4th Birthday!

This is (over) a month late now, but I still want to document the kids' birthday. December is always such a crazy month. Since Ayden and Rylee have been born, I have a new appreciation for December birthdays. We actually have a lot of December birthdays in my family, but I never thought anything of it before having my own kids! And I'm finding it even more challenging as they get older for some reason. Maybe it's because this year their birthday was literally spread out over the entire month!

We always celebrate Thanksgiving with Tony's family the weekend before Thanksgiving. Well, this year, mil decided that they would also celebrate Ayden and Rylee's birthday that weekend as well, since they would be gone for the birthday party. Not only did they open their birthday gifts from grandma and grandpa, but we also had cake and had to sing happy birthday.

Then when my extended family got together for the Candy Cane Express train ride and an early Christmas party, we also had a little birthday celebration for all the December birthdays. More presents, cake, and another birthday song.

Then the following weekend we had their birthday party. We debated for what felt like forever over what to do for their birthday party this year. We finally settled on renting the local community center, which ended up working out perfectly! It only cost $45 to rent for 5 hours, which is a steal compared to if we did it anywhere else!

Not only did we debate over where to have the party, but we also debated over the theme. Someone gave me the grand idea of doing a "Christmas" theme and decorating Christmas cookies as an activity. Tony thought that was a terrible idea, mixing Christmas and their birthday. He really thought we needed to keep their birthday completely separate from Christmas. I agree with that mostly, but we weren't having a CHRISTMAS party. It was a BIRTHDAY party with Christmas themed activities. I didn't think it was such a horrible idea.  Besides that, I am most definitely not a party planner type person. I can do a brilliant job once I have something to roll with, but coming up with ideas/themes is not easy for me and I had no other ideas!

The party turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself! Although it was not without a few hiccups along the way...

The birthday twins!

A friend made these birthday shirts for the kids.

When I told my aunt about my cookie decorating idea, she told me she had "tree" cupcake tins that I could borrow. Brilliant! Instead of decorating cookies, the kids could all decorate their own individual cakes! She also had a larger tree shaped cake tin. My plan was to use that to make a cake for the adults to eat from. However, when I tried to make the cake, it turned into a disaster. I could not get the cake from the pan, despite the fact that I had greased it. The entire cake fell apart. It tasted delicious, but didn't do me any good when the cake was a crumbled up mess. The little tree cupcakes were also not the easiest to work with. In the end, it all worked out, but I was up almost the entire night before their party. I don't think I went to bed until about 4:00am!!!! I think I'll be sticking to Costco cakes in the future. haha!

I ended up making a cupcake tree instead.

The cake table.

I had a crafting table set up for the kids to make cute little snowman ornaments. Two weeks before the party, I got all the popsicle sticks painted white, hot glued the strings on, drew the snowman eyes and mouths on, and cut out all the little pieces so the kids could assemble their own ornaments. I also made a few example ornaments so everyone could see what they were suppose to look like.

Naked snowmen, ready to be decorated!

I printed off some coloring pages, and we had a coloring station. This was also kind of a pain in the behind! There were several really cute "free" coloring pages I would have liked to use, but every time I tried printing them, I kept being told I needed to download certain software to do it. I tried, but could never get it to work. I managed to find a few that I could actually print out, but was really limited in my choices. I don't think it should be that hard, but I managed to make it difficult anyway.

Party guests coloring their masterpieces.

We played Pin the Nose on the Snowman, which turned out to be a much bigger hit than I ever anticipated! I thought it would be just a silly little game, but all the kids got a HUGE kick out of it.  Several even wanted to take multiple turns!

There was lots of balloon "fighting." It's amazing how much entertainment a dozen balloons can provide!

You can't have a birthday party without singing Happy Birthday! Ayden and Rylee got to pick out which tree cupcakes they wanted, and they got to blow out their birthday candles after the birthday song. Then all the kids got a cupcake and they had a blast decorating them. This was even a hit with the parents. I was told several times what a great idea it was!

Decorating their tree cakes.

Ayden was off playing and too busy to have his picture taken, so it was just the three of us for a family picture.

I gave my phone to my brother-in-law and asked him to take pictures for me. He took about a million (okay, I'm exaggerating, but he did take close to a hundred) pictures, including a lot of silly selfies! I love having all the pictures, but it's the number one reason it's taken me so long to do this post. It took me a long time to go through and decide which pictures to keep and edit!

BIL taking a selfie and showing off the party room.

See, I told you. Silly Selfies! My mom, oldest niece, and BIL.

My sister helped me write down what gifts came from who as the kids opened their presents. We try to send thank you cards to everyone, although I know that there are a few that still need to be sent out. I should probably get on that... Sis also helped out at the party by putting temporary tattoos on all the kids. Ayden was funny about this. He didn't want a tattoo put on, but he hoarded a dozen or two tattoos in his pockets. I'm not sure what he was wanting to save them for, lol. He would have collected more, had I not stepped in and told him he had enough already!

Opening presents.

Overall, the party was a success. Almost all of Ayden and Rylee's cousins were in attendance, as well as a few friends from preschool, and their Playgroup friends. I wasn't sure how well the activities would go over, but every one of them turned out to be a big hit. The cakes were kind of a nightmare for me to make, but the end result made it all very worthwhile. I'm not sure I'll ever attempt something like that again, buuuutttttttt who knows.

The day after their party, we had a family day and took the kids to see the movie Ferdinand. They loved it. Tony and I thought it was a cute movie, but agreed that there was a scene in the movie that was a little too much for four year olds! Not that the kids seemed to mind, but I almost covered my own eyes when the bulls went to the butcher shop! Kind of similar to Toy Story 3, when the toys were about to be incinerated. That movie never fails to make me cry, by the way.

After the movie, we went to Red Robin for an early birthday dinner. We thought it would be fun to go somewhere that the waitstaff would sing Happy Birthday to them, and they'd get a birthday treat. Both Ayden and Rylee love ice cream (they take after their momma), but Rylee almost didn't eat hers because of the whipped cream on top! I have never known a kid to not like whipped cream, but my two are not huge fans. Once we realized the issue, Tony scooped the whipped cream off for her so she could enjoy her treat.

Down to the last drop!

Then for their actual birthday, we spent a night at the coast at a great hotel that is super kid friendly. Tony took that Friday off work. We woke up, ate breakfast, loaded up the car and took off for the coast. We wanted to make a full day of it. We didn't anticipate actually being able to check into our room that early, so had planned on playing on the beach once we arrived. However, our room was ready and we were able to check in right away! It turned out to be a good thing, because once the kids saw the play center, they could NOT WAIT to go check it out!

Indoor playground.

And then once we went to the indoor playground, the kids got a good look at the pool and couldn't wait to go swimming! We ended up spending most of our time at the pool. The kids love swimming so much! We spent several hours at the pool, then went back to our room to relax a bit before heading to the beach. We decided to give the kids their birthday gifts during this down time, instead of waiting for the next day, which was their actual birthday. We got them each a tablet this year. Oh boy, has that been a big hit!

Not only was there a pool, but there was a splash pad as well!

I think we all enjoyed the hot tub the most.

Opening their gifts.

They suddenly look so grown up playing on their tablets!

After relaxing in our room for awhile, we made our way down to the beach. We had hoped the kids would have their first sunset experience, but it ended up being too cloudy and we didn't get to see it. We still had fun playing in the sand though.

Drawing in the sand.

Digging a "big, big, BIG" hole.

She decided to climb into the hole.

After playing on the beach, we all went swimming for another couple hours. We ate dinner in our hotel room, and had breakfast the next day in our room as well. While I packed everything up the next day, Tony took the kids swimming one last time. After we checked out of our room, we let the kids play at the indoor playground for a bit before heading home. This was the perfect hotel to stay at in December. While we had fun playing on the beach, it was also very cold, so we didn't end up staying out there very long. This worked out perfectly for the kids, because all they really wanted to do was swim anyway!


It was a busy month, but it was full of fun. And now, we have four year olds!!