I think it’s taken us just about a week to recover from vacation. One positive: since Joseph was still on CA time, he let us sleep in the Monday after we got home (which was Labor Day, so Paul got to sleep in, too)! On the flip-side, it was kind of hard to get him to go to bed at night. Now he’s back on his normal schedule, which I’m kind of glad for. We get more done during the day if he wakes up earlier. 🙂
This past week we celebrated both my birthday and Joseph’s. We didn’t do much for my actual birthday, since it was a Sunday and we were driving home from CA, but that was okay. We’d celebrated early with family, which was an awesome present (Paul also got me my birthday/anniversary/Christmas present: an upgrade for my Kitchen aid mixer). We didn’t do much on Joseph’s actual birthday (2 days later than mine) since we had a party planned for the weekend. His party was loads of fun (and we kept it simple enough that it wasn’t too overwhelming for Paul and me). I made it a combo party for me and Joseph, though the main focus was Joseph. It sort of had a Mickey Mouse theme, but we didn’t do any games or anything. I made the cake (pictures to follow), and we just had hot dogs, chips, and sodas/juice boxes. As for the guests, we invited 2 families who both have boys Joseph’s age (as well as other kiddos. We had 8 kids there, including Joseph). The kids had a blast playing out in the back yard (everyone had to be wiped down thoroughly after playing in the sandbox…I even caught Joseph rolling back and forth in the sand…yeah…he got a bath after everyone left, lol), especially since Paul managed to turn the sandbox cover (some landscaping fabric that he normally has fastened to the frame) into a shade tarp by fastening it to our fence and one of our trees. We also purchased an EZ-UP type of shade tent to give more shade. Another funny party story was that I noticed Joseph running around with one shoe on (not his own…it belonged to one of his friends who is about his size), so I decided to check to see if the other little boy had the other on…and he sure did! They ran around the yard like that for about an hour before they both ended up taking the shoes off. I still have no idea how it exactly happened in the first place! After the kids played, we ate lunch outside and then went inside for cake and presents. He got some Mega Blocks and some cars from Paul and me. From his two little friends that came to the party, he got some sidewalk chalk and a Mickey Mouse board puzzle. As for the cake, Joseph was fine looking at the cake and enjoyed it when Paul and I helped him blow out the candle (he didn’t want to blow it out on his own), but when it came to eating it, he was not interested. He was still not interested today when I tried to give him a bite of leftover cake. I guess he’s anti-cake…meh, could be worse!
The last thing I need to mention in this post is Stake Conference. We showed up, even got a cushy seat, and then had to relocate not too far into the conference because Joseph decided that he was done with sitting in the chapel and wanted to move around (it was expected, because he’s used to church being a different way: sit in the chapel for a bit, and then get to go play in nursery for 2 hours). We ended up going to sit in the Relief Society room, since they had the conference broadcasting through the speakers, and Joseph could run around and play with his toys. I think that was the most I’ve gotten out of a stake conference for quite a while, lol. There was another family sitting in there, for the same reason, and the kids shared toys and snacks with Joseph. I really do love this ward!
Okay, here’s the pictures for this week:
