A Three-historic Birthday Party!

November 11, 2017 nk3302 Comments

After a very low-key 2nd birthday, I wanted to do something really fun for Gerrit’s 3rd birthday. I settled on a dinosaur theme months in advance, since he was mildly obsessed with them! And apparently this is the age where kids start to get really into birthday parties, which made it even more fun. He was talking about his birthday party for weeks before it actually happened.

I Pinterest-ed so many cute things for this party, but pared it down considerably in the week leading up to it. I had a great, well-organized to-do list for every day before the party. Plus I had my mom there to help with everything! No stress, right? Hahahaha… well, my procrastinating ways came through as they always do for things like this. I left SO much for myself to do the MORNING OF the party like a crazy person. Despite being super stressed out and scrambling to get things set up the way I wanted, everything turned out fine. It wasn’t everything I had in mind, but the kids had fun, the food was good, and Gerrit loved it all, so it was perfect.

Once the party guests had all arrived, we did a dinosaur egg hunt in the backyard. I gave each of the kids a gift bag and off they went!

This was my way of doing party favors and a game all in one. Gerrit LOVES egg hunts, so I figured it would be a winner for kids of all ages! Every egg had a baby dinosaur in it plus some kind of goody (bouncy ball, tiny Slinky toy, stickers, tattoos, fruit snacks).

I’d say it was definitely a hit! The kids loved finding the eggs and opening them up at the end.

After the egg hunt, people headed in to eat. My mom set up the streamer backdrop with the leaves and banner, and she cut the table cloth to look like foliage.

I made little signs for the herbivores (fruit skewers and veggie cups) and carnivores (crackers, meat, and cheese), and we HAD to have pepperoni pizza, of course. Gerrit asks for pepperoni pizza on a daily basis.

We also had a watering hole and a volcano-like raspberry lemon cake! The only thing Gerrit insisted on for his cake was little dinosaurs be on it, so I paraded them around the top of the cake. I know this was Gerrit’s birthday party, but I definitely made the cake that I wanted to eat, haha. I love pound cakes, and I knew Gerrit would love the raspberries in it. I got lots of compliments from the adults, so I think everyone enjoyed it.

The birthday boy blowing out his big ‘3’ candle!

Gerrit was thrilled to be able to eat as much pepperoni pizza as he wanted!

My mom drew and painted this Triceratoss game, which we played with glow necklaces. It turned out great!

My mom also drew these dino footprints leading to our house — too cute!

Gerrit had such a fun birthday party! A huge thank you to my mom for helping me pull it all together, and thank you to everyone who came to help Gerrit celebrate!

Halloween Fun!

November 7, 2017 nk330Leave a comment

Halloween is really not one of my favorite holidays, but Gerrit definitely showed an interest in it this year for the first time. Since we were invited to a friend’s house for a Halloween party, I actually put forth some effort into getting us some costumes this year too!

Since the dinosaur obsession is still strong in this house, and I have a super cute crochet pattern for a triceratops hat, I wanted to do a Jurassic Park family costume theme circa 1993.

Now I thought this would be an easy thing. But apparently, denim shirts and salmon button-downs are not as easy to come across now compared to 25 years ago. Especially if you want them cheap and last minute by rummaging through thrift shops and discount stores. Nevertheless, I did my best:

We looked a little goofy, but Gerrit LOVED his dinosaur costume, so it was all worth it! We only brought him to the party for 45 minutes or so (it was only 2 houses down from us), then I walked him home so my mom could get him ready for bed. It was fun to be kid-free for a couple of hours!

The day before Halloween, we finally carved our pumpkin from the corn maze we went to in early October. It was Gerrit’s first experience with pumpkin-carving, which was fun for all of us!

He definitely was wary of the inside of the pumpkin! He had no interest in helping to clean out “the guts” with Andrew, despite how much he enjoys getting dirty.

After awhile, he did come over to touch the seeds and pulp. It wasn’t until the very end of cleaning it out that Gerrit actually stuck his hand down in the pumpkin though!

I was given the honor of carving the pumpkin. I don’t think I’ve carved a pumpkin since I was in college, so I opted for a simple, traditional jack o’lantern:

All in all, I think Gerrit enjoyed his first pumpkin carving! Hopefully next year we can get him a little more involved and maybe try one of the carving kits. I’m glad we kept it simple for this year though.

A bittersweet thing about this Halloween? I’m pretty sure it’s our last time staying home to hand out candy. Gerrit wanted to go trick-or-treating, but he and I got sick with a cold ON Halloween, so I let him put his costume on and help me hand out treats. I don’t have a problem going trick-or-treating, I just dread all that sugar coming back to my house! I know, I know… don’t be a party pooper, Nicole…. he’s only a kid once! So next year I’ll just have to give up my control freak ways and let Halloween happen. I hope you all had a fun and safe Halloween!

Daily living

Tour of Del Rio

October 30, 2017 nk3302 Comments

My mom has visited us here in Texas once before, but my dad just spent a few days here for the first time! Although he only had 3 full days with us, we got some fun little excursions in.

San Felipe Creek – I personally think the paths by the creek in Del Rio are really pretty. Gerrit loves picking up sticks, running down the trails, and checking out the water. When we have time, we like to walk to the playground to play for awhile too!
T-38 Simulator – One thing I thought my dad would really love was getting to check out the T-38 simulator! It’s one of the perks of coming to visit during pilot training, and when else does someone get to try this out?
I was really glad that Andrew was able to get us into the sim for this experience!
Lake Amistad – One of the perks of living in Del Rio is being near Lake Amistad. It’s a great place to rent a boat and relax on the water, go fishing, and explore. Since we had really great weather (not scorching hot), I thought we could try hiking in the area.
This really is a pretty time of year in Del Rio. With the temperatures dropping and a bit of rain, we actually get some green in our landscape and some flowers blooming. We ended up hiking the whole 3 mile trail that we chose!

After hiking near the lake, I took them down to Governor’s Landing to actually get up close to the water. It was so pretty down there!
Gerrit just wanted to stay and throw rocks in the water! We had to persuade him to leave with pizza from Lou’s Woodfire Pizza haha.

I think we all had a great time that week! We had some time to relax, but we also got out to see some of what Del Rio and Laughlin have to offer. We’re so glad you were able to visit, Dad/Papa!