Andy's Birthday Parties

We rushed back from camping so we could have Andy's friend party on his actual birthday.  He was SO EXCITED!  I let him pick everything out...his (weird) robot invitations, which he loved delivering to every guest.  He picked out funfetti cupcakes with orange frosting.  And cotton candy ice cream cones, of course.  He had about a dozen friends over (craziness!) to run in the sprinklers and play on our slip 'n slide.  Andy loved every second of it, so I'd call it a success.  

He could hardly wait for his friends to come.  Can you tell? His job was to put a party hat on everyone.  

We played a rousing game of duck, duck, goose while we waited for more guests to arrive. 

4 is THE cutest age.  This is the friends playing hide and seek.  They loved to hide in large groups. :)

 We had a family party a week later with Andy's grandparents, aunts, uncles, and G.G. (Cameron's grandma.)  We had "cheese han-ga-burs" (Andy's favorite), and of course, cake and ice cream.  He was spoiled to death with tons of fun presents.  He's one loved kid!

The birthday hat made a reappearance. :)

Max and Jordon have the sweetest bond.

Monster feet!

G.G. gave Andy this biking jersey, and we're all obsessed!  She knows how big into biking my family is, so it's perfect.  Andy has to go put it on now every time he's going to ride his bike. :)  

Birthday boy with his four candles.

I think he was a little confused, basically having three birthday celebrations so close together.  He's still asking when his birthday is, like it's going to be next week or something.  He's officially a fan of birthdays! 

Birthday Camping

We went camping for a night in June with my family up Big Cottonwood Canyon.  We had so much fun!  It's the first time the four of us have all camped together in a tent, and it went pretty well.  Max was up for a couple hours in the middle of the night, but overall did great.  It ended up being Andy's birthday during the camping trip, so it turned into a little birthday celebration.  He's been begging to go camping for months, so it was basically his dream weekend.  (Other than when he lost a round of kick the can.) He soaked in every minute of birthday attention and had the time of his life!  He opened his presents from us up there (a new sleeping bag and some Leap Frog DVDs) and my sisters brought up some fun presents too...a ring pop, skittles, bubbles.  He was just as excited about those as any big presents! :) We can't wait to go again! There's nothing better than sitting around a campfire with family.

"A sleeping bag!!! For my birthday!!!"

"Best weekend ever!"

Max loved throwing rocks in the river.

We surprised Andy and started singing happy birthday while bringing him over peach cobbler with a candle.  He was beaming.

Campfire family selfie! (Max was asleep in the tent.)

"A RING POP!!!!!"  (For some reason, he's been asking for one for months. He'd never had one, so I'm not sure why he got the idea in his head?)

Andy arranged all the chairs for us.

A peek into our tent.

Sweet, sweet Max.  Too cute in his chair.

Easter

We had a two-part Easter this year.  Since Cameron and I were out-of-town Easter weekend, the Easter Bunny was kind enough to visit us the week before.  We did an egg "hunt" at Mueller Park Jr. High, dyed our Easter eggs, and the Easter Bunny visited Sunday morning.  He didn't bring much candy for the boys, but seemed more into educational toys.  But strangely, he brought Cameron and I all the good candy. 

Andy got it into his head that he wanted an "Easter kite" from the Easter Bunny.  Luckily, the Easter Bunny pulled through.  Notice Max's measuring cups.  He loves those things for some strange reason.   

We took the Easter Kite out for a spin.

 The boys got to celebrate Easter again with Cameron's parents, which included an egg hunt at Great Grandma and Grandpa Baker's house.

Max and his buddy Ethan.

The boys finally got to wear their Easter Sunday clothes later in April.  Cutest picture ever. 

April & May

April and May were full of fun.  

• These two started playing together more.  And are they cute or what?!

• Our church time this year has been slowly killing us.  We go from 1:00-4:00, with sacrament meeting last.  The mornings feel long, so we took a beautiful spring walk in Temple Square one morning.  

•  Who wouldn't guessed the first snowman of the season we'd build would be in April?! We had a massive snowstorm, so Andy and Cameron took advantage.  Andy loved building his snowman and loved watching him slowly melt even more.  "Look mom! His head fell off!" 

•  I organized a piano festival (Applause Piano Festival) in our area at the end of April.  I was so happy with how it turned out and had so much fun working on it! 

•  We took a fun Joy School field-trip to Wheeler Farm.  

I think this picture about sums up Andy's personality.

I love watching Andy and his buddies chat.

•  I helped throw a baby shower for my cute mission companion, Emily. 

•  Mother's Day was wonderful.  It was busy with lots of family visits, but Cameron made me feel so loved and appreciated.  How did I get so lucky to get these two boys?! 

•  I ran in the very wet Ogden Marathon!  It was all very last minute; I bought someone's bib from them the day before.  Considering that it poured rain the entire time, I still had fun and enjoyed myself.  Until I stopped running; then I was freezing.  

•  Max started nursery! He did so well the first couple times!  No tears at all.  Now he's a bit more hesitant for some reason.  P.S. This picture melts my heart.  

•  Joy School ended.  We had such a fun first year!  Andy loves his school buddies (Jacob, Elena, Jana, Savannah, and Olivia), and he'll miss having school with them.  

•  Andy had a great soccer season! There were many, many rained out games, but it was still a fun season.  Andy even made a few goals!  Gooooo Purple Monsters!

•  Memorial Day was so fun!  We had a fun breakfast with my family, played kickball with them too, I got to go shopping (without kids!), and then we finished the day off with a hike, just the four of us.  And Max fell in love with throwing rocks in the river. 

•  I love that I get to spend my days with these wonderful boys.  They make my life so sweet.  

•  We got to go to Cameron's cousin Garrett's wedding in Fillmore.  It was so fun to spend time with Cameron's family and the Curtos.  Any was the entertainment at the reception; he proved to be quite the charmer, asking girls (young and old) to dance, even telling one college-age girl how pretty her hair is. :)