The Birthday Party

I had every intention of baking my own giant cupcake cakes for the party. They were going to be wonderful and look so cool and make me look so domestic and savvy, but this did not go as planned. I had gotten the inspiration from the very domestic and wonderfully savvy Darby. I will remember in the future that I just do not have the skills that one does. However, it was a fun memory making the cake with Alder and I froze the cake and so we will pull it out and frost it on some rainy day. It was not that the cake turned out poorly it was just that I started this "project" too late in the week and felt too overwhelmed. 

So I did the easy thing and picked up the phone and called the Cake Gallery in Chatty and had my parents pick it up on their way down to our house. I mean my time is money, right??? I felt like I could breath again and proceeded with all the other party planning.

We wanted the party for Alder to be very low key and simple. We brainstormed on what we should do and came up with the idea of "borrowing" farm animals from one of our friends. I have learned that this is an easy thing to do while living in rural Alabama and that if we had asked several more friends, we could have ended up with a whole slew of farmyard chaos, but we settled for just a donkey and a baby cow. The whole week leading up to the party all Alder could talk about was the "donkey horse" and "bebe cow" that were going to come to his house. It was very fun to build the excitement of the animals, the cake, the friends, and both sets of his grandparents all coming just for him. Alder seemed to really understand that it was going to be his special day. I planned the party for the morning (so I would not have to serve a meal) and that we would be outside RAIN OR SHINE. Rain it was and we still had a ball. Our large covered porch came in handy and all 35 of us or so all gathered around migitized tables for the kiddos and ate cake, drank hot chocolate, and snacked on goldfish. It was a fun time of fellowship and donkey rides....yes, there were donkey rides. Alder LOVED the donkey (as he loves all animals) and just sat upon the donkey gazing out upon his party guests. He was quite frustrated when he wanted to also ride "bebe cow" and we had to explain to him that "bebe cow" was too small.

 Clearly one child wanted to play fetch with baby cow.

These two are sisters and were adopted by a wonderful family here. Sweet A is from Russia and Little H is from China. These two are very fun. They both loved riding the donkey.

I know it seems from the look on Alder's face that he is NOT enjoying himself and being a poor host at his party, but when he was on Moses the Donkey he would just get all serious about it and seemingly concentrate on,well, just sitting there.

Halfway through the party Ms. D came to deliver the mail. Well, we love Ms. D and Alder vacated his own party to run down the sidewalk to see her and help her deliver our neighbors mail. Alder is obsessed with the mail truck and garbage truck. Ms. D loves Alderman and the garbage men always honk their horn in a melody for Alder every Tuesday and Friday.

Alder blew out the candles like he had been practicing all week. 

 My tables for the kids were graciously donated. The L Family (Mrs. R is pregnant with baby #8) let us borrow the migitized tables which were greatly appreciated. I was given the fabric for the table runners (thanks Amanda!) and I borrowed a huge roll of red butcher block paper from Bets (thank you and I promise I mean to return it, but we are just having so much fun doing crafts on it...hehe). Mrs. Pat sewed up the table runners for me and I purchased the rest of the paper products from Wal-Mart. We really did not have a lot of expenses which was my command goal for the party.

This is Mrs. Pat. She has been a real blessing in our lives over the last year. She and her family are Menonites and they could not be more dear and loving people. Mrs. Pat helps us out with whatever and is our regular babysitter so I can run my errands and so on. Alder and Kingston both adore her as do I.

It was such a dreary day.

The covered porch just worked wonderfully though.

This picture is just so funny to me.

Yes, there are farm animals tied to my banisters.

These ice cream cones filled with a $1 voucher from McDonald's were our party favors. I did not want to pass out just junky toys from Wal-Mart's party favor section and so I brainstormed feverently and thought of this. I figured the kids could go and get an ice cream cone with Mom for a special little outing.

We had a wonderful time. Alder adored his cake and animals and I think everything else (like grandparents, friends, and presents) was just icing on the cake. 

As Stubborn as a Mule or rather a Donkey

Ok, so I am frantically working on trying to get the birthday pics loaded and so on, but our new camera is well, problematic. The camera seems to be rather stubborn so I thought I would leave you this picture from the party.

Stay tuned.

The Birthday Boy

In a blink of any eye this one turned 2 on the 17th.

Alder knows all of his colors, can count to 5 (kind of), recognizes a dozen letters, and loves to build really high block towers as well as create new tracks for his trains. He has become very independent and quite the little helper around the house. He adores his little brother and wants Kingston to watch whatever new trick or activity he has mastered. He will feed Kingston O's and Ally a cup of food each day and seems to enjoy the responsibility of being the oldest. He is starting to converse with us about all sorts of things having to do with the life around him. We love this little boy.

Birthday pics to follow.

Brotherhood

Yes, I realize the pics are grainy. Dada has a new camera and these pics were taken with his digital camera. Why are they like this? Curses I say.

I think Alder is telling King King in the first picture the "rules" about watching videos on the couch. In the second picture, it is quite clear that King King is just excited to be sitting there with his big brother.

Oh how my cup overflows.

Speaking of brotherhood...

Jared and I finished watching a documentary called "Brothers at War." The movie is moving, emotional and real. It is not left or right, for war or against, it is not a war film.  This film is about the lives of American soldiers fighting on the ground in Iraq.  It was refreshing to see a movie that was so raw with honesty. Sometimes I feel as though our poor soldiers that serve now are being subject to the same treatment of those who were coming back from Vietnam. I know soldiers are not having to take off their uniforms in the airport bathrooms upon arrival back into the States to avoid being spit on, but I feel like our soldiers are grossly under appreciated.

Recently the National Guard in our small town was being deployed to Iraq. We went as a family to "send them off," shake their hands, say thank you, and show our support. It was incredibly emotional. There were mothers and fathers saying goodbye to their small children. There were lots of tears.

Why did our whole town not line the road as the 2101st company left town on their way to defend our country? 

Where is our patriotism? We don't even have an American flag on our house. 

Our mayor shared these words at the ceremony. 

“A few weeks ago, a group of boys from this town put on a uniform in Tuscaloosa and brought home a trophy. A couple days ago, a few more boys from here put on a uniform in Pasadena and brought home another trophy,” Grayson said, referring to Demopolis High School’s 5A state championship, won at the Tuscaloosa-hosted Super 6 Championship, and the University of Alabama’s win in the BCS National Championship game Thursday.
“And we realize that because of the uniform you wear, we are able to play these games and do these things, and we appreciate you, and you need to remember that,” he said. 

I get to take pictures of my sweet boys because of those men and women.

Aahh....my love.

My addiction love for coffee developed slowly over our time of living in England and traveling extensively in Europe. When we moved back to the States, Jared and I enjoyed our french press and our stovetop cappuccino maker, but then we had children and we needed something that made coffee faster. For Christmas, we received a coffee maker that we love and it has coffee waiting for us in the morning. Jared leaves the house at an ungodly hour (like before 6 most times) and I get my coffee around 8. It is hot at both hours and tastes oh so yummy. There is one funny thing about all this coffee love though. I am extremely caffeine sensitive and NEVER drink straight caffeinated coffee. Therefore my love affair must just consist of loving the smell, the taste of the wonderful creamer I pour into my mug, and then just holding the warm mug in my hands throughout the morning as I gently sip and sip and sip. Its really just about the process. So Jared and I have agreed that drinking half calf is the way to go and we each get a little of what we need.

We are in a bit of a quandary and need some help though. Does anyone know of some great and economical half calf coffee? Because after trying it for the first time this morning, the best part about waking up was NOT having Folger's in my cup.

Playtime and Tiger Stripes

I just recently spent a lot of time researching a great book that would help guide me in conducting more constructive play with Alder during our days together. I do not believe that he should be "schooled" right now, but I know that I could use some help in the area of constructive play as well as having a list of skills-concepts that a 2 year old should be able to do. This book is wonderful and very informative. It is a part of a series and so if you have other aged children you could probably find the other books on Amazon. Some of the activities are certainly geared for the classroom, but for the most part I can do a lot of them with just Alder and myself.

Do you see the "tiger stripes" on Alder's face? This happened a few weeks ago when he, Dada, and AllyB (our dog) were all wrestling before bedtime. It happened by complete accident. Alder loves for Dada to sit Ally on his chest, which is called a PILE ON, and as Ally was getting off one of her paws scratched Alder's face. It looked terrible for several days, but I think it will heal just fine without any need for Mederma. Praise the Lord.

Aren't these cute?

These were designed and created by the talented Meredith. She is super creative, talented, and very easy to work with...not to mention her prices are very reasonable. She designed our Christmas cards as well that I recently posted. If you would like Meredith to design for you just leave me a comment and I will get you her info.

Yes, that's right....Alder will be TWO next Sunday!

Love is All Around

"General opinion's starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don't see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it's not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it's always there - fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends.....If you look for it, I've got a sneaking suspicion... love actually is all around."
-H. Grant


I could write a lot about our holiday season, but I think these pictures sum up the general feeling. We are blessed to be loved, to love so many, and to have a Savior who's love cannot be measured or even understood. We hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Happy New Year to you!

Hope your New Year's Day was better than his. Poor Kings.