AJ's Early Birthday Party, Thanksgiving Day~ November 23 and 24th 2011


AJ's birthday is on December 23rd. The last few years we have a birthday party closer to Thanksgiving for several reasons. Grammy and Papa from California have come for Thanksgiving the last few years and this gives them a chance to be at AJ's party. We also find it less hectic to plan a party in November then extra busy December. AJ loves it because we still do something fun as a family on his actual birthday so he really has 2 parties. This year AJ wanted to go to Plaza Fiesta where there is a 3 story play ground. He wanted an army theme and I made him a tank cake. I made the cake green so that when we cut it, green was inside too. AJinvited a few friends from church and a few from school.












The weather has been beautiful and daddy is off of work until the Monday after Thanksgiving!! We really took advantage of having him home.  AJ and I have been practicing throwing and catching the football and Frisbee.  AJ is great at throwing both, and progressing on the catching part.  Aaron was able to play with him and was impressed at how well he is doing. He is really growing up and becoming more athletic, which makes us happy.  Sports are great at teaching a lot of the things we want AJ to learn. Plus we love to play with him!








 Papa and Aaron are putting one of his Lego toys together that he got from his birthday. We loved lounging around Thanksgiving morning. Papa made his famous Eggs Benedict that is a family tradition Christmas morning, but we have him make it for us since he's here Thanksgiving.  After breakfast we all joined Aaron outside for some remote control race cars and to watch Aaron as he helped AJ ride his new bike we gave him for his birthday. AJ thought it was so big compared to his bike with training wheels.  He did a great job adjusting to his bike.  Grammy stood at one end of the rode and Aaron or Papa stood at the other. He would make a big loop up an down our street. He was really wobbly at first and it scared me to watch him.  It is the first "big boy toy" that could really hurt him.  I had to remind myself that when I was 5yrs old I was riding a mens ten-speed and fell into the grass to stop the bike and leaned on a big curb to get on the bike. Time to let him take some chances too.












 After bike riding we found a little lizard.  We seem to have a few that like the bushes in our front yard.  After a few minutes of encouragement from Aaron and the grandparents, AJ held the lizard and it made his day.  He wanted to keep it of course, but we just let him release and catch it a few times then let him go before we gave it a heart attack.










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