glow, baby, glow!

wayyy back in november, on a night JUST as cold as tonite, we celebrated caroline's 6th birthday with a glow-in-the-dark party in our backyard! when this idea hit us, i knew it would be a fun one. but i also knew that partying in the dark = sacrificing great pictures. so i must warn you... this post isn't full of cute kids doing cute birthday party things. you may see a blur of a child here and there in a picture, but i mostly took pictures of adults standing still. with icicles on their noses.

the upside to a glow-in-the-dark party is that it requires very little decorating. the downside to a glow-in-the-dark party is that there is not much you can do to prepare ahead of time! in other words, if you happen to show up 15 minutes early to our glow-in-the-dark party, you will be tasked to help us crack hundreds of glow bracelets to get them glowing!


when our family and friends arrived, they all grabbed a handful of glow sticks and started to party.




we had a glow-in-the-dark ring toss set up, as well as a few glowing balls to toss around.


i love the pictures with all the glowing colors blurring everywhere!

brian also rigged up some floating glow hoops in the backyard...


ok, just kidding. they weren't really floating. but it was pretty cool to see the glowing circles in the middle of the yard. :) brian was awfully proud of his creation! (if you are curious, the circles are white pex tubing with glow bracelets inside. they fit perfectly! and the stand is a sprinkler head tee on a tall sprinkler head riser.)


i gathered everybody around and gave the directions for our game. i recruited most of the adults to play as well. greg and james look SO excited to play!


we divided into 3 teams and lined up in front of the glow hoops. the goal was for each team member to throw the ball through the hoop as fast as possible. the team to finish first was the winner!


ready, set, GLOW! this picture of all the balls flying through the hoops (or elsewhere!) cracks me up!


we fed everybody a gourmet dinner of hot dogs, chips, and hot chocolate.


the hot chocolate helped us forget about how cold it was outside!


as i said earlier, i didn't get many pictures of caroline's friends because they were all running around in the dark most of the time! but our friends were a little more cooperative.




oh, there's a kid! we love cousin karina and aunt kristie!!!


and these big kids are just awesome! so glad they came to party with us!




there were several recipes for glow-in-the-dark icing, but they didn't sound like they were worth the trouble... so my cake-makin' mom got a break this time around. :) caroline requested chocolate cupcakes with oreos sprinkled on the top, so we obliged and stuck a glow wand (that didn't glow so much) on the top.


here is my 6-year-old girl with her cake...


where there is cake, there are children!


caroline quickly opened presents before everyone froze...


auntie kim, the awesome hairdresser, gave caroline her own little stylist chair for her dolls!


after presents, everybody went home to thaw out. the party favors were a glow-in-the-dark bead necklace & bracelet set for the girls & glowing snakes for the boys (thank you, after halloween clearance at target!). didn't get a picture of them, unfortunately. we also completely forgot to take a family picture. this whole party-in-the-dark thing really threw me off, didn't it?!?!

we had glow much fun celebrating our dear caroline, who continually glows with enthusiasm and love for others. happy bloggy birthday a few months late, sweet caroline! :)

birthday mornings

i recently took a quick online personality typology quiz for fun, and the result was no surprise. but when i clicked on the description, i had to laugh when the paragraph began with "guardian of birthdays, holidays and celebrations..." yeah, i'd say that's me.


when i began this thing called motherhood, i set out to create special traditions for my kiddos. while i may not have succeeded with other attempts, i love that at least one tradition has stuck. if you have been a follower of this blog for the long haul, you will probably already know what our children each wake up to on the morning of their birthday. it has been the same since ethan turned 3, and i pray it will be the same when hallie is a teenager!

we sneak into the birthday kid's room and wake them up by singing "happy birthday"... except usually these days, they are awake before mommy & daddy. but they still stay in their bed and wait for us to come in singing. :)


then they blow out the candle on their birthday muffin before their feet ever hit the floor.


and mommy's heart is already recording every little minute...


the birthday kid then comes running down the hall...


to see what is waiting for them on the dining room table.


then it is time for opening presents! i love watching them take joy in unwrapping even the smallest gift...



and then it is time for the big one!



for amelia's birthday, the big one was a voice changing boom box. yes, we bought something to amplify her voice. (brian thought i was absolutely crazy when i first suggested it!) this little girl loves to sing, always has, and i pray, always will. on christmas day at nana's house, she carried around this elf microphone thing all. day. long. so when i found this boom box that connects to my ipod, i knew it was the perfect gift for amelia. instead of just jamming out to the same 4 (annoying) snippets of songs over and over and over, amelia and gang can sing chris tomlin and seeds family worship at the top of their lungs. to the glory of God. like a chipmunk. or in a deep man voice.


and i forgot there's also an applause button and a spanish setting. it's a hit.

then we had one more surprise up our sleeves.


her very own ipod!


now before you go all crazy on me, saying, "you bought your 4 year old an ipod?!" no, we did not. a few weeks earlier, i posted on facebook that i was looking for a very very (VERY!) cheap used ipod, and within 5 minutes, a sweet friend commented that she had one we could have. for free. she said it was scratched up a little, but um, i don't think amelia cares. do you? she's been making ipods out of playdoh since she was two. now she actually has one that doesn't look like a purple waffle!

so after all the presents are opened, mommy subjects the excited birthday kid to a little photo shoot with all the presents. i gave birth to them... i have just a tad bit of influence here.


i love, love, love how amelia had trouble getting all her fingers up to make "4" with her hand!


my favorite part of the birthday morning is re-lighting the candle on the birthday muffin again and singing "happy birthday" again.


'cause you really can't sing happy birthday too many times in one day, can you!?


and then we just soak in the birthday-ness of the morning.



i. love. birthdays.

so now let's rewind two months earlier and do the same thing for caroline! her birthday comes right before the rush of thanksgiving and christmas... plus add in our family vacation and my week with the flu this year... and wow, her birthday just falls through the ten little cracks on this blog.

and if i let her birthday fall through the cracks, i will really hear about it in a few years. (won't i, mom??) don't worry, we'll speed it up a little since you all know how this works...









aaaand the big one...







this is what caroline thinks about falling through the blog cracks...


nope. ain't gonna happen.


i sure do love this 6 year old! i can't believe how much she has already changed since we took these pictures in november!


we had a super fun time celebrating her birthday waaaaay before thanksgiving. hopefully i can share it here before easter!! in the meantime, hope you had a happy valentine's day!