Birthday Time

This one turned 8

And this one

turned...

It's that time again! Having boys with birthdays a day apart makes for an exciting couple of days.

Sean's turn was first. The plan was to get up early to make his requested breakfast (crepes with ice cream and strawberries--anything goes for birthdays!) and serve it to him in bed. That plan was foiled. Brig had a rough night's sleep (which meant so did I) so I was not on top of my game. Warren also woke up screaming in pain. He had a kinked neck. By the time I was up and functioning and Warren had calmed down, Sean was up and dressed. The first thing on his agenda was to weigh himself to see if turning eight made him gain weight. He was slightly disappointed that the scale said the same thing it had said the day before.

Next was breakfast:

The rest of the morning was a pretty normal morning. He played with friends and watched cartoons until it was time for his parent date. Sean, Brigham and I met Darin at Golden Corral (Sean's choice) for lunch. The afternoon was filled with more playing with friends, the baking of the cake, and anticipation for the opening of presents. When Darin got home we started opening presents. The tricky part about having birthdays so close is trying to keep everything equal and making sure each boy feels sufficiently celebrated. This year we did one combined gift, so the boys opened it together. Warren had spent the entire day on the boppy pillow (in tears off and on), stretching and bending his neck and having me apply some aromatherapy lotion that my massage therapist brought us. We were able to persuade him to come to the table to open presents. The boys' current obsession is Bakugan Battle Brawlers. They are little balls that pop open and turn into different creatures when placed on metal. The creatures have different strengths, and they battle using the strength of the character and the cards you use. For weeks Sean has been trying to earn money to add to his Bakugan collection and I have heard countless requests for a trip to the store to buy "a really rare" Bakugan. There was even a request for him to place a bid on e-bay. It was beginning to drive me crazy. I did some research on e-bay, ksl.com, craigslist, etc. Each of these little balls sells for around $5, and they can be as much as $20 (insanity). I found a guy on ksl that was getting rid of his son's collection (he had grown out of his obsession). There were 53 bakugans, the battle mat, and several cards. We got an amazing deal, especially when you figure there was easily over $300 worth of goods. It was still difficult to fork over any amount of money for it, but I knew the boys would be over the moon about it. We let them open 4 each, letting them believe that was their present.


We had the rest in an empty ice cream container in the freezer. I told the boys to get the ice cream out of the freezer so it could thaw out a little bit.



Sean also got a pocket knife. We had an extensive quiz about the proper use of the knife, and we plan on keeping very close tabs on his knife use. The rest of the evening was devoted to Bakugan. The boys were in heaven!

After dinner (he requested Hawaiian Haystacks) it was time for cake and ice cream.

Late that night Darin took the boys to pick out new bikes. Both boys had grown out of theirs, and both had back tires that had been run over by our van (the driver will remain nameless, but it wasn't me). They got back too late to try them out, so the bikes waited patiently until the next day.

At around midnight David woke up crying. Darin went in to see what the problem was while I attempted to enjoy the fact that Brig was sleeping in his bed peacefully (he had had two not so great nights in a row, so this was a welcomed event). My hopes were dashed when I heard the unmistakable sound of a child throwing up. I went in to help. Darin cleaned David up while I cleaned up the bedding. A couple of hours later it was Warren's turn to throw up. My first thought was, "what a way to ring in your birthday". My second thought was how ironic it was that this was all happening while Brigham was having the best sleep he'd had in a while. Fortunately that was the end of the barfing for the night. Warren threw up one more time in the morning, and his neck was still a little sore, so he spent the morning on the couch. David also fell back asleep and spent the majority of the morning sleeping. Breakfast didn't happen (for Warren), nor did his parent date. By late afternoon he was feeling much better and I let him go out and play. The boys both had a great time on their bikes.

Warren learned how to ride one-handed. Here's proof:

His other present was a Tee ball set:


Warren had requested homemade pizza for his dinner, but the jury was still out on whether or not that would happen. He had kept applesauce and toast down, and he was acting like he felt fine but I didn't want to chance the pizza coming back up. About this time I saw my friend Kellie in the cul de sac and asked what their Pioneer Day plans were. They didn't have any. Our original plan was to go to Kangaroo Zoo, but we cancelled that when the throwing up began. We planned an impromptu get together. I doubled the pizza dough recipe, Kellie provided a yummy salad. We brought cupcakes and ice cream, they provided the fireworks (and the house). A few other neighbors joined us for various stages of our get together. We were able to see the Orem Owlz fireworks and do a few of our own. The weather was perfect. It was such a nice night, and there was enough of a breeze that the mosquitoes didn't overtake the area. At one point I asked what time it was. It was 11:30! We were out riding bikes and doing fireworks like it was early evening. I apologize to any neighbors that we kept awake/woke up.

Here are all the kids:David and Savvy:David doing sparklers with a tissue up his nose (he had a bloody nose):Here is Sean strolling ever so casually right past the fireworks:Here is Jaden attempting the same casual stroll. Little did he know that this particular firework had sound effects. Loud ones. This picture makes me laugh every time I see it:Julie and Lily:It was such a fun night!
The next day (in the evening) we decided to follow through with our Kangaroo Zoo plan. We picked up Grandma Moses to join us. The kids made some new friends there and played tag for the majority of the time. They got some great exercise!
Here is Olivia showing David that the slide was fun. He wasn't so sure he wanted to try.He spent most of the evening on the couch with us.Brigham and Grandma (Gotta love Brig's signature deer in the headlights look):David finally warmed up to the idea and spent the last 20 minutes or so playing on the toys.Happy Birthday, boys!