Luke's Birthday

Luke had a wonderful birthday! We started off bright and early with a portion of his birthday gift waiting for him when he got downstairs in the morning: a small wooden train track with two trains! He and Beth immediately were drawn to it, Luke had huge smiles on his face! After breakfast we let Luke open the rest of his gifts, two books from Beth and Luke and more wooden tracks and trains.

He and Beth played with those for about an hour until we decided to let him open his gift from MawMaw and PawPaw:

Yup, a John Deer Weed Eater! Talk about big smiles on a little boy's face! He knew immediately what it was and how to use it. Between that, the trains, and his two favorite books, I'm pretty sure this 2-year-old was in heaven.

We had a quick lunch, put the kid's down for an early nap and got ready for our big afternoon! We met friends at a local pumpkin patch where they were having a free "fair." We brought (gluten-free!) cupcakes, sang happy birthday, opened a few more presents and had some fun! There was a petting zoo, a playground, pony rides, a corral-type place, swings, pumpkin painting, and more fun things. Beth and Luke ran around with their friends and with Grandma and Grandpa. We were there for about two hours and they had a blast. Jack stayed comfortable in my Ergo sling the entire two hours, he snoozed for awhile but was mostly taking it all in. He appeared to have no desire to ride in the stroller, so I carried him. :-)

After the pumpkin patch we went to dinner with our out-of-town friends, and it was really good to see everyone and catch up. Beth and Luke both really enjoyed the tortilla chips and green sauce! On the way home we decided to stop by another pumpkin patch that was a little closer to home, since we didn't get any actual pictures of the kids and the pumpkins at the first patch. (They were charging $5 just to take your own photo!) We had about 15 minutes of day light left so we hurried in and got a few pictures before the sun went down. I took about 20 pictures of the three kids but none of those turned out, they were pretty blurry since it was pretty dark by that point and poor Luke was so exhausted, he was staring blankly off into the distance! I did get a couple of good ones of Beth and Luke though, sitting in an old tractor!


We got home at about 7:15 with some very exhausted children! BUT! Luke hadn't blown out a candle yet! So for the sake of another photo op (and for bribing them to behave in the car ride on the way home), we put them in their chairs and gave them each a cupcake right when we got home. Now, if you've ever met my children, you know that absolutely nothing- not even complete and utter exhausten- will come between them and chocolate. They are their mother's children afterall! So they battled their droopy eyelids and inhaled another cupcake after Luke blew out his candle, then Ryan hearded them upstairs for bed as I put Jack to sleep. All children were asleep before 8:00 pm, without any cries or protests (and I'm sure that's a new record!). Mommy was pretty tired too, but somehow I found the energy to stay up editing all of these photos. Oh, and this is only 20 or so of the 245 I uploaded from my camera!


Although he couldn't tell me in these exact words, I'm pretty sure he'd have said it was an awesome birthday! All day long he had huge smiles on his face, got to experience a lot of new things and places, play with friends and family that he loves, and eat lots of chocolate cupcakes. Pretty great for a 2-year-old. :-)