Categories
Daughters

She’s Three

CE’s birthday celebrations stretched over the course of the week. It started with a small celebration down in Myrtle Beach, where we were staying with CDF’s sister for the night. She had a red velvet cake.

ce_bday_9523_thumb.jpg

Blowing out the Candles
ce_bday_9525_thumb.jpg

This is Good Cake

Then on the next weekend we had a bigger party at the local park. This time CDF made a cake in the shape of a butterfly, and we ordered pizza. We invited a lot more people this time. Before we ate the children were able to play on the playground and then afterward they played in the lawn beside the picnic shelter.

dsc_9623_thumb.jpg

Butterfly Cake

One of CE’s favorite gifts was the scooter and helmet. Now she wears the helmet while riding the tricycle too.

ce_scooter_9678_thumb.jpg

She has a new Scooter
Categories
Daughters

5th Birthday

We celebrated MD’s 5th birthday today. We had plans to go on some outings in the morning, but ended up stuck doing errands until it was too late. We did manage to open a “Fat Cat” account at the bank so she could deposit the coins from her bunny bank (to the tune of $94!). It took a lot longer than expected, mainly because the coin counting machine choked and didn’t complete the transaction, so we had no receipt and no record of depositing any coins! The bank straightened it out, but that took most of the morning.

So the celebration was mostly in the late afternoon when we went to Chuck-e-Cheese for her party. She had invited five friends and their families. We got tokens and pizza and the children just had fun playing on the games and in the play zone.

Technorati Tags:

Categories
Daughters

Singletary Lake

For CE’s birthday we had planned on going to the beach. But with a storm churning off the coast, the water was too rough to get in. Instead we decided to go to a lake where we could get in the water. One such lake not too far away was Singletary Lake State Park. We had never visited it, but it looked interesting.

We missed the entrance on the way their — actually passed it by because it said “Group Camping,” but it turns out the park is dedicated to camping and they only allow visitors when the park hasn’t been reserved. But we found the office and they gave us the key to get in the main gate. Once in we had the entire park to ourselves.

We walked a little on the main trail, but the girls really just wanted to go to the lake, so we turned back and headed to the pier.

dsc_6277.jpg

The weather was just right for wading in the water, so we all left our shoes on the pier and got in the shallow water. The lake bottom was sandy around the shore and stayed shallow for a long way out. CE was not happy with the texture under her feet, but got used to it after a while. MD was ready to explore right away.

dsc_6312.jpg

Later I went back for the picnic bag and the girls went out the pavilion at the end of the pier. We sat on the benches there and ate our sandwiches. At the end CE gave us a scare by running up to the edge of the dock and almost falling in (the water was over 6 feet deep there).

dsc_6338.jpg

We had a great time and during lunch were scheming on how to get enough people to reserve the park for a weekend.

csc_6341.jpg

Categories
Daughters

Two Years

CE is two years old today! One of the major changes that I’ve noticed is that she has really started talking over the past month. She repeats words that anyone says, especially her sister, and enjoys learning sign language. She is also very outgoing and will respond to people when they say hi. She is often the first to say hello to a neighbor, and will shout to people going by on the street. Her personality is really starting to blossom.

Technorati Tags:

Categories
Family

Pop’s Birthday

We celebrated Pop’s 55th birthday on Friday. We had a cookout (but ate inside because of the heat) and grilled hamburgers and hotdogs. Pop got the grilling started, but my brother took over so he could go spend time with the guests.

dsc_5479.jpg

Mom baked him a birthday brownie and CE helped blow out the candles.

dsc_5493.jpg

See more pictures.

Categories
Wife

Her 30th Birthday

We celebrated CDF’s birthday over the weekend. I took the day off Friday so we could spend time together. In the morning we went biking around town after walking MD to preschool. After lunch we went to the Arboretum in Wilmington to walk around the gardens and take pictures. From Wilmington we went to Jacksonville to drop off the girls at my parents house (they were going to spend the night) and to go canoing.

dsc_4680.jpg

In the Arboretum’s Garden

CDF had never been out in a canoe before, but she has wanted to try it for a number of years now. So finally this Friday we got in a canoe. She was a little nervous about tipping over, or just meeting wildlife that could be in the river, but we ended up having a really good time. We saw some waterfowl, a few turtles, and water bugs, but otherwise had the creek to ourselves. We didn’t go very far, just past the curve that goes around the apartments on the other side of Henderson Drive. When we got back it was time to go to dinner at Chili’s.

On Saturday we had a party at our house. We invited around 20 friends and had a combination cook-out and pot-luck dinner in the back yard. For dessert I made a Peanut Butter Silk Cake for the birthday cake, and someone else brought banana pudding (one of CDF’s favorites).

dsc_4666.jpg

Playing Together


Update for April 26th: we had a party on Saturday afternoon and invited family and a number of CDF’s friends over for a potluck/cook-out in the back yard.

dsc_4704.jpg

The Birthday Cook-out