Birthday spring begins!

Here we are, it's March 28th and I've survived two kids birthday parties.  Can I get an "amen?!"  All in all, it was really fun.  We started out celebrating Mr. Isaac Alan on March 14th.  He awoke to presents and a homemade Storybots sign.

When your birthday is "pie day" you get pie!  Bamma picked up a Pi Pie!

 Happy 4th dude!

 We went to McTeacher Nite at the local McDonald's.  Sam was pretty thrilled to see a teacher dressed as a pie and to see his kindergarten teacher behind the counter taking orders!

 St. Patty's Day requires green ensembles!

 Mike was out of town all week and came home on Friday to get cracking on Isaac's cake.  He spent many hours getting the characters just right.

 Very successful reveal the next morning at breakfast!

 We had a joint birthday party for Xavier (2), Isaac (4), and Noah (9) with all the family that weekend at my parents' house.  It was lovely!  Here's the cake artist with his masterpiece and the lucky recipients Isaac and Xavier!

 The birthday boys work together to get the candles out!

 Sam does a spot on impression of "Boop" the angry, red Storybot!

 All the kids left to right: Sam, Francesca, Isabella, Isaac, Nicholas, Xavier, Anya, and Noah!

 These two characters!

 We spent a few days prepping then for Noah's friend party at our house.  Sam was feeling a little left out, with two brother birthdays, so I gave him a special archaeology kit to work on.

 Noah wanted a repeat of last year's theme: Minecraft.  Fortunately, Pinterest came to the rescue with a few new ideas...

 Party day!  He woke up ready to creep it up with his friends!

 The cake was inspired by Noah's avatar "skin" in the game.  It was very accurate (according to him).

 He's nine!

 We hosted a motley crew of school friends, other friends, and neighbors.  It was busy, but awesome!

 Ellie spent the day with Kelly and Ginger, away from all the hubbub.  I think she enjoyed her day with Kevin and Boots!

 So now we head into Spring Break week with lots of new toys!  Thanks to all who celebrated with us, we have a very lucky 4 year old and 9 year old now!

Low key month before the birthday gauntlet

 Things have been fairly calm around here, nothing crazy to report.  Just normal days of school, evenings of karate and homework, and weekends of gaming and other fun.  The older two have been getting along a lot better lately, it's been nice!

 Recent Sam masterpiece, The Lorax.  Looks like he got some of daddy's drawing genes!

 Brother's forever!  Cue heart melting now...

 We had a fun Star Wars/February birthday celebration with the Worsts and Kelly and Ginger a couple weeks ago, so fun!

 Noah has been very much into creating presentations using google slides lately.  He prepared a talk about pugs for the group.  He had a very attentive audience!

 I "pinned for the win" with a rainbow jello creation.  Ginger said it was the most "gayest midwestern creation ever!"

 You say you want a photo with all the kids? Yea, good luck with that!

 Yay for high school friendships that span into the next gen!

 Valentine's Day was very red indeed!

 We had a Friday off school and took advantage of the Field Museum free IL resident day!

 Noah requested some oobleck (cornstarch and water), which Dr. Mike was happy to whip up!

 We suffered through some yucky stomach bug.  Sam had the worst of it and was home for two days.

 But after a couple of days rest, he was good as new and equipped with some new slippers!

 Cold days require warm blankets!

 Waterbury did their Jump Rope for Heart and Sam rebounded from his illness and won the title for his class and was able to represent at the all school assembly!  Way to go Sam!

 Another Friday off (institute day), another jammie day with playdough!

 I was able to sneak away for a gals weekend with Michelle and Andrea, we had a great time!

 Isaac had trouble keeping up with the boys weekend while I was away!

 And Noah has been working hard in Karate sparring class lately, so proud of him!

So, that's what we've been up to lately.  Now, we head into the gauntlet of March birthdays.  Much fun to come!