Birthdays, cakes & parties!

We celebrated Ava's third birthday on Sunday, April 3rd at Gym Kyds. Gym Kyds is a pretty cool facility full of all kinds of gymnastics equipment like trampolines, climbing structures, rings, mats, balance beams...pretty much everything you need for a fun birthday party! After all her little friends (14 kids in all, including Ava!) had the run of the place for an hour, we headed up to the party room to eat. There wasn't much talking going on, so I guess the kids were hungry! Ava really liked her Buzz Lightyear cake that Joelle and I worked on. It ended up looking very cool. (Thank you again Joelle, for being so patient and helpful while sitting back and letting me decorate Ava's cake.) There wasn't really time to open her presents at the facility so packed them up into the car and opened them at home. She loved them all, and we are so thankful and blessed to have such wonderful friends and family who gave Ava such beautiful, thoughtful gifts. After Ava's party we had a little lull but then were back into party mode for Alix's 16th birthday. We had family over on the day of his birthday, April 12th, for a little BBQ, cake and ice cream. Alix seemed to really like his 'mini' party, and I think he really liked his gifts!! For Alix's cake, Joelle and I deocrated his to look like a Green Bay Packers football player (again, thank you to Joelle for her great ideas and patience). He seemed to like it a lot, taking pictures of it with his cell phone camera! Ava and all the little cousins loved being able to blow out Alix's candles (such a generous big brother/cousin!) and then eat the icing off the bottoms of the candles, too! Pretty soon, everyone headed for home and we got some relax time with the boys and Ava. Now we have Ava's actual birthday to celebrate on Friday and then nothing until EASTER! Thank goodness...! :)