Happy Birthday Tyler!!
This little boy turned 5 on Feb. 17th.
And no photo-shoot of him would be complete without some spiderman poses. :)
We've decided to do birthday parties every other year for the kids, and just do smaller family parties on the year that they're not having a big party. I was a little nervous telling Tyler he wasn't going to have a party this year, since he's had one the past two years, but he didn't mind at all! He was just concerned he wouldn't get to have Ironman be apart of his big day and wouldn't get any presents, but once we assured him that wasn't the case he didn't care a bit that it wasn't going to be a big shebang.
I just did a simple set-up on the table with some balloons, cake and his presents for him to see when he woke up. There were also some balloons and streamers I snuck in his room the night before to put up as well-which he came running into my room at 6:30 in the morning to tell me, "MOM! It must be my birthday because there's balloons EVERYwhere!" ha ha-and then I made him go back to bed.
About an hour later I heard him and Kylee whispering in the kitchen and I walked out to see them just sitting here in the dark starring at everything on the table, telling each other all the different things they saw. ha ha!
So even though he wasn't having a party he still wanted "an Ironman birthday", so I picked up this cake (a set of 12 cupcakes frosted together) from Walmart and I swear to you I will never bake my own cake for a birthday again. For less than $8 I got this fun little cake with a spinning/light-up Ironman that Tyler got to keep and it was the thing he talked about all day!
He also had pre-school that day, so I picked up some cupcakes for him to take to school and share with his friends. He's recently become obsessed with Captain America (Bobby's showed him some clips from the movie)...
...and I knew he would LOVE these superhero cupcakes with the cool rings on top that all his friends would get to keep.
After we dragged Bobby out of bed, we lit up 5 little candles and sang him happy birthday! He thought it was THE. coolest. thing. EVER that when the candles lit up, it looked like fire coming out of Ironman's feet as he was flying!
After a nice, healthy cupcake breakfast he got to open his presents.
I don't know what it is, but Kylee loves to wear Tyler's old jammies-especially his toy story ones!
This is the first birthday that I've had a really hard time with. I've just loved watching him grow up, and learn, and discover life, and become his own person but there's something about him being 5 that terrifies me. I think most of the reason is because it means that he'll being starting school in 6 months. And starting school means that I won't be the one that's there for all those moments of learning and growing and discovery. It means that he's really starting his life as his own little person-picking out what he wants to wear, who his friends will be, what his interests are, what he believes in. It means that fairly soon, I will no longer be the center of his world. And...it just makes me feel old. Like really old. I have a 5 year old. What?!?! I still have memories from when I was five.
Just looking at this picture makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time.He was SO worried that those darn balloons were going to blow away so he was holding onto them for dear life and kept saying, "mom, I just CAN'T let go! Make sure they don't blow away ok mom?!" And then I look at that sweet face and I just see everything that he is: happy, playful, determined, excited about life, kind, sensitive, and completely everything I've ever wanted in my life.
After daddy was done with school for the day, we headed over to the Fun Park and had fun playing all sorts of arcade games-where Tyler beat Kylee at air hockey, and then I CREAMED Bobby-9 to 1...booyah!
Look at that look of determination...ha ha!
I promised he played lots more than just gun games... :)
They also ran around together in the little soft play area for an hour-I need to come here during the winter more often!
After we scored hundreds of tickets, we "purchased" all sorts of crazy knick-knacks from their ticket shop-that have mostly by now been thrown away-and headed to Tyler's choice of Firehouse Pizza for dinner (he also chose this last year!). It was a friday night and the food took forevvvvver to come out, but the kids were so good about coloring and keeping themselves busy.
Daddy and Tyler being weird.
Mommy and Kylee being...well, Ky's being pouty because she was HUNGRY and just wanted some food!
About 15 min. after we got home, Amanda knocked on our door! She came up from Provo to stay the weekend with us (since it was a 3 day weekend) to surprise Tyler for his birthday and he just fled into her arms and would not let go of her! He told me that BY FAR, it was the best part of his birthday! It was so fun to have her here with us for a couple days and she helped him build legos, play with his new Ironman toy from Grandma, play games and be his teacher in primary (I happened to be subbing in his class that day so Amanda came with me).
Sat. night Amanda and I escaped away for a nice girls night! We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner and shared some Ribs (sooooo good! I'm salivating just thinking about them!).
Then we went and saw The Vow, which we both loved! I'm so happy I had her to go see it with me, as Bobby refuses to watch movies with actors that have 2 first names. :) (and seriously...if I woke up from being knocked out, and Channing Tatum told me he was my husband I would not question that!!)
He's pretty excited to be 5.
Happy Birthday little man. I love you.
