Bronwyn Turns 2

 Bronwyn is our 2nd October baby.  Going back to when we had leaves on the trees, here's a few pictures of her birthday celebration.

 She is picking out a pumpkin pancake from the big pile flipped by her brothers and sisters for her pancake feast.

 Breakfast for dinner makes Bronwyn happy!  Actually, I think we were singing the birthday song to her.  She loved it.

 This was her first time to open gifts when she knew what she was doing.  But she still required a lot of help.

 She needed some explanation and demonstration to see that this was a flashlight with several functions.

 Now she understands.

 Yum, yum fruit snacks.

 More explanation and assistance.

 Bronwyn's sisters picked out a set of plastic horses for her because she can comb their hair and take them in the bathtub.

 "Here's the comb..."

 Finishing with dessert, of course.  We made blooming roasted apples from a recipe shared on Pinterest.

She knows how to celebrate!

Cecily's 6th Birthday

 Birthday celebrations are one of those things that rely almost entirely on me.  Other family members pitch in a lot to make it happen, but especially the cooking depends upon the head cook, as we usually try to make something special, that we wouldn't ordinarily have.  This year we settled on coffee cake for breakfast, but this particular week was an especially bad one and Cecily's birthday came at the climactic end of it.  When we woke up that morning, I tried several times to get going on that cake, but came to realize that I just couldn't do it, for once.  Lots of times, I just need to push through and do it even though I don't feel like I can, but this wasn't one of those times.  I took some time to think it over and I knew that even though I would feel disappointed, Cecily would not feel disappointed if we went and got doughnuts and yogurt and ate at the park.  So we did.  Does she look disappointed?  I'm thankful for such options on such days.  I had to remember the goal of a birthday celebration in the first place and get over my own ideals about how I wanted it to look.  It's the spirit of fun, enjoyment and celebration of the individual who is being recognized and thankfulness to God that matter.  That can be conveyed in so many different ways.  I'm thankful this year that the Lord helped me not be selfish and feel upset about the inability to make a coffeecake and have a homemade birthday breakfast for my girl, but rather to focus on a celebratory attitude for her sake and enjoy a good thing with her instead.  A slumped over, discouraged mama doesn't exactly speak, "This is about you and about thanking God for you and the good work he's doing in your life."

Thank you Lord for helping me not to do that this time and for forgiving me for the many times in the past where I couldn't resist the temptation.

 This was a beautiful morning to be outside, and a big treat and she was delighted. 

 We let the kids run off a little energy at the playground before we went home.  (Truth be told, we didn't go directly home, we ran to Target to get a gift, because none of my plan-ahead plans had worked out, including a gift.)

 Happy Birthday girl.

 Also thankfully, we had planned an easy dinner of turkey burgers and frozen fries.  Amelia and I did manage to get a birthday cake made in the afternoon, which you will see shortly.

 Time for gifts.  Lousy picture quality is due to being in the basement at night, with inadequate light.

 Nail polish!

 The bag had some snacks in it that the boys picked out for her.  She is holding some bunny cookies that they found.

 Her own wallet, from Grammy and Papa.

 Millie helped her check out all of the compartments and tell her what they were for.  ("This one's for your debit card....")

 We bought Cecily Spirograph (last minute) and she also got a Make A Plate from my parents.  Both of those gave her some new artistic things to work on.

 Amelia wrapped her stick horse up in a blanket and gave it to Cecily.  I let her because it was generous of her and I knew Cecily would love it.

 The Oreo Cake.

Something worthwhile to celebrate: God's gift of life to this girl.  She's really so easy to please and such a treasure to me.  Thank you Lord!

Samuel's 15th Birthday

Sam's 15th birthday was at the end of July.  Here's a few photos to catch you up.

Sam just wanted roast and potatoes for his dinner.  Oh, and homemade bread.  Homemade bread only makes it's appearance around here every so often, so it was a treat.

Peter picked up a couple of books for Sam.  If you haven't heard of this one, October Sky, you might have heard of the movie.  Sam really liked the film because it was about a West Virginia boy, Homer Hickam, from a small coal mining town who became a famous author as well as a NASA engineer and helped put West Virginia on the map.  

The second book, below, is hunting and fishing tales by famous outdoorsman, Zane Grey.

Sam's gift from us was a recurve bow, for hunting, that he has been wanting.

He was very pleased with it.

He's been practicing with it and he's hoping to at least shoot at a deer or turkey this fall.

Sure was fun to celebrate our oldest.  He's such a contributer and a blessing to our home.

Pictures from Peter's Birthday (finally)

A favorite thing that he looks forward to is his birthday beer.  I got him something extra special to go with his birthday dinner.  (It was an organic chocolate stout)

We kept our tradition of doing a hunt with clues for Peter to find his birthday gifts (before dinner).  The kids have so much fun with this.  William always creates the clues.

Here he is finding a gift in the bottom of the chimney.

He found the one in the office, now he is reading the clue to take him to the next gift...

...which is in the dining room which is appropriately the last location so we can begin dinner.

But first we took a couple of birthday photos with the kids out on the deck.

Dinner was:  BBQ spare ribs, corn on the cob and cheddar biscuits.

Ben had fun printing off these photos for Peter, who is pictured in number one.  I'm not sure where he got the idea, but this was his contribution for his dad and it was pretty creative. 

Time to open gifts, starting with little ones from the little people.

I enjoy watching him interact with each of them and how he appreciates the things they give him.

Our older sons found a set of cigars and an airtight case to keep them in for a really good price and knew that their dad would enjoy that. 

Next is a gift from his in-laws. 

A big smile for the commentary that they got for him!  Thank you!

From all of us: a football...

...and a book stand for his desk.

He found this book stand on Amazon and had it in his wish list.  I ordered it and he just loves it.  I think you can tell a lot about Peter by the gifts he got this year.  They sum up his interests pretty well.

We made brownie ice cream sundaes for dessert, to finish the evening.

 No celebration is perfect, but in all it was a lovely time to celebrate the years that the Lord has given to Peter and has given to us with him.  What a blessing he is to his family.