More Birthday Fun

This past week, Bella's birthday fun continued.  We went to Greenfield Village to ride Thomas the Train, as she had wished.  We had fun with all the other activities they had there that day too.  

 Benjamin LOVES magic tricks.  He ended up choosing to watch this dinky little free 15 minute magic show rather than ride Thomas that day.  Good bye money which I spent on Benjamin's ticket.  I will never make that mistake again.  It was worth it though to make him so happy. He got selected to help out in the show and it was the highlight of his day.  That and all the great climbing trees he discovered the village has.

Our version of a backyard pool.  The kids did this last year all the time and the first chance they got, they wanted to do it again.  Something about cooling off in a cooler.  They just love it.  I love it because it uses a lot less water than those big, shallow kiddie pools.

As soon as the big kids finished and went over to a neighbor's to play, Christian got right in.  He loved it just as much.

Our other hot day activity - the river.  Christian has no fear here and thus, I do.

Without any hestiation, he'll stride right into the cold rushing water up to his chest.  I try to find places along the river where it's not so deep, so he can't get in too much trouble.  I have no desire to go diving into that sludge to rescue him.

He also LOVES looking at the ducks.  He'll follow them around and even get in the water after them.  He found this male duck sitting next to a dead female.  It sat there keeping vigil all afternoon and never left her, even as kids and dogs came close.  He just quacked warning quacks but never left her side.  No idea how long he'd already been there by her or how much longer he stayed.  So sad.  I googled it after we got home and found that this is actually pretty common behavior for ducks.  My heart hurt for the guy.  I wished I could have done something for him.

A few days ago we had one of those "I'm so bored, there's nothing to do!" moments.  I noticed our "warm fuzzy" jar and said, "You could have a pom pom war."  Don't remember where I got the idea from.  Probably pinterest, like all good ideas, but in any case, a strip of tape and two straws later, everyone was happy.  We used mostly white puff balls, with two green ones which were worth extra points.  They had to blow them across to each other's side until the timer dinged and then count up their points.  Except for the spit on the floor, it was a very fun, clean activity which lasted a long time.

Finally, Bella's last birthday bash - her party at Pump It Up.  I kept Benjamin out of school that day so he could join us too and I think he had the most fun of anyone.  They were both moving so fast I had trouble getting anything but blurs of color in my pictures.

Group shot.  Benjamin and 15 preschoolers.  So funny.  He didn't mind at all. He had a blast.  Bella (can you see her?  She's to Benjamin's left) had a great time too.  Pump It Up never disappoints.  We had Benjamin's 4th year party there too and it was just as much fun.

Benjamin was thrilled when one of the employees, completely out of the blue, offered to do some magic tricks for the kids.  He called Bella and Benjamin up to help him and then proceeded to do fun little tricks with pennies.  In this one he pretended to throw the coin through Bella's stomach to Benjamin against the red wall.  He ended up yelling, "oh no, it got stuck in your stomach!  Cough for me!!"  She coughed and he "found" it in her mouth.  "Eeeewwww, it's slobbery!" he declared.  The kids thought it was the greatest.  He did a bunch more that Benjamin's been trying to recreate every day since.  Such a fun day.  Now I think the birthday celebrations are finally over.  Time to get ready for Benjamin's!

This past weekend we went "treasure hunting."  Kelly told the kids were were going to look for treasure in the woods and they were stoked.  We got three geocache sites up at Kensington Park and had a great afternoon looking for them and riding our bikes around the park.

We were pretty tired of it all by the end.  Bushwhacking in the heat wears you out! Christian had the hardest time by the end.  Life's tough when those fallen logs are up to your hips.  I ended up carrying him and Bella back to the car and we shared a snack while Benjamin and Kelly looked for the last one.

I think Bella's favorite part of the trip was the food.  She ate 3 granola bars, a Cliff bar, 4  pancakes leftover from breakfast, and an applesauce pouch.  Then she whined the rest of the way home that she wanted more to eat and was still hungry.  She's crazy.

Today was Bella's last day of preschool, so now we have just 3 more weeks until Benjamin's done and then Summer!  I'm so ready to be done rushing Benjamin in the morning.  He just HATES getting ready for school.  It is such a struggle.  I found a book called "Let's play in the forest while the wolf is not around" which originated in a game to help kids get dressed in the morning.  We've played that every morning since and it was  pretty successful for a few days, but again today, he got bored of it and fought me on getting ready.  How can I have a girl who changes her clothes 15 times a day and a son who makes a war out of getting changed once!??!  We really need to spread the wealth around a bit.