Celebrating Drew's Birthday

Yesterday we celebrated Drew's birthday with Mike's family.  It was a great time, and very low stress, which is what I like.  

Zach and Drew started the day off by snuggling on the couch.


During Drew's nap, Mike and Zach  went to pick up the meat/cheese tray, and I got all the food set up.  Having just Mike's family was nice for many reasons, one being that we were able to use all of our own dishes rather than getting paper plates and such.

The family all arrived right on time, and enjoyed catching up with each other.  

Drew got to enjoy the balloons Zach picked out for him at the grocery store.

Then we all sat down for lunch.  Another nice thing about the party being so small- we could all fit around the kitchen table!  Ok, Mike stood, but we could mostly all fit around one table.

Drew practiced his silly face while he waited for his lunch to be served.  We were treated to many silly faces yesterday, and they just keep on coming!  I love this look- it makes me laugh every single time.  If I am ever mad at Drew and he gives me this face, I know I'll snap right out of it.  

After lunch we had cake.  I made a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting.  A big thanks goes out to my friend Kristi for her tips on how to make the cake more moist and some other tips she gave me.  It's obvious the cake was made by an amateur, but that's ok with me.  I thought it tasted pretty good.

Drew seemed to like it, too!

He really didn't do too bad of a job of getting it all over himself.  There was some on his face, and some in his hair, but it could have been worse.

After the cake, we went to the living room to open presents.  First, Zach got some more snuggling in, but this time with Aunt Katherine.  We were so happy she came home from college to celebrate with us!

Drew got a lot of great presents that he has been enjoying very much today.  Zach has been enjoying Drew's new presents, too.  I'd say the two favorites so far are the little basketball hoop thing (Drew loves putting balls through things, so this is a big hit) and the car.

The great thing about this little car is that Zach can push Drew in it, too, and they both have fun.  And for as big as it is, it's surprisingly easy to steer.

It was a great day and a great party.  Thank you to all of Mike's family for coming to celebrate with us.  

Here are just a couple of fun pictures of "the kids," as Mike's dad would say.  

I think the last time we had a picture taken of Mike, Katherine, and me was about 7 years ago or so.  That picture is in our dining room right now, and the one below will go in the dining room too, on our new picture wall.  I think it's safe to say that Katherine has changed the most in the last 7 years, since she was just 12 then!  She's still cute as a button, though, I think.