Ben's Birthday!!

So, the first few months of the year is a very busy time for our little family. Clint starts out on Jan. 4th with his b-day, then comes Curtis' and then Ben's follows on the 26th of February. (Mine follows just a couple of weeks later, and then we are done with our birthdays - Sad, but makes for a pretty fun beginning of the year!).

For Ben's two-year-old birthday, we were lucky enough to have Grandma Spencer (from Utah) & Uncle Kirk and Aunt Mandy (from Oklahoma) come for the festivities! It was SUCH a treat to have them here!

We started out the week with a couple of trips to some of our favorite play places. The "train park" out in Katy is a huge, wonderful contraption that the boys love! We spend hours there some days! Ben was a little dramatic on the slide this day! He likes to go up and down, over and over again...

One of our next stops was the mall for a very short, overly-priced ride on a little "locomotive" that excites the kids whenever it is cruising by. I think Ben and Curtis had a fun time - although they may have blinked and missed most of it.

For Ben's birthday cake, Grandma, Daddy, and I, spent hours decorating three different flavors of "bugs" from a cake pan with all the different molds - butterflys, bees, ladybugs, and dragonflys. The flavors were carrot cake, vanilla pound cake, and chocolate. It was fun to see how excited the boys were - I think it was for the highly candy-covered ones that Daddy made just with them in mind! Of course there were way too many, and so it was also fun to deliver a few plates to some of our friends.

We found out that Ben is quite fascinated with fire! He loved the candles and learned that it really is best to BLOW the fire out - not try to pinch it out with your little fingers!...He tried to grab the flame and eventually said: "Ouch!". But, he didn't cry...The expression on his face says it all...

The day after his birthday, we all went to the Houston Zoo. What a beautiful day! The sun was shining, the air was crisp, and we were all in a big truck!! (We just LOVE Kirk and Mandy's truck...It is a family group goal to have our own sometime soon!!).

Ben and Curtis are both on a goat kick these days...The petting zoo was fun for them to pick up on some goat behavior and grooming (They regularly pretend that they are goats. When they want food, they ask me to "feed the baby goats". They often refer to me as "Mommy goat" - I actually prefer this to "Mommy Elephant"...And, Grandma also earned the nickname "Grandma Goat" before the end of her visit - that means that she is "in"!).

On Sunday, we had a dinner with Uncle Bubba, Aunt Linda, and Keith! They spoiled the boys with a deluxe PlayDo set, some Fireman and Construction kits, some cool books, a dancing/singing frog and doggie, and an Aqua doodle kit! WOW! They always give the best gifts! The Playdo and doodle mat have been hours of fun almost every day since!

It was just such a great week with everyone!

We are so happy that we have Ben in our family! He seems to suprise us daily...We really don't know how Clint and I produced such a "firecracker" of a BOY!

He really is great at: getting dirty, finding trouble, teasing his big brother, making messes, yelling (Curtis is constantly reminding him that "we don't yell Ben."), and flashing heart-melting grins! Our home would be way too quiet without Ben around. And, we might just get to sit down for too long...

We love you Ben!...Now take a nap!! (Another of Curtis' favorite things to tell him to do when he grabs his head over for a hug and kiss in the shopping cart.)