Emma's birthday was quite the occasion. The celebrations began the weekend before at Nana and Papa's house. Emma had decided last year that she wanted to go bowling for her birthday. Rather than paying for and trying to deal with a half dozen or more 5 year-olds at a bowling alley, I convinced my family (which was not difficult) that we should go together. It was a lot of fun and Emma did extremely well--she's a great bowler! Aunt Emily got to show off when she got the only "turkey," and I discovered the challenges of trying to bowl when nine months pregnant. We then followed that up with a delicious lunch at Sizzler.
On Emma's actual birthday, Sept. 17th, Jason had to work late. So I gave her one of her presents early and then we went to McDonald's Playplace where Emma and Gavin got Happy Meals and playtime (a rare opportunity to get the Happy Meals). Then the next day, when Jason was home. We had a treasure hunt to find her presents and blew out candles on the first "pizza" cake that Emma had helped decorate.
To end off the two weeks of celebrations, the next Wednesday (two days before Josiah was born), she got to have her friend party. She invited her neighborhood friends to a "pizza and bowling" party. They decorated cookies like pizzas with red "sauce" frosting and toppings like fruit roll-up "pepperoni" and Swedish fish "anchovies." We had Little Caesar's Pizza and the second "pizza" cake for lunch.
And went bowling in the park! (My brother Nate bought these pins and balls ages ago and has left them in my parents' garage for years--quite the novelty.) These kids bowled like pros!
The first weekend of October found us visiting my family in Salt Lake for General Conference. Papa, aunts and uncles (Emily, Barry, Jordan, and Sammy), and cousin Elanor all got to meet Josiah for the first time. He got oodles of attention from Nana and everyone, and Elanor and Gavin discovered the joys of "playing with" cousins (as much as you can call the interactions between and 3 year-old and 9 month-old "playing").
On the 13th of October, we got our first, and so far only, snow of the season. Emma took full advantage and got fully decked out to go out and play. It was fun to observe her joy, despite the limited quantities of snow available. And of course, she came in asking for hot chocolate even though it had already warmed up to normal temperatures outside.
Halloween was fun. We carved pumpkins the night before. Emma did it herself and did a truly fabulous job. Gavin "drew" a face that I attempted to cut, until I noticed that the newpaper we were working on had quite a few jack-o-lanterns on it and Gavin picked out his favorite for me to copy. 
I managed to pull costumes together fairly easily because of the costume choices the kids made. I like the kind of costumes that the kids can wear parts of again. Emma saw the pink hat at the dollar store and decided that she really wanted to be a cowgirl. Gavin was idolizing the men working on our house so we dressed him up as a construction worker. While at D.I., I found a pumpkin costume for Josiah that fit perfectly for one whole dollar! Unfortunately, both boys weren't very excited about getting their picture taken.
Gavin's preschool had a great Halloween party that morning and they went trick-or-treating around some of the University offices. Later, we went to pick up Daddy from work and went trick-or-treating at the mall. After having a pumpkin shaped pizza from Papa Murphy's, Emma wanted to go out around the neighborhood. We thought Gavin would be too tired--but he wouldn't put up with the idea of Emma going and not him. So he went for a third time. A very busy, but fun day!
2 comments:
You are amazing. I love their costumes. My kids have an obsession with Superheroes and for the 3rd year in a row Thomas has worn the same Superman Pajamas for Halloween. This year he was lucky and he had batman pajamas too. Your kids are adorable, and I love your Pizza party theme. That is the coolest.
I love how Emma has scraped as much snow as possible into a little pile. Snow must be played with! Also we have that same phenomenon after playing in snow. It doesn't matter if it was 3 and a half minutes or that it was 50 degrees and the snow melted by noon, they must have hot chocolate!
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