for the 8 and 9 year olds. We should have a Halloween block party.

The Star Wars Birthday Party

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attempting creativity, Autumn, Birthdays, Sam

Sam’s 6th birthday party was a Jedi Training Camp. First we had all the padawan learners make their own lightsabers.

The lightsabers are made from pool noodles cut in half. Then we wrapped silver duck tape around the bottom for the handle. The kids used black electrical tape to customize their handles. These homemade lightsabers were a hit (both literally and figuratively). I will say that it was not easy to find pool noodles in October. I wish we would have thought about this at the end of August. We got lucky there was a few left at the local sporting goods store.

Next we had to have lightsaber training. We first played a game inside where the kids had to keep a balloon off the floor using their lightsabers. Once they honed their skills, we went outside to play some more games.

The first Jedi challenge was a podrace.

Their next challenge was to duel with their lightsabers. We also played a game called Steal the Planet Naboo. The planet Naboo was a soccer ball.

Then it was on to the Jedi Obstacle Course. The course included knocking over droids (camp chairs with faces on them), climbing over the swamp (climbing on the swing set), and crossing the lava pit (the red blanket).

After all of that training, it was time for snacks, cake, and ice cream. We also had Yoda Soda and candy lightsabers (candy-coated pretzel rods with tin foil on the end).

And then it was present time. Which included Lego Star Wars III for Wii, a General Grievous lightsaber, a Roaring Rex, and a pillow pet.

As soon as the party was over, we kicked all the remaining kids out of the house – including our own. I collapsed on the couch and while Mike was walking out the door to get pizza for dinner he said, “Why do we do this every year?” I said, “Because, you know, it’s fun.”

Six Years of Sam

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Birthdays, Sam

Today is Sam’s 6th birthday.  We can hardly believe it. We have been busy these last couple of days getting ready for birthday party season and today we had a successful Star Wars party for Sam. I will post those pictures soon. In honor of Sam, here he is on all of his birthdays.

The birth day.

1st birthday

2nd birthday

3rd birthday

4th birthday

5th birthday

Today- the 6th birthday

Happy birthday Sam! We love you.

A 3rd Birthday

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Birthdays, Kaitlyn

Today Kaitlyn turned 3. We love third birthdays because it is the first year that they understand what a birthday is and they are so excited for it. Kaitlyn chose a Dora the Explorer theme and Grandma and Grandpa were still here for her party. She still has a little trouble blowing out candles though.

Popular gifts this year included a pillow pet…

(it’s a turtle), and a hoppy ball.

Kaitlyn hasn’t had much time on the hoppy ball because her brother and sister keep stealing it. We may need another hoppy ball. After the festivities we went over to Rexburg Rapids because that is what Kaitlyn wanted to do on her birthday.

A Belated Birthday

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Birthdays, Mike

Yesterday was Mike’s birthday but as usual, he had to work. We celebrated today by making him a green donut/gummi bear cake with raspberry filling. It actually tastes better than it looks.