Yesterday was my baby’s 6th birthday! It’s hard to believe he’s already six years old. But it’s also hard to believe that he’s only six! Hasn’t he been in my life forever? It certainly feels like it! I don’t know how I managed before I got to see his silly smile every day. He’s definitely the life of our family and I’m thankful every day that he belongs to us.
Purple is still his favorite color, for two or three years running. He also loves flowers, so I bought him some purple flowers for his birthday.
Caden still pretty obsessed with my new laptop… (And passports out because ours expire in the next month and I need to do something about that.)
Shepard wanted donuts for his birthday breakfast. But…I bought donuts for Friday’s breakfast and he brought homemade donuts for his treat at school on Friday, and I just didn’t feel like going to another store just to buy more donuts. So he was happy to eat a toaster strudel instead.
Pretty early on Saturday morning we let him open the presents from us.
I was most excited to give him this northern lights simulator for his room, but we are apparently out of batteries, so haven’t been able to try it yet.
He got a lot of new underwear this birthday!
Face timing with Aunt Melissa and Andrew in Columbia!
Painting his new butterfly house for the garden.
The packaging said butterflies like asters, so that’s what he painted.
Taking another break to talk to Grandma and Grandpa Noe on the phone.
I bought a couple last minute boomerangs for a gift. He said they were his favorite! Of course we had to immediately go try them out.
Like father, like son.
Of course he had to have pizza for lunch. I made frozen pepperoni pizza on Friday night to try and give myself a bit of a break after prepping all day. Well…meltdown city because apparently pepperoni is no longer an acceptable pizza topping. So for his birthday he made himself his own bbq bacon pizza and I made a garlic honey pizza for myself. Greg was out of luck because neither of our doughs would stretch big enough to share! Caden was out to lunch and a movie with Grandma Braatz because he was having a hard time letting Shepard get the spotlight. He basically spent the entire day screaming about how unfair it is that Shepard gets to pick what he wants to do because “I NEVER get to pick things on my birthday!!!” Grossly untrue, except that his last few birthdays have fallen on school days, so it was extraordinarily unfair Shepard’s was on a Saturday. Well, wait for it buddy because all of our birthdays are on weekends this year.
Enjoying his pizza, despite the fact all the toppings sunk to the middle!
This was the first year Shepard was allowed to have a friend birthday party. I scheduled it on his actual birthday since it landed on a Saturday and February weekends always get tricky around Valentine’s Day and such. I’ll probably never do that again because it did make the day feel a lot more high pressure and stressful. But, it happened, we survived. 🙂
The weather has been crazy these last few days. So warm!! Which was fortunate for the party because those kids were insanely wild. It helped that they could spend most of the party just running around outside. I felt kind of bad for Shepard because he had all these plans that he wanted to do in a certain order with his friends, but then they came and everything just turned into two hours of mass chaos. I think he was pretty overwhelmed.
I wasn’t going to serve any snacks, but then I saw a new brand of soft pretzels at Costco, so decided to pick them up since it’s one of Shepard’s favorite treat foods. Most of the kids took one bite and then ran off again. Probably should have skipped the pretzels!!
Pin the star. Shepard most definitely cheated!
A real smile!
I think she’s the only one who didn’t cheat.
The kids noticed Caden’s bubblegum stashes all over the family room. There was a whole lot of gum chewing going on! The gum machine was very fascinating. 🙂
I thought for sure I could get everyone to stand still for ten seconds for a nice picture with Mario! Nope! Parties are way too exciting for standing still. 🙂
Present time. He was very happy with all of his gifts!
Sweet giggles.
I love all the homemade cards.
Shepard didn’t want cake, so we had a sundae bar for dessert. I think this is the first time in my kids’ lives that I actually served ice cream at parties! I think they all had a good time loading up on the candies!
Shepard REALLY wanted trick candles. Pretty funny stuff. 🙂
And that was the party!
We spent the rest of the day just playing with the new toys, watching a movie, playing video games, and getting measured. He grew three inches in the last year. For dinner we had “Ponderosa chicken” and french fries. He was pretty wiped out by the end of the night, but I think he had a good birthday.
Today we celebrated again with family. He wanted ice cream sundaes again, but I decided to make a skillet cookie to go with it, mostly so I’d have a better place to put the candles.
Pizza party! We made buffalo, pepperoni, and bbq. Our standard three!
Apparently holding your head like you’re in pain is the new way to smile for pictures.
Finally a nicer one!
Shepard wanted pizza and doritos for his party food. So that’s all I provided!! Definitely going for the minimal effort this year.
Grandma Noe brought veggies and Shepard’s favorite “carrot dip.” Grandma Braatz brought her amazing Chinese salad. Lots of good food!
Lots of awesome presents!
I can’t believe that on February 19th in Wisconsin my kids are wearing shorts and flip flops and playing outdoor floor hockey. I know that winter weather is surely going to come back, but this is awesome while it lasts!
Always such natural smiles.
Shepard’s rain boots were too small and Caden’s had holes in them, so they both picked out some new pairs on amazon the other day. Shepard LOVES his Batman ones.
Today’s ice cream spread. I added a few extra toppings, including a homemade butterscotch sauce that was super simple to make and sooo delicious.
My sweet and sometimes shy boy.
Split second later, my silly class clown boy.
I sure do love this kid!
The rest of the party the women played Shepard’s new Emoji Uno, the men talked or slept on the couches, and the boys played outside by themselves.
Overall, it was a really good birthday weekend! Shepard is one loved little boy!
