Crosby is ONE

Our cute baby turned ONE a few weeks ago. What can I say about this unexpected joy that we have in our life?



Okay, first let me tell you about the day! We took the boys to a kangaroo farm and got to see a ton of awesome animals and have a lot of interactions with them. It was a really cool experience.



The big boys got most of the action that day since Crosby was in the carrier, but he did LOVE looking at the animals and got to touch a kangaroo and a mule.



After lunch and nap we took the kids to Build-A-Bear, which is a tradition for us on each first birthday. The kids all still have their animals from when they turned one. Crosby chose the "Thin Mint Bear" which was pretty ridiculous, but it was the only one he got excited about.





Then we had dinner and cake and called it a day! It was SO much fun celebrating as a family of 5.





Crosby is the funniest little guy. He's energetic and stubborn and determined. He scoots along with one hand a leg all day long, opening cabinets, pulling out toys and snacks and racing to get to splash in the dog water. He LOVES to be around his brothers and isn't intimidated by them in any way. He holds his own. He's pulling himself up more and more, but I do think he'll be our latest walker and predict he'll start around 16 months. He's our strongest communicator for this age. He says, "dada, mama, ni-ni (night night), ball, uh-oh, and whoa" he signs for "more" and "all done" but mostly just grunts and stares and points until we cave and give him more or clean him up :) Sadly, he is NOT a smuggler, but he does give the world's best kisses. He loves animals, including his stuffed animals. He showers them with more affection than any human. He's about 21 pounds now and is the tiniest of our children for his age. His heart has remained unchanged since birth which is great for us! We get to just keep waiting to do anything more about it, and for now, I'll take that!

I never pictured my life with three boys, and Crosby was nowhere in our plans, but I'm SO freaking happy that life doesn't usually go according to my plans. Crosby is a gift to our family and we all love him SO SO SO much!



Happiest of birthdays to you, my sweet boy.

Maxton is FIVE.

I mean, really. Could we just SLOW things down a little bit here? My oldest guy turned FIVE last week. FIVE. FIVE. Are the caps making you realize how dramatic that is? He's old. He's officially crossed over into the land of kid. One more year until Kindergarten and then he's basically graduating high school and leaving me forever. I can't handle it, guys. It's too much, too fast.

Okay, meltdown over (for now). We decided to do 5 up right and take the fam to Disneyland. Disneyland is up there with boots and sweaters in the fall and Christmas trees with twinkly lights and banana splits with REAL hot fudge. It's one of the best places in the world to me. I was giddy, like a, well, 5 year old over going there and witnessing my kids experience it was like heaven. I told Ritchie I was going to feel depressed after our trip because I was SO looking forward to it and it would be all over, but I'm not. I'm still remembering it and loving our memories.

Anyway! That's another blog post. Here's how we celebrated Max sprinkled in with some fun Max facts:



We started off with pizza (pepperoni with no cheese please for this 5 year old) and a "spicable me minion cake" with his Papa and Mimi and Uncle Andrew and Rusty.  This was the best we could do on that one....






Max has been obsessed with Despicable Me (both 1 and 2) and everything that goes along with it. He speaks minion, he owns a fart blaster (thanks, Gillettes!) and he's constantly quoting the movies.





His favorite gifts were anything "shooter" related, legos and money (with which he bought more "shooters" and more legos). Smart child (on the money part... the shooter thing is also a whole other blog post)



On his actual birthday we were in Disneyland! We did a character breakfast and enjoyed his favorite rides which were the Haunted Mansion, Toy Story Mania and Buzz's Astro Blasters.







My fantastic friend Kirstie joined us with her two sons. Roman is almost 5 and he and Max get along swimmingly.





Max is a creature of habit. He loves oatmeal with honey and cinnamon and peanut butter toast with honey and cinnamon as well. He despises clothing that is at all fancy or buttons or is a puffy vest. T-shirts and comfy pants for this kid. He's a negotiator and a talker (He gets that from Ritchie... obvs) and sometimes I understand why my parents used to ask me if my jaw hurt when I was his age. Kid can TALK. He's competitive and loyal and prefers a few close friends over lots of people. He's still not independent whatsoever. He'd rather have you play right along side of him then alone, any day.

Max is SO CLOSE to reading. He can count to 100 (+) and do a plethora of coloring/cutting/gluing activities. He likes it when we do our "school" together. I think he just likes being together, but I'm hoping that this will all translate well in Kindergarten next year.

He loves playing games on the iPhone and watching movies, but also builds legos like it's going out of style and plays many different variations of "running games". Imagine him running in a circle and you get the game.

He hates most food but likes most people. He can make me melt and make me crazy all within minutes. I couldn't love him more. I think he's smart and funny and sweet and hopeful. I love his wit and determination and smile. When he hugs you or says he loves you, it's because he means it whole heartedly because he's not overly affectionate usually. It's something special when he loves on you. I soak it up.






Max, buddy, I know you're all in a hurry to grow up, but maybe you could slow it down just a little bit? We'd all appreciate that....

Bennett Turns 3!

Little Mr. Ben. A whole 3 years ago I was snuggling my chubby second baby. He has grown so quickly. Too quickly. He still requires too little sleep for his mama's liking. He's up with sun with lots of energy everyday. He has an intense love of television and snacks and things that go. Right before he turned 3 he decided he wanted a Hulk birthday cake (it was his only request) and so we ran with it and did a Hulk themed celebration for our special 3 year old.

We started out with a family celebration at Chuck-E-Cheese. The kids had SO much fun there, it was sort of unbelievable. They've been asking to go back EVERY day since.








We stopped for cupcakes on the way there (we knew we'd have a cake at his party on the weekend, so we wanted something easier for our small celebration) and the choice was froggies or cookie monster. Ben told me he wanted cookie monster so I got 4 of them. THE WHOLE WAY to Chuck-E-Cheese he cried and cried because I did not get the frogs. Ahh, 3 year olds. It was a true grand entrance into this territory of being 3. Tumultous? Yes. Adorable and loving? Absolutely!




He loved his hulk costume and hulk smash fists.









Even Crosby enjoyed Chuck-E-Cheese!



Over the weekend of B's birthday, my mom was in town and we, along with the Gillette's, went bowling. Bennett was sort of iffy about bowling (but he was sort of iffy about anything) so he was in a bit of a bad mood. It was a bummer, but I think overall he had a good time. If you ask him about it, he'll say he loved it!







The kids scored just as well if not better than the adults thanks to this handy little ball guide gadget.










We're thrilled to be able to celebrate with our great friends this year!! It's a first of many :)






My new favorite family shot! It's SO hard to get 5 people to look semi happy and decent. Score!




These kids... I love them all. But, this photo is PROOF that Crosby looks like Ben (haha!!)


His Hulk cake! Thank goodness 3 year olds don't care what their cakes look like! Box cake for the win!


Oh, Bennett. Your whole family loves you SO much. You're fun and loving and a great mix of sweet and spunk. Watching you grow is one of my greatest joys. I love you!

Maxton's Rockin' Fourth Birthday Party

My Max turns 4 on Tuesday and guitars and music are amongst his favorite things in the whole universe. His ONE request for his birthday party was "lots of big purple guitars" So, naturally, we decided to have a rock star party decked in purple and with lots of big guitars. Here's a peek:
































This one cracks me up. My mom got him the keyboard and it came with headphones (yes!) and he is SO serious when he has them on. Playing music is clearly serious business.


HAPPY BIRTHDAY to our sweetest little guy.

P.S. It looks like nobody was at our party. It was actually quite a full house (almost 30 in our small townhome! We pretended it was a crowded backstage) but I don't know most of his classmates and their families well enough to post a bunch of pictures of them. So, that's that. Why I felt I had to explain that, I'm not sure. I guess because it looks like we just partied with just the 4 of us - haha!