Turning four is kind of a big deal

Such a big deal that I've almost lost count of how many different times Alder got to celebrate his birthday. He got to celebrate at school and had a fun party with his friends. He was supposed to have soccer on the day of his actual birthday but it was rained out. Luckily his buddy Sam invited him over to play at the last minute and the cupcakes we were going to share at soccer didn't go to waste (though there were a few extras, which made a nice complement to coffee the next morning). Adler had a great birthday with one of his best friends and especially enjoyed some of Sam's toy tools, including his safety goggles.

We also did a birthday dinner with all the grandparents at White Fence Farm, which is always fun.

Soccer

Adler is doing soccer this fall and some of his buddies from his class last year, including Sam, are doing it with him. I'm not sure anyone in this family has a future in the sport but Adler's doing better with it than his brother, who's soccer career is likely already over.

Back to the Home Depot

Just like his brother, Adler had his birthday party this year at Home Depot. I have to admit it's a pretty nice venue for a kid's party, if the kids are into building or constitution at all.  And it seems like most are. Home Depot provides a room and little building kits for each of the kids as well as someone to walk the kids though assembling the kit (though parent assistance is still needed). And they provide all that for free, which is kind of nice. So you just need to show up with a cake and some snacks and drinks. And clean up is relatively easy. It doesn't take all the stress out of the birthday party experience but it's a pretty good way to go and the kids really seem to really enjoy it.

Adler was very serious about putting the right amount of sprinkles in just the right places on his cake. This was the second cake that Kari baked that day but that's a different story.

Heading out to the Home Depot.

Adler chose to make toolboxes at his party. We got there a bit early to set up and it was a little hard to wait to get started.

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail (paraphrasing Maslow's law of the instrument, of course).

I guess if you get a bunch of young kids together in a little room and give each of them a hammer, at least a few tears are kind of inevitable. 

I'm not sure why but Adler was very worried that the other kids would blow out the candles. Maybe because he and LT had recently insisted on blowing out the candles on Baba's birthday cake. Everything turned out okay with the candles though.

Another nice thing is being able to use the big Home Depot shopping carts to help bring things in and out from the party. The boys wanted to carry their own newly constructed and painted tool boxes though.

Footosporin and gasoline

There is no way I can write this and make you all cry from laughter the way Brian and I did when we first heard these words from Adler, but we needed to record this to remember.  Driving home from the doctor today Adler repeated over and over that he needed "footosporin".  I had no idea what he was talking about, but he was intent that he needed it to put on his cut on his foot.  I finally asked him and he said "Its like neosporin, but instead of it being for your knee, its for your foot!"  He then proceeded to tell me all about gasoline and how if you put gasoline on your body, it won't wash off in the shower.  Gasoline=vasoline.

A hike with a llama

 A friend of ours has a llama up in Evergreen.  For years, she has been asking me when I could bring the boys up to take the llama for a hike.  We finally found a time that worked for all of us.  We got out of the car and immediately the boys found a pile of dirt to dig in.  They had no interest in the llama.  They didn't want to pet it, walk it, nothing!

 Brian and I took turns walking the llama on a little hike.  Honey Bear is his name and he was very well behaved.

 We stopped a lot on the hike to gather rocks.

 And found a lot of mica.

But mostly played on this huge mound of dirt.

Happy

Two tickets to the truck show

Over the weekend a friend's school had a fundraiser where they brought in trucks and construction equipment of all kinds. As you can probably guess, it was a hit. 

4!

I was working in my basement home office today when Adler bounded in with a big grin on his face. They'd made this birthday crown for him at school and he was apparently pretty excited about it.

Golfing

The boys and I went to the driving range at City Park last weekend. I managed to get a couple short videos of them hitting the ball, which was kind of a challenge because I had to keep Adler from running out on the range to pick up his balls. I don't think the next Tiger Woods is going to come out of this family but I feel like LT has a pretty nice natural swing. Adler's swing is, well, a little more unique. Later that day LT drew me a very sweet picture of the two of us hitting balls off of tees, which is now hanging in my office.

the second child goes to school

Today was Adler's first day of preschool (this year). I'm out of town for work (in Vancouver just a few weeks after going to Germany) so I wasn't around to take the obligatory sentimental first day of school photo like I did with Landon. But the day didn't pass without some notice of the milestone. Kari posted the picture above and said, "he was so excited (new for Adler) he had his backpack on before his clothes." And knowing I was going to be gone, I did try and get a few photos of Adler over the last few days to post today as a poor substitute for not really being there today.

Like this one where he seems to be mocking and/or provoking me.

And a nice one of the boys together. Although Adler's smile nowadays coincides with squinting his eyes. 

Apparently, just like last year, this was a good time for some little guy yoga. 

 Just being goofs.

Explaining some of finer points of Bob the Builder to me.

Just for good measure, a couple more from Landon's first day last week.