Birthdays and Zoo

Jonas turned 3 and since we were in the wake of having his older sister's birthdays he knew the drill.  He got to pick out a special cereal and requested breakfast in bed.  We were testing him and I told him "Ok, Jonas, Time to do your chore!" to which he hesitantly shook his head.  I responded "Just kidding! Birthday boys don't have to do chores, do they?"  He totally had the hang of it by mid-morning.
He shared some fruit kabobs and chocolate dipped pretzels with his nursery friends at church and then had his friend Max and his family over for some cake and ice cream that afternoon after his special birthday dinner of chicken nuggets and Mac & Cheese (His favs).  He wanted a superhero cake so I chose the easiest one to decorate :)  Jonas lucked out with a garage sale find of a black and decker tool table as his big gift.  He wore down the drill battery within 3 days drilling everything in sight.  He was so excited he had one that looked just like Dad's!

Jonas with his super chocolate batman cake

With our ticket system the kids have decided they pretty much want to save up for the "dates" with mom and Dad. If they want to spend more than a few dollars on their date they have to bring their own birthday money so for Jonas's date the other night he wanted to go to Target.  After a lot of deliberation they decided on some Halloween clearance costumes that were a few dollars each.  He was very excited to say the least...When his friend came over the next day for a playdate he was so excited that both the super hero costumes would be used at the same time!

Ironman Jonas

Captain America

Breakfast in bed

 The next day we pulled the kids out of school to go to the Zoo as a family to celebrate Jonas and Emma's combined birthdays.  The school doesn't have much funding for field trips so I take the initiative when I can to take them on fun educational adventures :)  Plus, the only time we could use the library pass (to get 1 adult and 2 kids in for free as well as parking) was on a weekday.  It was a really nice day to go (not only due to the beautiful weather) but because it was hardly crowded at all.  We didn't get to see some key animals like the lions and elephants very well because they were either far away or taking naps or both, but we really liked the zebras and giraffes and chimps and bats. Emma was getting done with her stroller about the time we hit the giraffes so we pulled her out and let her stand on her own near the short fence.  Shortly after that one of the big male giraffes looked right at us and started walking right toward us.  Emma immediately burst into tears and screamed out of fright.  Poor thing! It was so cool to see the giraffes so close up though.  Jonas also had a fright when we were in the petting zoo with the goats and he was petting a short one near him. When he turned around there was a huge goat looking him straight in the eye.  I tried to calm him down saying "Wow! What a big dude, do you want to pet him?" so we kind of laughed and the rest of the day he kept talking about "Big Dude." 

4 kids looking at zebras

4 kids riding on the tortoise at the playground

Jared and Jonas by Camels

Petting Goats

Giraffe staring us down

Family by giraffes

Tortoise Jocelyn

Lilly on the frog

Super Dad at the Zoo

In the middle of there we celebrated Halloween and then Emma's birthday at the end of the week. It was so fun to have my parents here to celebrate with us.  It's hard to believe my baby is one but she is walking around like she owns the place and is really happy having that mobility so I guess I should get used to it.  We also weaned last week in honor of her birthday since she was nursing me dry.  We have her doctor's appt. next week so I'm anxious to know how much weight she has gained. The best birthday present she got (since my parents were in town to stay with her while I was running errands and doing school drop off/pick up) was that she had both of her naps in her OWN CRIB and she was able to sleep until she woke up ON HER OWN!!  Being a fourth child she doesn't get that luxury very often since we are usually on the go.  She did a great job eating her smash cake and we were so sugared out by the end of the week nobody even asked for a piece of cake after we sang happy birthday and unwrapped gifts.  We just threw it in the trash the next morning.  Emma got some duplo legos for her main gift and she loved them!  

Emma with Legos

Birthday girl checking out her cake (mostly just avoiding the camera, but whatever)

Emma eating her smash cake

We loaned this riding zebra toy to some friends who had kids at good ages for this and they recently returned it.  Emma is loving it (as are all the kids). You'd think they'd received it for the first time.