Happy Things...

Hurray! :-) Hurray for...

Sunshine!

Snowdrops...

Honeybees...

Future happy places...

Silly boys...

Learning how to tell if your wall is level...

Tent shaped birthday cakes...

Yummy food cooked camping style...

More birthday presents...

Birthday wishes...

Decorating cupcakes...

Smiley boys...

And hurray for rain! Which I was too lazy to take a picture of today... ;-)

Joshua Is 5! :-)

Joshua had been asking almost every day since brother's birthday "is today my birthday?" As the event drew nearer the question became "is it my hot dog birthday today?" Can you guess what the boy picked for his birthday dinner? :-) Finally, about two weeks ago I took down the calendar and Joshua watched as I wrote in his birthday and crossed out the days that had already passed. The next day we crossed off a day, and planned to do so each day until his birthday. Well, with one thing and another we forgot and when Tuesday came I suddenly realized he hadn't asked about his birthday since we marked it on the calendar.

Thursday morning he woke up at five-thirty am. I thought good grief, he doesn't even know it's his birthday! After breakfast I took down the calendar and told him we had forgotten to cross off some days. One by one we crossed off the days, remembering something we had done each day. Oh, his delight when he realized it was THE DAY:-) We had a good laugh, then went to wake Papa so we could open a couple presents.

Now, you may think it is funny to give a four or five year old garden seeds on his birthday. But just look at his delighted face...
He genuinely loves getting seeds and plants and last night wanted to know when we can fence in his own little garden:-)

What little boy wouldn't love to get chocolate cereal for a present

I really meant to take my camera and document our whole morning out. Imagine my frustration when we tumbled hungrily in the door at 1pm and I saw the camera bag sitting in the hallway and realized I had completely forgotten! Oh well:-}

We stopped at Dutch Bros to get Joshies free birthday drink (I love that Dutch has apple cider now, so the kids can have a treat there once in a while). Of course we got B a cider too:) Then we headed over to the mall (after a quick detour at Joann's for a belt buckle and some transfer paper;-)

Joshua had decided he needed a playmobile princess so his knights would have someone to rescue. We surprised him by taking him to "the train store" (lol, the boys name for any store that carries wooden train tracks) to pick out a princess.

Then we went to a candy story and J got to pick out a candy apple for all of us to share. We usually do homemade (sugar-free etc) pudding or cereal bars or something for the birthday treat. So this was quite a bit different and exciting for the boys. Nate and I were both surprised when he didn't immediately go for the mini-m&m covered apple. We figured that would be a given. He carefully perused all the apples (there were at least a dozen different ones) before picking one lavishly covered in different kinds of chocolate and chopped almonds. Since he is always saying he doesn't like almonds too well I asked if he'd rather have a similar apple with peanuts instead. He instantly agreed and we were set. I do wish I had a picture of the boys sitting on a bench, hands and faces covered in sticky caramel and white chocolate.

Back home we snoozed for a couple hours then the boys headed out to help Papa pile branches for a bonfire. We didn't end up lighting it but the boys got to earn some change (a nickel a branch)

Josh is demonstrating the size of the pile for us...

"How many more branches to make a dollar?"

Flame-broiled hot dog anyone?

Brannon considers himself an excellent hot dog cooker, able to perfectly roast a hot dog to his exact personal tastes. The cutest thing was watching him sit down in his chair with his black hot dog, take a little experimental bite, then nod his head with a very reflective look on his face as if he were a professional chef critiquing a fine dish. His little mmm of approval nearly had me in stitches lol...

After all the excitement of the day my sweet little man completely forgot he had more presents waiting for him. Do you think he's excited?

I think the Lego critters are a big hit(sharks,crocodiles, and an octopus)...

My other sweet little man...

So, I got Josh some cake decorating stuff--frosting bags and tips and some tubes of gel icing. He had us in stitches when he pulled the decorating tips out of his bag. Just a clear little package. "Oh! Fwosting tips for a fwosting fweezer!" We totally cracked up that he knew exactly what they were. He pulled the next item out and said "oh, my fwosting fweezers!" :-D (fweezer is squeezer btw)

He was equally excited by the rest of it, especially his cupcake "recipe" book. He proudly put it on the bookshelf next to mamas cookbooks this morning.

He proclaimed his favorite present of the evening to be the treasure box full of plastic jewels. Papa was very smug since that was his pick, lol...

Building the new Lego set...

He followed all the directions with almost no help at all. What a big boy! :-)

Happy Birthday Joshua Cade!!! We love you soooo much:-)

Mushroom Fun...Or, I Should Say, Little Boy Fun

I ordered this nice field guide recently because of all the fun we had finding mushrooms in our yard and the surrounding forest a couple months ago. We must have spotted at least a dozen different kinds just casually looking.
So, it's been lying around the house for a few days, waiting to be "discovered". Last night Joshua was hanging around feeling bored cause brother wasn't interested in playing (having a cold has that effect on a person). Suddenly I hear him cheerfully exclaim, "hey, i found our mushroom book". He proceeded to curl up on the couch and look at the pictures. I was highly entertained by the stream of exclamations that then occurred:

"That's a weird one!"

"Hey, another weird one!"

"This one looks like poop!"

"Another poop one!"

"One that looks like brown poop!"

"A black poop one!"

"A brain mushroom!"

"Another brain one..."

I think we were both thoroughly entertained for at least ten minutes:-)

This Morning I Woke Up To...

Snow!!

It started snowing yesterday afternoon, but as usual around here it snowed for a couple hours then started to melt. By evening it was cold enough the snow stopped melting but I really didn't expect to see so much more this morning.
Of course, the kids are hoping for enough snow to sled in. :-)

Hunter's Birthday

We helped celebrate one of my nephews birthdays yesterday evening. Hunter is twelve days older than Joshua, and they are great buddies. All the cousins get along really well and love each other tons. Can you tell? :-)

We were glad for the sunshine so the kids could get some energy out while dinner was being gotten ready. Here they are enjoying some sidewalk chalk

Chloe wrote 'happy birthday hunter' and Joshua drew this birthday cake with flower decorations.

Brannon drew fish and seaweed in the ocean.

Hunter drew a bigfoot footprint (not pictured) and some scenery with sunshine and flowers and a big heart.

Brannon doing a trick...

Joshua on the swing doing a trick cause big brother's getting so much attention lol

The birthday boy with one of his uncles.

Hunter's excitement was infectious and we had to keep corralling the other kiddos so he'd have a little air space to open his gifts:) They like grandma's big footstool...

Little Miss Haylie

Josh enjoying a gluten-, egg- blah blah blah-free cookie

Eliana did not like the feel of cold sticky ice cream lol

Noah enjoying his Rice Dream...

The birthday boy, I think he's quite excited about that piece of cake

I had to sneak in a picture of my honey:) I know your mouth is wide open babe, but at least it's not the pizza picture! You're just too cute, love you:)

After the excitement of presents and cake Melissa brought out her Wii and we had some fun while Dad sought refuge in his newspaper...

And Brannon helped Hunter with his new legos...

We took turns with Dance Revolution for a bit, then the boys got into boxing. Here's Zac (dad of Hunter and three other cuties) and Shiloh boxing

Then Nate and Levi had a turn...

I realized later I didn't get any pics of the kids boxing. First Chloe and Brannon went, they had a blast. Then Hunter and Joshua took a turn; it was funny they both decided they were done at the same time, right before their turn was up. Guess they got bored all of a sudden. :)