I can't believe that 9 years ago this guy weighed in at just over 6 pounds and was sick and in the NICU. Look at him now ~ happy, healthy and full of energy! Boy 2 has been such a blessing to our family. He is fun loving, funny, super sweet, has a kind heart and is the smartest kid on the block! I'm so glad I was chosen to be his Mom, he makes me look GOOD! ;o) Last year Boy 2 wanted Jungle Jim to come to his party, however, Jungle Jim's daughter has a birthday the same day as Boy 2 and as it should be, her birthday trumped Boy 2's birthday. This year, I called Jungle Jim again hoping that he could come to Boy 2's birthday party ---- that is when Jungle Jim told me HE MOVED OUT OF THE AREA!!!! WHAT?!?! NO!!!! This would be our last chance to have JJ to come to a party, I begged a little, reminded him of last year and really just wouldn't shut-up until he caved and said yes, he would make the trip from Dallas. Thank you Jungle Jim! :o)
Birthday Cake made by B&N Creations
If you have been following me for a while you know I like to have at home birthday parties and we like to go big! This party was no exception even though 3 days later we started packing out for our move to Korea. I did give myself a break and had someone else make the cake (and had Jungle Jim do all the entertaining). If you live in the Killeen/Fort Hood area and are in need of a cake B & N Creations are cakes sent from heaven. Not only do their cakes look amazing, but they taste AMAZING too!
This year Girl & her friend helped make the party food!
Grasshopper Bell Pepper
Hedgehog Watermelon
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Bugs
Bug Juice! Gummy worm ice ring, and plastic bugs in the juice (too bad they didn't float)
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Birthday Boy with the Albino Burmese Python
If big snakes didn't eat big animals I would consider letting Boy 2 have one, but I think the first time he had to feed it a bunny he might freak out...
Jungle Jim puts on an amazingly educational birthday party! He is very thorough when teaching the kids about each reptile. He teaches them how to hold them, feed them, what is special and unique about each one. And he is SO GOOD with the kids (and adults). The birthday child gets special attention and always gets to hold/feed first. If you live in the Dallas area this is a once in a lifetime birthday party you don't want to miss out on!
Happy Birthday Boy 2! I love you!
I cannot believe we have a 15 year old. It seems like only a few short years ago (NOT yesterday) I was in labor for 26 FREAKING hours with this kid. That's right, his birthday really should be the 25th of June, not the 26th, but he decided to take his own sweet time and put his mother though hell for just over a day.
Relax. I'm not going to tell you his birth story.
I will tell you that I am glad he gave me a hard time then and that he doesn't do it now. Don't get me wrong we have hit a few speed bumps in this journey of life, in fact I would like to have skipped ages 3, 10 & 12 altogether, but since the age of 12 we have only had a few minor bumps in the road, thank God. He is a good kid. He makes good grades, he loves him mom (yes, he is a Momma's boy - leave us alone! ) and his family. He stands up for his siblings when it counts (even if the does torcher them on a daily basis) and he would never let anyone outside of himself be mean to them. I watch him every day and I am in awe of him and I often wonder what we did right and hope to mimic it in all of his siblings.
For the past few years it has been kind of been sad ~ he hasn't really wanted to have a party for his birthday and you know me, I'm all about parties. I LOVE throwing parties, especially for my kids' birthdays. So this year when he told me he wanted to have a "Korean" dinner party for his birthday I was all over it. However I was informed not to go 'over the top'. Got it. (Darn it!) I did not play Korean music. I did not dress in a Hanbok. I did not ask the guest to dress in Hanboks. We did not play traditional Korean games like 'Yut'. I was also informed that I should not do streamers or balloons this year. However, I could not help myself:  Hehehehehehe!! Sorry Boy 1! I did not do balloons though, and I only put up a few streamers in the house.  His siblings love giving him birthday spankings on his birthday! This is the only day they can get away with something like this! Boy 3 even spanked him a few extra times. One of the birthday traditions around our house is that you get to choose whatever you want to eat for your birthday. Boy 1 wanted bacon and biscuits. I was shocked by this. Really, that is all you want? I think he did this because he sees how hard I work on birthdays and wanted to make my job easier this year - I also think that is why he said no balloons and no streamers. I'm on to you Boy 1.  After breakfast we opened gifts. He got the Drivers Ed handbook. That's right, he is going to drivers ed next week! ;o)  Inside joke? Look at their faces....
Things that make you go 'hummm...'!  Bulgogi!  LOL... I taught them how to do this, wrap the meat in lettuce leaves - obviously someone wasn't paying attention and used 6 seaweed wrappers to stuff full of rice, bulgogi and kimchi's. It looked like a Korean burrito if there is such a thing! ;o)  Trying to master the chopsticks and not really sure about this Korean fare....  Getting ready to go to the pool....  Dessert! Hoduk - Korean street food.  Of course we HAD to have cake.
I can't believe it has been 8 years since a beautiful little 6lb; 13oz baby boy joined our family! Time goes by WAY too fast! I remember being so scared when the nurses whisk him away from us in the delivery room and then there were all sorts of crazy jibber-jabber going on. I knew something was wrong. It wasn't long till the doctor informed us that our little man was having a hard time breathing and that needed to be transferred to a children's hospital - while I stayed put.
It was a rough start for this handsome young man, but that didn’t last long. Within no time started growing and developing just like the other kids. I am now proud to say that I am the mother of one of the sweetest boys with a tender heart; he has a love for life and family. He TRIES to be the comedian of the family, but he has a couple of rivals in this area - come to think of it, maybe this is just a boy trait. He loves his Momma. He is very dependable, and always tries to do his best. If I ever need anything done I know I can count on Boy 2. He is one of the smartest kids I know. He is my favorite Boy 2. ;o)
As many of you know when your birthday rolls around in our house you get to pick what you want for breakfast. Boy 2 picked Silver Dollar Pancakes, crispy bacon, an egg cooked over medium and Crystal Light Fruit Punch...really. He picked Crystal Light Fruit Punch OVER the chocolate milk I had bought special just for him. Go figure.
After breakfast we opened gifts! Not long after that it was party time! Boy 2 had a 'sports themed' birthday party!  Yeah, I made that.  As guest were arriving a balloon war broke out!  The kids made their own 'dogs'. After the kids filled their belly's we headed out to play a few games. The first game was 'PIG', you know the basketball game - followed by golfing (in grass, which was VERY hard), baseball pitch, soccer score, hula hooping and more....  Group shot!  Boy 2 not too sure about his 'sparlking' cake. A birthday party at our house is not complete with a piñata!
 Happy Birthday sweet boy! I love you more!
This year I have had a much harder time with planning birthday parties for the kids (timing, & we have been insanely busy). Girl told me months ago that she wanted to have a Scary Halloween birthday party. I've had great ideas in my head for that long, I just didn't implement until the Monday BEFORE THE PARTY- aughh!!! Girl took invitations to school on Monday for the sleepover/Scary Halloween party on Saturday night (oops). I was so afraid I had blown it and no one would be able to make it, then girl would have to go to therapy for the rest of her life since her mom didn't make time to send the invites out at an appropriate time. Thankfully 5 out of the 6 girls were able to make it on such short notice.
Upon arriving the girls made those silly little ghosts out of lollipops and tissues. I assumed the girls could do this on their own with no instruction, but to my amazement, one girl had never made these. Really? How is that even possible? Good thing my girl is good at instructing (bossing).
Once all the girls arrived we hit the neighborhood for a fun filled old fashion scavenger hunt! Did I mention this is the Saturday BEFORE Halloween and that the girls are dressed in their Halloween costumes? When the girls started knocking on doors, they freaked out our neighbors - our neighbors all thought they had missed the memo that Trick-or-Treating had been moved to Saturday night. Opps.....my bad!
After the scavenger hunt we had a silly string fight, made mummy dogs (hot dogs rolled in breadstick) for dinner. There was lots of giggling and anxiety about what was behind the 'black curtain’s' that blocked the hallway.... We watched Ghost Hunters to freak the girls out a little and then just when it was dark enough we told them it was time to go through the haunted hallway.......
I took the girls outside and told them the rules, only 2 people at a time & you must crawl through the hall. All at once, five out of the six girls (that were all excited about the haunted hallway) started crying. They were so conflicted, "I want to go, but I don't want to go".... the crying continued. Finally 2 girls went in, the girls waiting outside could hear the screaming through the door, and then more crying & then the begging started. "Mrs. Trish, PLEASE just tell us what is in there. Mr. Hubby said something about a missing hand and he showed us the bloody cloth, please tell us (boo-hoo, boo-hoo)." It was great! After about 40 minutes all the girls except one had gone through the hall.
 Silly String fights...  Watching Ghost Hunters I was seriously concerned that I might have to call a mom or two and ask them to come back over and pick their daughters up. So after the ‘Haunted Hallway’ we took decided to give the girls a break from all the scariness and have birthday cake & opened gifts. Once they were all giggling again Hubby sat them all in the living room, turns the lights off and told the story of Two Face John (whose ghost appeared several times in the living room window during the story). During the story Hubby passed around John’s body parts for the girls to feel as he told the story.
 Time for cake! Now that the girls were all nice and freaked out again, we had them lay out their sleeping bags so they could watch a scary movie!! Once the movie was over (and Mom was asleep on the couch), the girls were ready for a little shut eye. I thought this would lead to more giggling, but to my surprise, they fell asleep right away. I guess scaring them wears them out!
 Ahhhh, off to bed! In the morning we had funnel cake (Girl’s choice) & the girls played will all the new toys till time to go home. I overheard one girl say to Girl “This was the best party of the year!”
Ah, my work here is done. ;o)
So I'm a little behind....Boy 2's birthday party wasn't up to par for one of our parties, but hey, we had only been in the house for 8 days and who knew that you can't just go to the store and buy Mario stuff for a kids birthday? Well, now you do. You have to order it. Don't wait till the last minute to buy anything for a Mario party, plan this one in advance. I did order plates & napkins early on, but really thought it would be no problem to pop into the local party supply store for the rest of my goods. Anyway, the kids didn't seem to mind, there was cake, a bouncy house and a piñata, oh, and we had Super Mario on the WII. I've discovered you don't really need much more than that for 7 year olds. We did make up a few games too, but I'm having a hard time remembering the names I gave them. I think this one was "Don't break Yoshi's egg" or something like that…I don’t play video games, so I have no idea who Yoshi is and I don’t know why he has eggs. Getting ready for another game of some sort! ;-) I forgot how freaking HOT it gets in Texas in early May. We had to take several 'inside' breaks because the kids were so hot! The entrance to the bouncy house was burning their feet!
Taking a break from the heat for cake and icecream.  Awe...brothers!  Having a Super Mario play off... I wish we had been videoing this....after not too long after this picture was taken one of the kids was hitting the piñata with the (thankfully hollow & plastic) bat when he let go of it & it nailed me right in the chest! OUCH. Happy Birthday sweet boy!
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