Happy Birthday Party!

Nick had his first school-friend birthday party!

He decided that he wanted to go bowling for his birthday.
This is something that he can do (with a ramp) and has fun.

Not all of the kids had been bowling before, but they all had fun

We had 3 different teams

It was a little complicated trying to decide who would be on who's team. But I think everyone was happy in the end. (And there wasn't any crying like at Katheryn's bowling party)

We had an hour of owling, and then an hour in the party room for cake and pizza.

This is Nick's Star Wars Rebels birthday cake. I think it turned out great!
And he really wanted a Star Wars Rebels Birthday

All of the kids had face masks in their look bags. So we got a group photo (lots of kids wanted to be Storm Troopers)

The birthday boy was very happy!

He got a little bit nervous when everyone sang happy birthday

But I think he also liked the attention

His friends were so cute, everyone wanting to show him what they got him.
I think that everyone had lots of fun. They each left with a loot bag with Star Wars goodies (and their face masks) and some token for the arcade (there was no way I was going to be in charge of 10 kids in there!

We spent a little bit of time in the arcade afterwards. Kyle and Katheryn had a fooz ball game

And somehow the kids talked us into going to Boston Pizza after the party

Nick said he had a great birthday party and can't wait to come back!

Birthday Party!

Katheryn has been looking forward to her birthday party at Chuck-e-Cheese
Apparently she put it to a vote in her class. The choices she gave were Disney Cruise, Great Wolf Lodge or Chuck-e-Cheese. The class voted for the Disney Cruise, but Kyle and I vetoed all of the other choices.

This is the Birthday Girl showing off her new nails... Rainbow of course.

Katheryn got to invite 10 friends from school.

I was much more organized with this friend party then I was the last party. I had a list and wrote down contact information for parents who left.

We had containers of coins that I gave to every kid and then paired them up to just go wild (with an adult). And that is what they did.

The only thing with this, is that instead of everything having fun together, they had fun with their partner. But the important thing is that everyone did have fun.

We came back for some pizza and birthday cake (Rainbow of course)
They had the Chuck-e-Cheese character come out, but Katheryn didn't want to have anything to do with him.

She also had a ticket grabber. Pretty much she get put in this wind tunnel with tickets and tries to grab as many as she can

She wasn't too sure about it

And I was really glad she had pants under the dress.
But she had fun in the end

Because we had lots of fun, we didn't have time to open any of the presents before everyone left. I'm not sure if this is how people are doing it anymore, but we have been to other parties like this.

Katheryn was very thankful for all of her presents. (And yes we made her pose for this picture)

And even though Kyle complains a lot about my picture taking. He still goes the extra step to take some shots!

And now she has to get started on her thank you cards

6 years old!

Someone turned 6 today!

On another lucky Friday the 13th

 

It's hard to believe that this little guy has grown up into the strong, brave, talkative, funny boy we have today.

I still remember driving into the hospital the morning he was born and everyone was talking about it being Friday the 13th. And being so nervous and so worried and just wanting him to be safe



 

 

And look at him now!

 

 

The kids knew that we had a surprise for them and they would miss the day of school. But they didn't know where we were going...

Until Kyle and I woke them up with Wolf ears on!

 

They were very excited to go to Great Wolf Lodge and the pool!

 

It was nice and small. Just the 4 of us. But we all sang and Nick had his own cake. And he got free ice cream every hour for the entire stay!

Nick says that he had a great birthday! The best one yet!

Birthday Party

Katheryn had her birthday party this weekend.
She had a number of choices and picked Neb's Fun World and bowling. (She originally wanted swimming like Nick's party, but I didn't feel comfortable watching kids I don't know in the pool.) It was my first... I mean Katheryn's first... friend birthday party.

So she picked 5 friends from school (which turned into 9 friends from school) and family and friends and we had 16 kids for bowling. We had 3 lanes and so divided everyone up.

Family stayed in one lane and then friends were in the other 2 lanes. We had girl friends and boy friends and there were some friends who didn't want to play together (my first clue that there might be drama)

I assigned adults to every lane. One parent stayed and everyone else dropped their child off. It wasn't until the last parent asked about leaving a phone number that I realized that if anything happened to any of the children I had no way to get a hold of anyone.
I also had my list to keep track of who was there, and then cross kids off after they got picked up.

I was in charge of the girl team, and the girl drama. I hadn't realized drama would start at such an early age (thinking more teens). But we had tears and it's not fair and she won't let her and she's not sharing. I think that I did well with the drama and everyone had fun.

Because it was a girl and boy party I also had girl themed and boy themed loot bags (and left overs for Nick's party in November).

Katheryn had a great 7th Birthday! And smiles all day

Nick-angelo's Birthday Party

When it was time for planning Nick's birthday party he knew exactly what he wanted.
He only wanted a swimming party, and of course it had to be Ninja Turtle themed.

So we did both, Ninja Turtle Themed with an hour in the pool as well.

Masks for the kids (and maybe some adults)

Ninja turtle loot bags

 And a couple of games
Some bad-guys to knock down (with ninja turtle coloured Frisbees). I got old-ninja turtles and new-ninja turtle bad guys

Pin the pizza on the Ninja turtle

And a ninja turtle basketball game

We had some Ninja-Turtle food trays, and of course pizza

And a Ninja Turtle cake

Nick got to play with all of his favorite friends

Nick had a fantastic time. He got to run around and play (in his Shellraiser), go swimming, then eat pizza and cake and have everyone sing to him

And after all of that fun, he still got to open presents!

Surrounded completely by all of his friends, who each had a job to do, including present passing, card reading, music playing and garbage collecting

And everyone was excited to see what he was getting

Nick was loving it of course
(Ninja turtle Kraft dinner!!)

 Pretty soon 4 hours had gone by, and the party was over

Cowabunga!
Happy Birthday Nick!

Aid4Alej

We went to a fundraiser this weekend. Raising money for a special little girl we have known for a number of years. Alejandra and her mother Antonella have joined us the last couple of years for our spipna bifida walk, we have done Conductive Education together as well as meeting in the Spina Bifida clinic baby group. And they will be at school together next year.

This is Antonella's second annual Aid4Alej event to raise money for stem cell treatments.

There were alot of fun things to do.

Katheryn was very excited about the face painting... and so was I

Nick was adamant that he did not want his face painted. Until the end of the night

It looked fantastic! 

There was music, but the kids were all over dancing to their own beat

After a bit of hesitation, Alejandra, Nickolas and Katheryn were all over the place together

There was also a photo-booth with costumes that Katheryn was excited about.

 

And live music by Danny Lamb a SB&H ambassador.

 

Katheryn got raffle tickets and picked out everything that she wanted.

And she guessed how many popcorn was in the bag!
And won!
Over 3333 kernels

 

We stayed until almost midnight, when the kids were turning into pumpkins

We went between the walker and wheelchair when Nick started getting tired.
As usual they were party animals and we had a lot of fun!

We even got to catch up on another SB family we haven't seen since baby group!

Can't wait for next year's Spring Fling!