The boys are SEVEN

For the past few weeks Hyrum and I have tried desperately to convince the boys they didn't want a birthday party.  We offered to take them on a small trip, to take them to a movie, to buy them something fancy...nope, they wanted a party.  I suppose after avoiding throwing an actual birthday party for my twins the last seven years I finally decided I should just do what they want and give them a party.  In the past we have had a few family friends over for cake and ice-cream with a strict "no gifts" rule but I think the boys have been invited to enough birthday parties now they have actually caught on to the fact they have been getting a bum deal.  So, two class parties and one big combined party later, we are all still alive and our house is still standing. 

Cakes #1 and 2

I brought in cake for the boys classes today.  Emerson wanted vanilla with oreo cookies and Townsend wanted chocolate with strawberries.  It was kind of crazy to organize it all.  I had to be in Townsend's class at 1:00 for his snack time and then Emerson's class at 1:15 but I think all the kids enjoyed the cakes.

Townsend wearing his birthday hat and enjoying his snack

Emerson and his birthday hat having cake with his class

Cake #3, for the evening birthday party.  This one was half chocolate and half vanilla.  Those are supposed to be number 7's all over the cake but they are kind of sloppy...I'm not known for my craftiness:)

They played a few games (duck, duck, goose and some other relay games)

They opened some gifts...

Then we smashed a pinata to bits!  Here is Emerson getting ready to take a swing

Townsend takes his turn at whacking the pinata

I'm pretty sure the boys had a good day.  The friends that came over seemed to have a fun time and there was PLENTY of food.  We ordered 8 large pizzas and a whole sheet cake...what were we thinking?  I'm also pretty sure I don't want to do this again anytime in the near future...good thing their birthday only comes once a year!

Random Happenings

 Well, we are still here even if I have been a little slack on my blog updates.  January has been full of everyday happenings as well as some real crazy moments.  The biggest thing to happen was our basement flooded.   We woke up Friday, January 14th, ready to start packing for our trip to Frieberg.  Hyrum had a four day weekend because of the Martin Luther King holiday and we had a few fun things planned.  The boys were the first to discover the lake in the basement.  I believe they went down there to hide one of Julian's toys (they are always hiding his favorite toy.)  They came upstairs and said, "mom, we have a swimming pool in the basement!"  I thought the worst and ran down looking for a broken pipe or the sound of running water but I didn't hear or see anything out of the ordinary that would explain the 5 inches of water in my basement.  Hyrum came down and we decided it must be ground water seeping in through the basement walls and floors.  Bavaria had about 39 inches of snow in December when the average snowfall is about 8 inches.  Then January came along with warm rainy days and all the snow melted at once...not good.  Our landlady who grew up in the house we are now renting said the whole time her family lived here the basement has never flooded.  The good news is we didn't loose anything too precious other than a few framed pictures and some books.  Most of the things we could just take to the laundromat and clean up or hang outside on our front porch to dry.  Still, it ruined our whole weekend and we usually get to explore something new and fun on a four day weekend!

You really can't tell how high the water got from this picture but just look at the sides of the cardboard boxes to see how high the water rose.

 

Here is Townsend showing off the gingerbread man house he made for his classroom gingerbread village.  Yes, I know it's made out of cardboard, but it had to last the whole month at school!

Do I really need to add a caption to this cute photo?  

OK, so the second crazy thing to happen in January (gee, the month isn't even over yet and we have had two major upsets!)  Yesterday I was making Julian a very nutritious and well balanced lunch (OK, so I was opening a can of spaghettios) and I sliced my finger on the open lid of the spaghettios can.  At first I grabbed a paper towel and applied pressure (thank you Girls Camp for the first aid lessons!)  The bleeding didn't stop and so I called Hyrum at his office and told him I was on my way.  Lucky for me he was on his lunch break so I wasn't interrupting his schedule.  When I got to his office he decided the best course of action would be stitches.  Those of you who know me well know I am the biggest wimp when it comes to needles so I wasn't too happy about this but I also wanted my finger to stop bleeding.  Hyrum's very nice nurse took Julian for us (she bribed him with gummy bears!)  Hyrum had to give me about 5 injections of numbing medicine to make sure my finger was nice and numb and then he proceeded to sew me up.  I was very brave but also very nauseous and light headed when it was all over.  I am posting the G rated picture because I can't even abide looking at the stitches and I didn't want to expose anyone else to the gore.

So there you have it.  January has had some ups and downs but we are still here!

Happy 2011

Another whole week with no school? What am I supposed to do with these kids for 7 more days? To make things worse Hyrum had to work 2 whole days this week (I know, pretty crappy right?) Here's a run down of how we said goodbye to 2010.

Monday: We headed over to Mega Play, the giant indoor play area that is usually a mad house. We got there at 11:30 and left at 12:30 and we never saw ANY other kids the whole time. We had the entire play area to ourselves for an hour, it was awesome!

Julian and Townsend at Mega Play

Tuesday: We headed out to Bamberg, about an hour and a half away. We went to the Natural History museum which has a fantastic collection of birds. After the museum we walked around the city a bit and had some hot chocolate, it was a pretty good day.

Townsend and Emerson examining some of the birds on display

Townsend and some birds

Some of the Christmas decorations were still on display in the city

Mommy and Julian on the bridge in Bamberg

Wednesday: Hyrum was at work so the boys and I went to Burger King for breakfast. The boys were so excited to get the french toast sticks!

Thursday: We went to Weiden in the morning and Hyrum switched out a sweater I bought him for Christmas for a larger size. We walked around briefly in Weiden but it was super chilly so we didn't stay out long. Thursday evening we went to our friends, the Platt's, for some yummy pizza and popcorn as well as some fun games. The boys LOVED running around their house with their 6 year old son Cael. They especially liked that Cael had a slide to get off his bed!

Friday: We did a bit of grocery shopping and got the boys hair cut. That evening the Platt's came to our house for movies (the kids watched Scooby Doo) and for games (we played Ticket To Ride and Quibbler...lots of fun!) At around 10:30 PM we decided it was late enough for the kids to be up and we decided to torch our Christmas tree to bring in the New Year...see video clip at the end of this post. I really like how you can see the sparks going up into the air as the snow is coming down.

Saturday: We headed to Nuremberg to visit the German History museum. There is A LOT to see in this museum and our boys get tired after about an hour in a museum so we had to be pretty picky as to what we saw. We saw the worlds oldest globe, so old that America was not on it yet! We saw some paintings by Albrecht Durer as well as Rembrandt. The museum itself is housed in a pretty cool building so it was just fun walking around. After the museum we grabbed some lunch and headed over to the Roxy theater, one of the few theaters near us that plays English language movies. The boys and I watched Tangled while Daddy took Julian for a walk. We tried to sit in the theater with Julian but he is just too young and wiggly at this age to sit for long.

Mommy and the boys at the museum

Townsend and Emerson in front of the very old globe

Our family in front of an exhibit showing how a hunting lodge would be furnished back in the day.

We survived another week with no school but I have to admit I am really happy school starts again tomorrow:)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!