Turning into a TEENAGER!

My oldest just turned 13!
ThirTEEN!
a teenager- am I ready for this?


Here he is - 5 years ago when we first moved here to Hawaii.


This was at Ward Camp and these two rascals became

best buds.


(awe anjeny- aren't they adorable?)

How did this teenager want to spend his birthday?
Having a HUGE day of Nerf dart gun wars and playing Hockey.




Here they were rearranging teams and gathering ammo....
Nerf guns-- what a life saver!

Our ORIGINAL plan was to
go on a hike,
play hockey,
eat pizza
then walk to the beach




come back and have brownies and ice cream.
But as my luck has it-

it rained.

They were able to get in a short game of hockey.

It was hard core- half the kids had roller blades and the other half ran around barefoot!
luckily no toes were lost in the process.



Here he is ...
in his element..
sharing his love of hockey
with his friends.

Happy Birthday!

Typical 4 Year Old birthday

So my baby isn't a baby any more

We celebrated his 4th birthday!

This was his first friend party. I planned it short and sweet.
(One Hour)

My friends teased...






"Oh it's a drive by.. drop a gift off and pick up a cupcake kind of party."

Basically.


Actually- that would have been EVEN BETTER! We could have set up a Mc Donalds type "Drive Thru Window" and he could take the present and then given out the goodie bags and cupcakes.
(Mc Donalds is his FAVORITE restaurant right now because of the chipmunk toys inside the happy meals. ) Chipmunks are his FAVORITE movie! (Be it the first or the Squeekwal.)
(We've moved on from Kung fu Panda and before that.. it was Cars...)


I had planned playing at the park and a piñata...
but naturally it was raining for the one hour our party was planned.
SO we had balloon fun inside first.

And then he remembered he was turning 4


And you shouldn't have too much fun at your own birthday party.

And what is a party without the birthday boy

tantruming for a good half hour?

He ran upstairs-- yelling down, "LEAVE ME ALONE! I NEED A TIME OUT!"

So we went on with our Party plans and next decorated cupcakes.

This is one of my more brilliant ideas.

Why decorate the cupcakes in advance? Decorating cupcakes is half the fun of eating a cupcake! All the sprinkles and decorations etc...

So I just passed out paper plates with a dollop of frosting and they passed around the sprinkles and candy to decorate their own.

I couldn't get my son to come downstairs... so we just started singing Happy Birthday without him.

It was too funny! He came tearing down the stairs by the end of our song--

There was NO WAY he was going to miss blowing out the candles!

And here he is..

happy again...

He must have realized "oh yeah! It's Happy Birthday to me... not have a screaming tantrum fit- of a birthday..."

We jimmy-rigged the Pinata in our garage...

Took a million turns at whacking it- until we gave up and just had the kids pull the legs off Optimus Prime... so all the candy could fall out.

Put the candy in the goodie bags and ...

before I knew it

His first birthday party was over.

{WHEW!}

look at those dimples! He knows how to melt my heart.


Happy Birthday!