Jake's Birthday

This is the first year Jake's old enough to be really excited about his birthday.  Also, all year long, I've been using the "you can have it for your birthday" line when we're at a store and Jake sees something he wants.  So, I felt the need to get him something really cool.  We didn't want a lot of little parts or cheaply made toys, so we splurged and got him a really nice and big crane truck on the internet.  I invited a few of Jake's friends over for a little party, two little playdate friends and Max, the 12 yr old neighbor, who Jake loves and Max's sister came too.  We had a truck theme (of course) with balloons and I even made a truck cake!

Two Birthdays in Two Days = Two Exhausted Parents

This year for their birthdays, each kid got ONE day.  Not a party at school, then their actual birthday, and then their party day (turning into a week of birthday stuff).  They each had a party ON their birthday.  I'm not sure if this was easier or not, but then again there is no easy way to celebrate two birthdays a week before Thanksgiving!

Grace got a new room for her present.  For the last few months she has been sleeping in the spare room  because she got tired of Ariel and her bunk bed.   She decided on black and white (zebra) accent colors and kumquat (peach) for the walls.  I think we are happy with how it turned out.  

For her party (black and white themed) she picked two friends to take to the big McDonalds playground after school and then have pizza, cake and a treasure hunt at our house.  

Horse Day

A couple weeks ago, Grace went to Horse Day with her Girl Scout troop.  They spent two hours at a farm nearby learning about taking care of horses and even got to ride two different horses English and Western style.

Family Pictures

We had our annual family pictures last week.  I guess we felt like doing something fun and different from the usual pose (plus you get a much bigger smile from Jake if you tell him he gets to hang upside-down for the picture), so here's what we got:

"Please can you get me a truck?"

Jake's birthday is in a few days and we are having a few of his friends over to celebrate.  In the past, when we have given Jake gifts, he reacted unexpectedly disappointed in what he got, even cried and said "that is not what I wanted."

So, I wanted to make sure we talked about good manners before his party.  I tried to explain that no matter what gift he gets, he needs to say thank you.  Here's the rest of our conversation:

Me: "so if someone gives you a doll..."
Jake interrupts:  "Mom, I don't like dolls"
Me: "it doesn't matter, if someone gives you a doll, what do you say?"
Jake thinks: "if someone gives me a doll, I say, please can you get me a truck?"
Me: laughing

Hopefully nobody gets him a doll!!

Snow!!

Nov 11th, the first snow of the season.  The kids were very excited and couldn't wait to get outside to play.  As far as I'm concerned it's a little too early for snow.  There are still lots of beautiful fall leaves on the trees.  I'm not ready for this.  I don't have the snow boots, snow suits, sleds, and all the other snow stuff out of storage!  Oh well, I guess I better get ready.

Jake's Strider

We got Jake a Strider bike (balance bike) in May.  It as a wonderful $75 purchase, even though when we first gave it to him he cried because he wanted a firetruck or a monster truck instead, he loves his Strider now.

It has no pedals and is supposed to help kids learn to ride a bike because they don't rely on training wheels to keep them up.  It took Jake about two weeks to really get the hang of it and now he's a pro.  He loves to get going really fast and lift his feet up and coast for a while.  He can also stop on a dime. When we walk to Grace's school he rides it and gets lots of second looks and comments (like, "that bike's got no pedals," and "how cute").  The only downside is he has to use his feet to brake so his shoes are worn through on the front and bottom!

Jake Strider Video: http://youtu.be/iqJvxqPNb-I

Family Hikes

One of my favorite things to do as a family is go on hikes.  We've been having some fun lately exploring the Cleveland area nature centers.  It's a great Sunday morning activity when there is not much else to do and we don't go to church.  We usually head out around 8, try a new coffee shop (if we can find one), visit a nature center and go on some of the hikes nearby.  It's been really pretty hiking in the fall.

French Creek Reservation - a nice nature center, with an awesome kids play area

Brecksville Nature Center and Deer Lick Caves - a very small nature center, but neat architecture.  We stumbled on a great, short hike to some "caves" and even managed to get a good family picture with the self-timer (one second before it clicked, Jake was whining and refusing to participate).  We also stopped at a fun playground on the way home

Halloween 2013!

2013 turned out to be a very windy, rainy Halloween night.  Nobody in our house was anxious to go outside.  Luckily Grace had gone trick-or-treating earlier in the week with her Girl Scout troop at an assisted living facility nearby.  (I don't have a picture, but she was a black cat.  Jake was a bear)
Jake got to trick or treat at his preschool Halloween party earlier in the day.  So we already had a lot of candy.  However, when the neighbors knocked on the door, the kids wanted to go out with them.  Grace stayed out about an hour and was pretty wet when she got home.  Jake only made it to the mailbox and decided to stay home with me and hand out candy.  He had fun seeing all the different costumes.  When kids came up the drive he would say "now, what have we got here"

Video of Jake helping me hand out candy. http://youtu.be/rL9py6L_JkI

Keeping Busy

We've been busy the last few weeks.

Grace had her last two soccer games.  They lost, but she played good and had fun.  We had great weather for some of the games, but for the last game it was cold and rainy.  Jake sat in the car, while I stood nearby with an umbrella (Matt was out of town).

We went on a hike with the Girl Scouts.

We are always playing with lots of cars and trucks.  I really don't know what we are going to do with all this stuff.

I've been decorating.

Matt went to his high school reunion and a guys weekend football game.

I went to Chicago with a good friend for a girls weekend.  It was a quick trip, but we had lots of fun: paint nite, interesting (scary) late night train rides, a play (it was pretty bad, but still a neat thing to do), chicago pizza, hot dogs, and a really cool boat tour.

While I was in Chicago, Matt put Grace to work refinishing our kitchen table: