Birthday Celebration!

Yes, it’s true.  The girls are 12.  How time flies!  I love those girls to pieces!

I think I’m more aware than they are of how big of a milestone the age of 12 is right now and in the future.  I wanted to do fun things for them and make it really special.  Usually we do big parties but they have made a couple of comments about two things that I thought I’d incorporate. 

The first is the breakthrough door!  My sister-in-law, Ruth, does this with her kids for their birthday.  They have to sort of break out of it in the morning.  I thought about doing poster paper, but they wake up sometimes in the middle of the night and I didn’t want them freaking out cuz they weren’t oriented enough to know what was going on and be strong enough to break through it.  haha.  So, I did streamers. 

Xanthe’s Door

Xoe’s Door

Xanthe was seriously groggy that morning. I let them sleep in until 9:30 a.m. and go to school late.  Xanthe was still groggy even when I woke her up at 9:30. She looks trashed huh?  Too many late night and very early mornings getting up for school.

I hung a happy birthday sign. Yes, it’s a train, but come on!  I used all this stuff from our Birthday Box (described below) and this was an amazing sign that my friend Randi had used to surprise Spencer and I on his first birthday.  So, I had to save it and reuse it.

Birthday Box

The infamous “Birthday Box.” My mom, one year for Christmas, made one of these for each of her kids that had children.  It comes stocked with everything you need for a party.  Cake mix, goody bags, streamers, signs, etc., etc. I actually didn’t realize how much I would use it until I had it.  She periodically replenishes stuff for us, and I’ll throw things in there as well. 

 

 

Birthday Breakfast

The second thing the girls said they wanted to do like their famous aunt Ruth does, is to make their favorite breakfast.  So, I made pumpkin pancakes with Butter Syrup and whipped cream, bacon and scrambled eggs.  Here are the kids before going to school. Brian even stayed home long enough to have their birthday breakfast (but secretly I think it’s cuz he LOOOOOVES Butter Syrup). 

And I’m surprised Spencer’s eyes are open in the picture above.  He has “Nanette Syndrome” (sorry, Nan, I had to).  She’s my sister who cannot keep her eyes open in pictures for the life of her. She has to look away during picture time.  It cracks me up like you wouldn’t believe.   As you can see from the majority of remaining pictures below, I could not get his eyes open, even when I practiced with the double flash or turned off the red eye flash.  haha.  Anyway, Spencer is here sans shirt cuz Butter Syrup is dang sticky and I did NOT want to deal with the mess.

 

 

Spirit Day

It just so happened that their birthday is on a Friday. Every Friday is Spirit Day and they’re supposed to wear blue and gold. Well, one of their favorite school counselors gave them some blue and gold hair paint.  I asked them like 10 times if it was going to be okay, and they said, “Yes! Mr. Haines GAVE it to us!”  It obviously made them super happy cuz look at those smiles!

 

 

Young Women Welcome

So many people made their birthday special.  One of those people was a girl named Sarah Anderson.  She is the Young Women’s President (the “Young Women” is the teenage group in our church that you have to be 12 to move into).  For awhile she was the only one in Young Women’s.  Can you imagine how excited she was to have 3 extra girls come in (I’ll explain the 3rd girl below)?  She drove all the way to our house after school (we live about 15 minutes from the base) to bring them these special treats.  How sweet, huh? 

 

(Ignore Xoe’s orange one.  She couldn’t keep her fingers off of it before I took a picture. )

 

I’ll post about our dinner for tomorrow’s post!