Happy Birthday Caleb!

Happy 3rd birthday to our little guy. Sometimes I'm amazed at how funny you are, or how cute and cuddly you can be, or at what you say when I'm thinking that I don't know what you're saying. Other times I'm amazed at how loud your voice is or how picky you can be or how you copy every bad habit that your sister copied from me. But, mostly, I'm just amazed at how fast these three years have passed and how quickly my baby turned into a little boy. Love you!

Just born: 2/28/10

1st Birthday Party: 2/27/11

2 years old: 2/28/12

3rd Birthday: 2/28/13

The party

Caleb's birthday is this coming Thursday, so we attempted to have a of party for him today. With school vacation and a snow storm, most of our guest list was unable to make it. Grandma and Grandpa were the heroes of the day and drove through the snow on nasty roads to share the day with us. I made pizza and cupcakes and the kids had a great time!

Pirate hat pose!

Balloons!

Grandma in the pirate hat and patch!

Riley's picture gift to Caleb. She's explaining how birthday's go. First you put a cake in the oven. Then Grandma and Grandpa come with balloons. Then the cake comes out of the oven.

Riley's present to Caleb.

Present sent from Nana and Grampy.

Present from Grandma and Grandpa. I think this was, "Peter Pan Diamond Edition!" in Riley's words.

When it's just Grandma and Grandpa, you definitely get to have two cupcakes!

Today on the pond

Clear skies after snow.

We've found Nemo...

Blizzard Nemo came starting yesterday (and is acutally still going), and while other areas of New England got a lot more snow than we have, we were still measuring in at about 24 inches. That's almost too much snow for the snow blower, and the end of the driveway must be shoveled by hand since that bank stands the same height as our mailbox. This morning Riley really wanted to go out with Chris and Caleb sort of wanted to go too. He has been having an aversion to boots all winter and I was actually planning last week to take his new boots back to the store since he wouldn't wear them and they will be too small next year. I didn't though, and managed to convince him into them today. He's a weird foot kids I guess. (Remember the socks and shoes at the beach all summer? Even when he switched from sneakers to water shoes, he still wanted to have socks - wet ones - on as well. Now whenever his socks are off - which is still rare - he's into "checkin' my toes" which means making sure the gunk gets cleaned out from between each toe. So gross!

Anyway, here are some pictures from last night and this morning.

Kids picked out their ownclothes for a snow day.

Out the back door last night showing drifts.

Using up some Pleasant Pond blueberries to pay homage to our buried blueberry bushes.

Almost buried mailbox

Covered cars

24 inches but some drifts go up to Chris's chest

Kids happy to be going out in the snow

Riley sitting on the snowbank at the end of the driveway

Caleb was not happy about being left alone.

Caleb on the big snow bank.

Today on the pond. Chris digging out the end of the driveway.

Disney on Ice

Today we surprised the kids with Disney on Ice! Do not be under the impression that this was long in the works. Yesterday, friends started posting on Facebook that they were at the show with their kids and I thought, "Man, we've really dropped the parenting ball again!" Chris had lots of work to do this weekend, but my workload was fairly light, so yesterday during nap time I called up Grandma to see if she wanted to come and bought tickets. Here is how it played out (except for the video that shows the big reveal before we meet up with Grandma. That's out of order, but I can't seem to fix it!)

Kids bored in the car on our way "shopping."

Surprised kids as Grandma, who was parked behind us, popped into the car.

Getting ready for the show to start!

Tinkerbell in the air.

Excited about The Little Mermaid

I loved the colors in The Little Mermaid especially.

All the princesses came out at the end.

Beautiful Ice

Well, we may not have much snow left after this week's rain and warm temps on Wednesday, but instead we have beautiful ice on the pond. The cold has returned and the ice is smooth and perfect for skating. If only Riley had skates (she really wants to learn to skate). We enjoyed walking out a little bit and Cesky and Chris went out to the island, and the kids likes throwing/sliding big chunks of ice and watching them break up. Then we came inside for hot chocolate. Caleb had never had it before, and describes it as, "Yummy in my tummy!"