Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Brody's #5 Birthday...A Pirate Party!

Brody has never really had a "Friend" birthday party before. We are usually traveling to see family around his Birthday, since it's so close to Christmas. But, since we decided to stay home this year...he made a list...a long list...of friends he wanted to invite. He ended up having 9 kiddos show up + our 4 = 13 kids having a blast!!! And he wanted a pirate party. So first we made hooks and eye patches. Then we had dinner. After dinner we played pin the parrot on the pirate.
Then we did presents and after all the wrapping paper and toys were picked up (thanks to uncle Brad), we embarked on a pirate treasure hunt. I looked online and found a ton of "pirate talk"....so using all the pirate terms I made clues and a map for the kids to hunt down their treasure. It was pretty fun.

Teagan, of course, was a big helper...being the oldest one there.
At the end of their hunt...they found these little treasure chests...for each kid. (These were just made out of paper bags, that I cut and folded to look like chests. The drawing of the "wood" took FOREVER, but I thought they turned out pretty cute.) And I just put gold coins, necklaces, rings, candy, etc inside for their treasure.
Last of all was Birthday cake and ice cream. This cake was one of the easiest that I've done lately. And Brody LOVED it! John helped by printing off sails and a pirate flag for me. And I opened 2 of Brody's presents early to retrieve the pirates and treasure chest.
Love this pic....especially since there are 2 others besides Brody puckering their lips to blow!
Happy Birthday to my sweet Brody Bug. Love, love, love you!

Christmas 2011

We always think we're going to have a slim Christmas...but some how our living room is always full with gifts under our tree come Christmas morning. I kinda shop during the year and shove things in my closet...never remembering just how much I have until it's all wrapped and under the tree. Santa's gifts always add to it as well. And Santa pleased the kiddos with a Wii this year. Woohoo!
We forgot to make cookies for Santa...so last minute I borrowed some from a plate of goodies a friend had brought to us. Phew!
Someday we will have a mantle to hang our stockings on. But for now, they are cozy on the couch.
This is the only picture I took of the kids. *sigh* But, we did have the video camera going. It was a wonderful Christmas. And a first in a Looooong time that we actually stayed home. Nice, mellow, somewhat-quiet, happy Christmas.

Gingerbread Houses

Someone gave me the awesome idea of saving some Halloween candy for making gingerbread houses. So I saved a baggie of Dots, Skittles, Starbursts, M&Ms, etc. and we had the kids make their own gingerbread houses with graham crackers. They loved it.
Liam supervised and was the candy taster.
This cute girl had a little construction help from Mommy....but basically did it by herself.

This is how I found Kamryn's house 2 days later. Apparently a tornado blew through and stripped all the candy and shot the tree right through the house!
Brody was ready to eat his right away. Love his face!
Teagan made this all on his own. He's growing up way faster than I could have imagined.

December Randoms

Liam is really such a joy to have around. He is silly and sweet and oh so funny!
Love these pictures where my kids are just totally enjoying each other.
Cute, happy children.
Okay...I am seriously worried about this girl becoming a teenager. She is too cute for her own good.
LOVED when I found this in Teagan's back pack!
This is how Brody writes his name. Terribly cute.
Teagan decided to add Cheetos to the grocery list. Ha!
I got a kick out of his "handsome" picture and the sentence he wrote using the word.
Best way to exercise...ever! (And have you noticed???...John has lost about 50 pounds in the last couple years. Hot...hot...hot!)

November Randoms

Brody and Teagan in the middle of a very intense game of Sequence.
Gma and Kiddos watching Daddy make a pumpkin cheesecake for Thanksgiving.
Showing off their Home Depot projects that they did with Daddy while Mommy was out with her friends.
My girl.