Birthday Bash

Ivan is really into cars, trucks, and especially big construction vehicles. Driving on the freeway, although a nightmare for me with all the construction, is a dream come true for him. From the backseat he shouts his excitement, "Mom, it's a CRANE!!!" or, "Cement Truck, Mom! Cement truck!" So, Aaron and I decided that making him a dump truck cake would be just the ticket. We were right. He was really excited about it. The pictures show the almost finished version, I added some black piping to make the windows and headlights more defined, and to put some squares on the bed of the truck. Then I used green (Ivan's favorite color) to write Ivan on the side of the bed, and to put little 2s on each of the wheels. We used the extra cake and crumpled it up and put it in the back for dirt. Unplanned, but definitely a good addition, during the middle of the night, the back part of the bed slipped off, and the dirt kind of rolled out, but it made it look like the truck was dumping. It was cool.

During the day, Uncle Richard came by to drop off a present for Ivan. A Nerf basketball hoop that hooks on the back of our kitchen chairs. The boys had a great time with this, and it allowed me to get the house clean and ready for our dinner guests.  Look at Ivan's form, he's got the beginnings of a great basketball player. :)

 We invited Ryan and Melissa (Aaron's brother and sister-in-law) over for dinner. We had spaghetti, which is Ivan's favorite. After dinner we started to open presents. The first present Ivan opened was from Grandma and Grandpa Swan. Once he got it open, he held it up above his head and said, "A book!" really excitedly, and didn't want to open anymore presents until we read the book to him. The boys have been in story deprivation, since I've packed all but five of their books, so they were very excited to hear a new one.

Maybe I'm silly, but I have my kids get each other presents. Usually just something little from the dollar store, but I like them to feel like they are apart of the giving too. Adelia got Ivan a big bouncy ball that the size of a softball, and clear, with sparkles in it, that lights up when you bounce it. And Lincoln got Ivan a plastic tool belt full of tools, and a construction hat that came with it.

Then Ivan opened his presents from Ryan and Melissa. They got him a big blue ball, a Styrofoam army airplane, and a thing of bubble solution with a giant bubble wand. While Ivan was opening those, his little neighborhood friends started to arrive. Carson from next door gave him a matchbox car Space Shuttle. Ivan opened it and said, "A ROCKET!!" and had to have it taken out of the plastic immediately. Kaitlyn from a couple doors down gave Ivan a lobster bath toy that winds up and shakes it's tail to swim across the water. All of the kids were fascinated with this one. We had a hard time convincing our kids that it was a lobster, not a crab. And Nathan, Kaitlyn's older brother, gave Ivan a fishing pole with little fish that you can hook. Even though the kids begged, we decided no to open that once, since there were a lot of people around, and it had kind of a lot of pieces.

Last Ivan opened his present from Aaron and I. A BIG Tonka dump truck. And trust me we looked just about everywhere for this thing. I really wanted him to have it, since we have a sand box at our new place, plus I just think every little boy needs a dump truck, and Ivan loves this kind of things anyways. The dump truck was a success. Even Adelia liked it.

After that we sang to Ivan and let him blow out his "candles" (we forgot to buy candles, so we had to use matches instead, but it worked). I was determined to let Ivan blow out his own candles this year (Lincoln blew them out for him last year), so I occupied myself solely with keeping Lincoln away from the cake. Ryan was kind enough to take a picture for me. It took Ivan about 5 tries, but he got both candles out all by himself.

Ivan also decided that he wanted to have his cake and eat it too...but not with his fork! He used his pliers. Oh well, it's his birthday, I guess he can eat his cake however he wants. :)

After that all the friends left. Ryan and Melissa took Ivan and Lincoln outside to make big bubbles. They had a blast. And even now, two days later, if I ask him, "Ivan, what did you get for your birthday?" he looks at me and says excitedly, "Bubbles!!" So, I think they were a hit.

And actually, I think everything was a hit. There doesn't seem to be a toy that he likes more than another, he seems to be playing with them all equally. But that could just be because my children are also suffering from toy deprivation, since I packed all the toys up a week ago. But really, Ivan and Lincoln will sit down and play with the tools, then they'll take turns pushing each other in the dump truck, or fishing, and then at bed time Ivan wants to bring his ball from Adelia to sleep with him. So I think we did really well with the gifts this year. Way to go us.

We'll also be having some more birthday fun in the near future. Saturday we're taking the kids to the Discovery Gateway Children's Museum in Salt Lake. And then sometime early next week my mom will probably come down to see Ivan and give him the presents from her and Kerry, since they were in St. George at Tanner's baseball tournament this weekend. The fun never stops when there's a birthday around here. :)

Happy Birthday Ivan. We love you and hope you had a wonderful day!