Adam is Five!

Happy, happy birthday to our fabulous five year old guy! We had a fairly large party on Saturday night - I invited a bunch of our friends with kids, and almost everyone was able to come. I was slightly worried about the house getting destroyed, and so set up a bunch of activities outside. The boys tossed cornhole bean bags straight in each other's faces, kicked balls and tossed frisbees over the fence, and raced around on the turf.

Tim drew a really awesome picture of the monster truck El Toro Loco, and the kids spent some time coloring him in as they felt appropriate, and then we played a rousing game of pin the wheels on El Toro Loco.

We also had a pinata, which result in a lot of screaming (from Ellie) when I made the kids line up in age order, and one of the four year olds knocked the thing open. THEN she cried because she wasn't getting as much candy. Dude, stop crying and go grab some! I'd put almost 400 pieces of candy in for a dozen kids - surely there was a sucker or a package of Smarties left. Oh my kids... always something to cry about at a fun event.

But see how happy she is to hang her bag on her bunny shirt?

We did pizza for the kids, and I made a turkey salad and a couple other big salads, plus I bought many of the meat and cheese items that Costco has to offer. (When I got to the register they told me my membership had expired, which, I can't imagine being up there with a bunch of beer, a bunch of chips and dips and snacks and a sheet cake and being like "well, nevermind then, I will just leave and buy 12 bags of chips at the regular grocery store to yield the same amount. Please put this cake back.") And the kids helped me make an El Toro Loco cake, which is both loco and straight up frightening.

And then towards the end of the night, all the kids curled up to watch a movie.

I mean, I joked about being surprised by having such a crowd, and having expected more people would be unable to attend, but I love having a house full of people and I feel lucky to have such friends, for Tim and I as well as for Adam. And it's definitely good for me to have a reason to get the yard cleaned up, the house acceptable inside, and the fridge stocked with beer and snacks for the summer fun to come.

The kids both slept in until almost 8 - they were pooped! We had a very relaxed morning - he opened his presents from us, worked on putting together his Lego firetruck, and we watched the third Harry Potter movie, since Tim and Ellie just finished the book. Then tonight we had Mimi and Poppy and Jake, Gigi and Grizz and Sara, and my friend Maree, her son and parents all over for dinner and actual birthday surprises (featuring the leftover appetizers and food I'd made the day before - THANKS COSTCO! And thanks to our families for being low maintenance, and awesome.

One of Adam's presents was a bunch of Overwatch shirts - he's been SO thrilled about having a matching Tracer shirt with Tim, so we got him a bunch of other heroes in his size. Today he picked out the Winston shirt for them all to wear, and I texted Mimi to let her know that she might want to get in on the action.

In short, Adam is a fantastic little nut and we love him to the moon and back. I can't believe he's five, and I can't wait to see what this year will bring. He's all signed up for kindergarten, and I just registered him for t-ball (good thing he got a baseball mitt and a t-ball set for his birthday!) I was also amazed - the other day he picked out a die-cast truck at CVS, and in the car on the drive home he tried sounded out the name and told me it was a "rum" truck. For an almost five year old who's not in a super-academic preschool, I was impressed that he saw RAM and got close to the actual word.