We have had a fun, busy, exhausting weekend, beginning really last Thursday and culminating in Brandt's birthday celebrations today. I have much to write about, but I feel that Brandt is most important in all of that.
It is hard to believe that Brandt is already four. This morning I snuggled with him on the couch and talked about his birth day. While I did tell him about the things we did to get ready for his arrival (all very last minute because he was almost three weeks early), the best part was sharing how we felt when he was born, the overwhelming joy and awe and gratitude. I told him how we saw his dimple almost immediately and how his ears were squished, and then I pulled out pictures and we looked at how small he was and how happy Kent and I looked.
Now we have a big, bright, beautiful boy who is four. Four! We have actually celebrated this momentous day for two days in a row, yesterday with the Barrus' and today with the DeMartinis. Yesterday we gathered for a Fourth of July dinner and Brandt got to open presents from the Brinkerhoffs. They gave him a cool fire engine puzzle and a swimming pool. A pool! We blew it up, put water in it and had something of a water fight. Brandt felt justified in menacingly wielding the hose. It was his birthday after all.
I'm not sure where we are going to put the pool considering the size of our backyard, but maybe we'll just put it in the front yard and deal with complaining neighbors as they arrive on the doorstep.
Brandt opening his gift under the table.
He does not like to be the center of attention, so when we began singing, he ducked under the table.
He stayed here to open the presents.
Blowing up the big pool.
Can you believe all the help I am receiving?
In back, Charlie, Tess, and Annie.
In front, Jace, Brandt, Lydia, and Blythe.
See what I mean about the size of the pool?
Where will we put it?
A menace!
Grandpa George took several pictures that turned out beautifully.
I will post those when I can get them from him.
Brandt and cupcakes.
He didn't want us to sing and he didn't want to blow out his candles.
At the last moment, he relented and went ahead and blew them out.
No qualms about eating the cupcakes.
Blythe "shaking her bushy tail."
To get all the children to look in the same direction at the same time when they were all in the pool,
I did a very silly squirrel dance so they would look at me.
It is a goofy thing from camp, and the words say,
"Squirrel, squirrel, shake your bushy tail," as the singer shakes her bum.
Blythe thought it was a great song and spent the next half an hour off and on singing and dancing.
She does a great "shake your bushy tail."
I couldn't come up with a theme for the party, but I decided to have the children do several crafty things then have cupcakes and ice cream. On the agenda for fun and excitement was the making of paper plate bean shakers, the painting of t-shirts using potato stamps, and the stringing of twine through straws to make bubble blowers. In my mind we would use the shakers when we sang to Brandt, adding an instrumental element to the song. All the children could wear their cute shirts home, and we could go outside and blow enormous bubbles in the front yard.
Nothing I foresaw was actually realized. The bean shakers did get made, but Brandt didn't want us to sing so intensely that he hid in the stairwell when I suggested we gather, and so the shakers remained unused and almost forgotten. I had to run them out to the cars as people were leaving.
The t-shirts did get painted, but the paint hadn't had sufficient time to dry so they couldn't be worn, and paint got all over. As I was explaining what we would be painting, Brandt grabbed a bottle of green paint and splurched it out on Makenna's shirt. The splurch became a flower stem so it wasn't completely ruined, but Brandt's shirt (NOT the shirt we were painting) was completely ruined when he got paint all over it. I didn't get a single picture of that activity because I was in a panic trying to keep the paint off anything but the t-shirts. And I didn't even both with the bubble blowers because all the children scattered to the backyard and it seemed more work that it was worth, even though I had cut up all the straws and taped all the string ends so they would be easier to thread through.
When it came right down to it, I could have invited everyone over to play in the sandbox and have a cupcake and it would have been a fine party. Brandt didn't seem to care much about the hoopla, and I suspect nobody else did either. Why did I feel the need to compete? Hard to say. Dinner with Grandma Sue and Grandpa De was pizza and rootbeer, per Brandt's request. All in all I think it was a good day, and I am certainly glad that we have a Brandt whose birthday we can celebrate today.
Brandt keeping a bucket away from Blythe.
Opening presents with LOTS of help.
And managing all on his own.
Blake, Blythe, Griffin, Brandt, and Ava
having ice cream on the porch.
Brandt with ice cream on his face.
I was frustrated by the pictures I have from the past few days.
Brandt has not been cooperative when I wanted to take his picture
so I don't have any really great shots.
Blythe in her zebra galoshes.
They look good with that pink bee outfit.
Blythe has been saying, "Happy birth-date to you, Brandt" all day.
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