Because I should be cleaning...

My house is messy, my boys are covered in peanut butter, and I am tired... So I'm sitting here blogging instead of getting busy. I think I have about 5 minutes before the peanut butter starts to migrate to the walls and door knobs.



Yesterday was my 31st birthday! I know, I'm old. We stayed up late the night before, and so by the time our heads hit the pillow it was well after midnight. Drew wished me Happy Birthday, and we sleepily pulled out the scriptures to read where we had left off the night before. This was the first sentence that I read..."And thus ended the thirtieth year..." Get it, thus ENDED the 30th year?! Ha, ha , okay, I realize that I'm the only one that finds that coincidence funny.



(*Ahem*) Anyway, the next morning I woke up to a bright shiny new mountain bike waiting for me in the living room: Pretty, huh? And just begging to be taken out on the open road, or really secluded path, since I'm sort of shy that way! So I took a nice long ride all by myself and came home to a clean house!



It was my day to teach Michael's class and of course, my lovely son informed everyone that it was his mommy's 31st birthday (the kid has no shame!) so a classroom full of 6 year olds sang "Happy Birthday" to me while I was holding a styrofoam cake and wearing giant cake shaped glasses! That night Drew baked me a pretty cake and made burgers, while I sat on the couch and watched him. Then we put the kids to bed and watched LOST, because we are obsessed like that! All in all, a pretty awsome day.

Little John

The little guy had his first birthday a couple weeks ago, and I am just now posting it (shameful)!
It was such a fun day, mostly because his 3 older brothers were over-the-moon excited about it. I never get tired of how much they adore EVERY holiday. I think it drives Drew a little crazy because they get too worked up to sleep when a big one is coming...They were up until 1 am the night before St. Patrick's Day! So, of course, they were standing by my bed before (WAY before) the crack of dawn in eager anticipation. "Mommy, when can we bake the cake?" "Can John open his presents yet?"

Before breakfast even started this is what our kitchen looked like...

Ande there was a lot of this going on...

All while the birthday boy looked on, drooling.

I had taken the boys to Walmart the day before to pick out a present just from them. Let me tell you, never was so much thought put into one gift. Would John like the Optimus Prime or the Ninja Turtle more? After about 30 minutes in the toy department and with a "little" coaxing from mommy, we headed to the baby section and looked at the toys that posed much less of a choking hazard. There were several votes taken and a few fits thrown, but finally they agreed that the stuffed Tigger was the way to go.

After it was opened and long forgotten by the Birthday boy, I found out why Daniel had been so determined to buy Tigger...

He was in love!

John, however, had a different favorite toy.

We could barely get him to look at any of his other presents.




And then came cake and ice cream. John couldn't quite figure out the fine art of blowing out the candles, but he did give it a try, it the form of spitting on the cake.

I didn't put much thought into the mess that a bright blue and black cake could create in the hands of a 1 year old...

He squished it in between his chubby little fingers.

He sucked on it, and smeared it on his high chair.

In the end, I think he got some of it in his mouth.

I was changing blue diapers for a couple of days after THAT one!

And I still can't quite get it to wash out of the high chair cover!

Happy Birthday my Little Man!