krewetland: July 2012

July is birthday month for us. First party was a gymnastics party for Madeleine to celebrate her 5th birthday with her friends. When we arrived they told us the air wasn't working well and did we want to reschedule. It was over 100 degress outside so it was a little toasty inside. Hard to reschedule though when you have one very excited birthday girl and 12 kids about to arrive in 5 minutes. The kids had a great time though and didn't seem to mind the heat. Madeleine has grown up so much in the last year. She is a great big sister and always looking out for Hadley and Tommy. She loves to dance and tumble. She just learned how to do a flip on the playground bar and to do the monkey bars. She also is learning how to swim and can do a little by herself. She has really taken to going underwater this summer. Hard to believe she is already 5 and about to start kindergarten.

Party 2 was the following day to celebrate both Madeleine and Tommy's birthdays with the family. The outside bbq got moved inside in the 105 degree weather. We had a pirate theme as Madeleine is really into pirates right now. Tommy seemed to like the pirate hats too. We did a quick treasure hunt with the kids outside. Tommy spent the party walking all over the place. He wasn't too into the presents but loved his cupcake. He had icing everywhere. Tommy is very mobile these days and into everything. It is becoming clear to us that all the babyproofing we didn't do with the girls we will need to do with Tommy. Just tonight he opened the built in cabinet in the dining room where I have all my glass pitchers and vases stored while I was putting away dishes. I heard glass clinking and caught him just in time as he was lifting out a vase. His sisters can really get him to laugh. He has a few "words" but still no "mama" or anything even remotely close. He also has started screaming at the top of his lungs when he wants something. We got to work on that!

Madeleine's actual birthday she wanted to spend by riding her new tagalong bike. So we loaded up early and headed out to the Katy Trail. With Madeleine graduated to the tagalong, Tommy took her spot on the big bike with Jim and Hadley. It was a great time and we are looking forward to many more family bike rides. We also went to the pool for a little while. Almost all the fireworks were canceled this year due to the drought and high temps so had to tell Madeleine no fireworks for her this year.

Here are pics from all the festivities.

The Birthday kids last year!

Madeleine picked out a very festive leotard for gymnastics this summer... also worked well for her party.

Starting off with some stretching

Madeleine and Hadley on the balance beam

At the end Madeleine got to award each friend a medal

Can't see too well but these were the cake pops Madeleine requested. She told me she wanted pink with purple ruffles.

Tommy trying to stay cool at the party

Tommy carrying around a balloon before his party. This cracked me up because Madeleine carried around her one year old balloon for weeks after her first birthday.