5th birthday party

Ben & Maddie invited their friends to a party at the YMCA in Shoreview, where they played in a bounce house for an hour and then had cake and opened presents. We ended up with 13 kids, including the birthday boy and girl.

They had a great time and came home with even more gifts! Our house is now officially overflowing with too many toys.

Here are close-up pics of the cakes that I made.

5th birthday

I feel like I blinked and my two little babies turned into full-blown kids! Aaahhh! And they are such wonderful children. I simply couldn't ask for more.

The 5th birthday festivities began today with presents, bowling with our friends and a small cake. The big cakes -- Spider-Man and princesses -- will be saved for Saturday, when Ben & Maddie will have a party with their friends. I'm sure there will be plenty of additional, random celebrating between now and then. 

Gifts were plentiful, as usual....Daddy got them small dome tents (which they are sleeping in tonight in their bedrooms) and compasses, Mommy got Ben a toy helicopter (with blades that actually spin!) and Maddie a Hello Kitty passenger airplane. They also got new books and games, plus Lego sets from Uncle David. It didn't come as much surprise to me when Ben insisted on putting together his new Lego set immediately this afternoon!

4th birthday!

It just doesn't seem possible that Ben & Maddie are four years old. Where did the years go?? It's so fun to watch them navigate the "big" world and to be able to tell us their thoughts, wants, needs, etc. (Mostly "wants", of course!) The things that come out of their mouths are amazing. To celebrate this year, our friends the Calgrens came over on the 30th and we had dinner and cake (and watched the Vikings beat the Packers, quite unexpectedly). Then on the 31st, we took them to Nickelodeon Universe at the Mall of America, where they rode lots of rides and had lunch before crashing in the car around 3 p.m.

From 2012-12-31

From 2012-12-31

From 2012-12-31

From 2012-12-31

Happy 3rd Birthday!

Ben & Maddie turned 3 years old yesterday. What an exciting milestone! We had a small party -- essentially a playdate -- with friends who have kids about the same age. We went to an indoor playground called the Eagele's Nest, where they let you rent a room for your food/cake, etc., and the kids can play all they want.

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

From 2011-12-31

Birthday party

We celebrated Ben & Maddie 2nd birthday today with a few of our close friends and their kids (all about the same age) -- kind of a playdate thing, but with food and cake.

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

From 2011-01-09

Happy Birthday Ben & Maddie!

Ben & Maddie turned two years old today. We didn't have much fanfare. We're going to have a little bit more on Jan 9th when we have a playdate with some friends who have kids about the same age.

But we gave them their presents today. The big present were two sit-n-spins. Other things were a toy bulldozer, dolls, books and a stacking toy (it has pegs with little pieces that fit on the pegs...they are different shapes and colors, so you can have them match shapes or match colors, etc).

All day Jamey practiced with them by asking, "How old are you?" And then got them to say "Two." Ben does it pretty well and consistently, but his "two" comes out sounding more like "toowoo" or something like that. It's pretty funny.

We didn't take pictures today, either. I'll try to get some tomorrow.

First Birthday Party!

We had a big party yesterday to celebrate Ben & Maddie's first birthday. My brother, David, made two massive, absolutely fabulous cakes! The birthday babies did great -- no crying, no stranger anxiety. But boy were they exhausted last night.

From FirstBirthday

From FirstBirthday

From FirstBirthday

From FirstBirthday

They weren't so sure about the cake. Although it's also possible they were full from all the other great food.

From FirstBirthday

And here are a couple pics with the other 1 year olds at the party (on the left is Kai and standing is Caleb...both born just a few days before Ben & Maddie).

From FirstBirthday

From FirstBirthday

Maddie's cake, yellow with pink frosting:

From FirstBirthday

Ben's cake, chocolate with blue frosting:

From FirstBirthday

Our friend Sheena and her daughter, Emma:

From FirstBirthday

Sara, Olympia & Ann with Maddie:

From FirstBirthday

Vicki with Ben:

From FirstBirthday