birthday branch

yesterday was david's birthday!  i like making him work (play) for his gifts, so this year i made a birthday branch decorated with bits of paper.  on each paper was a typewritten clue which he had to decipher to find a hidden piece of candy.  if the candy had a fuzzy little dinosaur sticker on the back he received a gift, if there was no dino he just got the chocolate.

last year's game was a birthday ball bounce and the year before was birthday beans (yup, those are the same beans in the birthday branch jar below).











in between searching for chocolates we worked on this jigsaw puzzle.

more memory

our handmade memory set just keeps growing...  we cut squares out of black mat board and paste on all kinds of images.  sometimes the matches are exact, but more often they are two relating images or different sections of the same picture.  (in these photos the pairs are stacked, so you can only see one of each). 

we have names for almost all of the tiles...  it may or may not help you remember the placement by saying the name when you turn it over.  (it does add to the fun though).  can you find "mister fox", "jelly fish", "fiddlin' cricket", "frog hospital", "eclair repair" and "ouch, i cut myself"?

pictured here is about 2/3 of our game...  we have almost 100 pairs now!

cake toss

included in the weekend festivities was a bridal shower.  we played a few fun games, but the best was this bean bag toss.  david made the box and his mum made the beanbags.  everyone got a chance to chuck some "cake" into the bride and groom's gaping mouths.

and thanks to ivy, the groom also got to taste a turtle...

best weekend

what a fun weekend this past one was.  the annual "camp" with david's family.  remember last year?  this year i took well over 500 photos!  (do you blame me with all these cute kids running around?)  here are my very favorites.

things kicked off with lumberjack night... (we were provided with the perfect chilly weather for flannel shirts).  all our bearded buddies balanced on logs, threw flapjacks in a hungry lumberjack's mouth, posed for photos with a big axe and lots more.











saturday we went "picketing".  everyone came up with their own sign.  i think we really puzzled some of the people driving by.









sunday we had our first ever "63rd annual parade".  all the kids in the neighborhood were invited to join in the fun.





just look at these sweet faces!

a birthday game

here is the game i made for david to play on his birthday.  i "hid" 24 bouncy balls around our living room for him to find.  throughout the day he would find 3 and play the game:  bounce a ball into a cup (seed starting pots, that i'll fill with soil in a few days) and redeem the colored circle for a corresponding prize.  simple, but kinda fun.  it was a challenge to find different hiding places for each of the balls.  below are photos of some of my favorite spots.









remember last year's birthday beans?

camp

we've had a fun and busy weekend.  got together for our annual "camp" with david's family.  the days and evenings were packed with fun activities for kids and grown-ups.  last year's big event was the joust and the year before david and i created the museum of imaginary animals.  this year we had "biker night", "winter night" and more.  with so many cute kids running around i could hardly set my camera down.  here are some of my favorite shots...

one of the "skull boxes" that david made and my beanbags.  (for biker night).



melting ice cubes with toys inside.  an activity from "winter night".



also from winter night:  a snowball fight!  the snowballs were pantyhose filled with flour.  as a result the kids became very pale.  they loved it!
















these last couple shots are of our niece, ivy.  who is impossibly cute.  she modeled a couple of my kids garments.  i'll show you those photos soon.

birthday beans

today is david's birthday and you know what that means...  get out the big bowl of birthday beans!


i "hid" a bunch of reese's peanut butter cups around the apartment.  For every three he finds he gets to reach into the beans...

there are numbers mixed in.  each corresponds with a gift (most likely wrapped in brown paper).

happy birthday, friend!