Happy Birthday, Cooper

I'm less than two weeks late so I think that's reasonable.

Back on the 19th Cooper celebrated his 7th birthday.  We had a friend party for him earlier on that Sunday so we had a small family gathering on his actual birthday.

I decorated his door for him before I went to bed the night before.  

Then we had a banner hung up and it fell down in the middle of the night.  We are ghetto like that.

We let him open his gift from us first thing which included some Avenger action figures to complete his set, a Lego set, and some clothes.  He had his favorite breakfast of bacon and chocolate chip muffins, of course.

My mom got him this jacket, which of course he loves.  Sometimes I just don't know what to think.  

After a long day at school and dinner at home it was finally time for our guests to arrive.  My mom brought over the cake.

He was ready.

 Of all the things, he asked my in-laws for a globe.  

Scott got him an IU sweatshirt then came the surprise hidden present....

that's right, my 7 year old has an iPad.  Must be nice to have a single, childless uncle to spoil you.

He's so cute, he kept asking me when I was going to set it up, he was saying, "did you set up my iPad mini, can I play my iPad mini?".  I finally got him to drop the mini.  

He had a great day and we had wonderful people to celebrate it with.

It's Party Time

We had Cooper's friend party last night at SIGS.  I ended up with a large credit at SIGS due to some classes I had signed them up for then decided not to do, mainly the rough start we had to 1st grade.  I was able to use that credit for parties.  It was a no brainer after that.  SIGS is the perfect combo of letting kids get their energy out and parents not having to do anything.

I only invited the boys from Cooper's class and there are only 7 others, 2 came.  Which is about what I expected since I don't know the others at all.  We also had Luke, the Reid's, Sharon's kids, and the Lopez family.  So it was still a great turnout.

Luke, Cooper, and London.

 Group photo. 

This did tasted just about as good as it looks. I used the same girl who did Cameron's cupcakes.  That chocolate icing was fantastic.

Time for cake.

Christy sent me this one of Cooper opening gifts.  He must have been super excited about this one.

Since Sharon was in town and she lives a good distance away, we kept the party going by taking the kids to dinner at Pizza King.  They were a rowdy crew.

Thanks to our snow day we've had plenty of time to dig into all the new toys.  We have family coming over on his birthday this week so more fun is coming up.

This is just because.. They started begging me to go outside as soon as they woke up.  Since it was warmer at 7:00 than it is now, this will most likely be the only picture I get today.

Enjoy your day people. At least it's only a day in February we have to make up, so far.

What have we been up to?

 Both boys have started basketball through Charlestown's Developmental Basketball League.  Watching Cameron is a hoot.  He just does a clinic on Saturday mornings. It's for 4-5 yr olds.  He is almost the smallest one out there.  Some kids are in kindergarten and he just turned 4.  He does great though and listens well.  I think he just thinks he tough stuff getting a chance to play like Cooper does.

Cooper is on a team for 6 and 7 year olds.  He is still learning the rules and to be more aggressive.  He made a basket our first game and is almost always the first one back down the court.  That kid can hustle.

Last Tuesday was extra special, Cooper got out of school for election day but Cameron still had preschool.  We enjoyed a couple hours to ourselves.  He chose Chick-Fil-A.  

We finally got our new iPhones that same week.  I say finally because for one we've had our other phones for over 4 years and two because we ordered our phones 6 weeks ago.  I'm still trying to figure it out, Cameron wanted to be the first picture on the new phone.  Once I publish this blog we will see if the picture quality is any better.  

Last Saturday after basketball my mom wanted to go to Simpsonville to the new outlets.  Well Steve was in Bloomington so the only way I could go was if I took the kids.  She bribed them with toys if they were good.  They did pretty well considering we got stuck in traffic and a detour on the way, it was so crowded we almost couldn't park, and some stores had a line just to get inside.  After it was all done they earned a trip to Toys R Us.  Cameron picked out a new hulk hand and Cooper got some accessories to go with the Captain America helmet.  It may have been a crazy day but at least we got out of the house.

One more kind of big thing, I signed up for the Kentucky Derby Mini Marathon. I have no idea what I'm getting myself into on this one.  I'm excited though and ready to start training.  I won't officially begin training until the last week of December or first of January.  There are a few plans I have looked at, most are around 12 weeks but I want to build in a few extra weeks, especially toward the end.  I think I've lost my mind.

Lots of fun coming up this week including a special little boy turning 7!!!

I guess I should blog about Halloween

Last year I blogged about Halloween before Oct 31st and this year it's over a week late.

The Sunday before Halloween it was looking good, check out that t-shirt and shorts.  Nice weather people.  We headed back up to Huber's for the afternoon with my mom and picked ourselves out a pumpkin.

On Wednesday Steve took the boys trick or treating at his work then on Thursday Cameron got to wear his costume to school and got some treat bags.  That night we carved our pumpkin.  Well, Steve carved and I made treat bags for Cooper's party the next day.  

Cooper had his school party on Friday afternoon.  It was a great party, the party planner must have spent a lot of time.  I think her name is Jami :)

I had them decorate bags and mini pumpkins.

Play a hot potato pumpkin game.

Then Halloween Bingo.  We finished with snacks and passing out their treat bags.

We had a full house for trick treating.  My kids lasted about 8 houses before deciding it was way too cold. 

We spent the rest of our evening indoors hanging out with the O'Neil's.  The O'Neil's have baby Aiden (He's two now) so my kids were in heaven.  Sometimes when plans don't work out how we imagine they make for the best memories.