We Have 5 Year Olds!

It still boggles my mind that we have kids. I mean, if you had asked us 10 years ago what we thought our life would look like today, the answer sure as heck wouldn't have included children. Not because we didn't want them, but because we didn't think it would ever be possible. 10 years ago, we'd been married for 11 years already. 10 years ago, 9 years had already passed with us trying to start our family. We had several years of timed intercourse under our belts, taken supplements in an attempt to improve our fertility, and had numerous doctor's appointments. We'd been told that while it "wasn't impossible, it was very unlikely" that we'd ever get pregnant on our own.

And we didn't. We didn't even get/stay pregnant with the help of IVF on our own. It took more than just science and the help of doctors. It took the help of donor eggs to finally have our babies, and even then we still had to go through the heartache of having a miscarriage at 9w5d. It took an army of prayer warriors, the generosity of my sister, science, and the team of doctor's at our fertility clinic.

But we DID finally have babies. It took us 14+ years of trying and put us in a ridiculous amount of debt, but our dream of having children finally came true.

And on December 23rd our babies turned 5 years old. Amazing! Last year I felt pretty emotional around their birthday because 5 was looming so close around the corner and it sounded so old! 5 is kindergarten age. How could they be approaching that so quickly! For some reason, it didn't hit me quite so hard this year on their birthday when they actually did turn 5. I'm sure I'm saving it up for the first day of kindergarten. Eeek!

A few days old

1st birthday

Almost 2 years old

3rd birthday party

4th birthday party

5th birthday!

I wanted to do a fire station birthday party last year, but that wasn't something they did in Veneta so we did something else. Then Tony's uncle attended the high school auction here in town, and ended up buying us a birthday party event at the fire station! I kept it very simple with no games and serving just cake. We had a few of their Veneta friends make the drive here for the party, they had a few friends from preschool come, and lots of family. 15 kids total and lots of aunts, uncles, grandparents, and parents of friends.

If I'm honest, I was a little disappointed in the organization of the party from the fire station. The guy who is usually the one that runs the party wasn't there, and none of the stuff we had talked about on the phone was prepared. When I showed up, the chief in charge that day basically asked me what I wanted to do. Ummmm, well, I want to do all the things I had been told about over the phone: tour the fire station, have Fire Pup make an appearance, fire hats and badges for the kids, and if possible, rides around the parking lot for all the kids. I 100% realize that putting on a birthday party is the very least important job that they have, and I appreciate their "real" job. It just would have been nice to have some communication about the whole thing.

Despite the lack of preparation, the fire crew there that day did a fantastic job pulling it all together to make it fun for the kids. We got a tour of the fire station and a lesson on all the different trucks and the fire equipment. They found the Fire Pup costume and they managed to put little gift bags together, which Fire Pup then passed out to all the kids when he made an appearance at the party. They didn't end up giving all the kids a ride in a fire truck, but Ayden and Rylee (and me!) got a short ride around town! Another little girl who came to the party also got to go for a ride because her birthday is the same day as Ayden and Rylee's. The chief said, "alright, anyone who has a birthday tomorrow gets to go on a ride," not knowing that there was another kid at the party with the same birthday! So she got a special surprise, too! I thought it was going to just be a ride around the building, but we ended up going several blocks around town!

Overall, it was a great 5th birthday party. The kids had lots of fun and got lots of presents, but the true gift was the friends and family that came to help us celebrate. That's not quite something that Ayden and Rylee understand yet, but someday they will.

Checking out all the gear that a fireman wears.

Getting a ride in a fire truck!