My babyguy is FIVE!

Happy 5th birthday to Maxyboy!
For his birthday treat at school, he wanted to take donuts from Busken - I'm sure they were a hit with his classmates!

He and Lucy had fun baking birthday cupcakes for him at home, too.
We celebrated at home a day early - on Wednesday, 5/15 - because Dave had a softball game and Max had practice on the evening of his actual birthday.

Once the cupcakes were in the oven, they got started on creating the "goody bags" (which were actually goody cups) for his upcoming Ninja Turtles birthday party.
He'd picked out the cups along with magic towles, kazoos (a specific request / demand as a party favor), TMNT fruit snacks and stickers.

On his birthday, we had his favorite dinner - burgers!

They had fun decorating the cupcakes and then I arranged them into a "5" which he got a kick out of.

We once borrowed a book from the library called Maxi the Little Taxi - specifically chosen because of the taxi's name. It's a very cute book and we read it a bunch of times before returning it but he still talked about it a lot. Lucy was at a book fair and spotted it and knew it would be the perfect birthday gift so she bought it for Max - he was pretty excited!

I keep a bin in my closet of future gifts - things I get on clearance / sale that would make for a good Christmas or birthday gift down the road...I'd picked up a few bottles of glitter glue on a big discount one day to save for a rainy day - since these kids LOVE making slime...well Max spotted the glue before it made its way to the bin and begged for the silver/gray glue. Offhand, I told him "maybe you'll get it for your birthday."
This was weeks before his birthday but he brought it up multiple times: "On my birthday, I get that silver glue!" He was happy to finally unwrap it on May 15!

Going to bed for the last time as a 4-year-old!
With his two best teddy buds

He got to skip school on his actual birthday but he started the day with a leftover donut from his classroom celebration and then we went to Frisch's before taking Lucy to school.

We dropped Lucy off at school and then Max got to choose what we did next - he chose to go to the park at the Cold Spring city building...right next to his school...a park he goes to fairly often...
But he had a great time monkeying around! 

Next, he was ready for a visit to Recreations Outlet - love that place! He was a little bummed not to have Lucy with him but he still had plenty of fun. He shot some hoops for a bit, climbed, went down slides, rode on several different swings, jumped on trampolines, then we played at the sand table outside.

We thought the colored sand at the sand table was so cool that we bought a few bags to take home to our sand table! They had bags of pink and bags of blue and mixed together, they made a purple sand - fun!

Next up was lunch at Skyline - yum!

Finally, it was time to pick Lucy up from school! Hooray! We got her and headed straight to Tower Park to play some more.

But soon, we had to get home to eat dinner so we'd have enough time to get Max ready for and to soccer practice. Per the birthday boy's request, we picked up McDonald's (burger with EXTRA pickles for Max!).

Then we opened our colorful sand - way cool!

We ended the day with soccer practice - and Max wanted to bring a treat (popsicles!) to celebrate his birthday with his team. 

That weekend, we had his TMNT birthday party. I ordered Max a 3-pack of turtles shirts on Amazon and Lucy squeezed into one of them to be on theme!
GranJan made the awesome Michaelangelo cake!

Since Max loves basketball so much, we decided to get him a hoop for his birthday. We'd managed to keep it hidden until the big reveal at his party. He walked right out to see his surprise, picked up a basketball and made his first shot!

Back inside to open the rest of his gifts - a fishing pole from Grandma and Troy, a giant bottle of ketchup from Lucy, crazy forts, a Nerf gun, some water guns - tons of cool stuff!

I almost forgot about the pinata! We'd gotten it a week or so before and it was fully loaded with goodies...and then set aside so it wasn't in the way. I think Troy spotted it and reminded me just in time! Kids were still there so they all got to take some swings and grab some loot - cowabunga! 

Happy birthday, dude!

My babies

Lucy continues to call me a creeper when I take pics of them sleeping...and I continue to be a creeper - and take pics of them sleeping! 

Sometimes they're laying funny and I want to show them in the morning but mostly, they're just so dang sweet, I can't resist!

Here's my cute girl before school one day on an out-of-uniform day with a luau theme. 
Aloha!

A cute assignment she brought home - reminiscing about the beach:

Little sweetie at her classroom Valentine's Day party:

Carnival day at St. Joe's is always tons of fun!
It's historically been an outdoor event but when Lucy was in kindergarten, it was rainy and they had to move it inside for the first time in a long time. First grade - same story...there was a threat of rain so we stayed inside...Second grade - rain again! 
It doesn't stop these kids from having a great day, though!
As room mom, I had to man a booth most of the day. I'd thought about bringing Max up for a bit but I didn't have the opportunity - but he'll get his chance!

In past years, Lucy has wanted me with her all day...this year, I was working a booth most of the day but she didn't care anyway - she was fine roaming the school with her pals!

My goofy guy loves puddles so much! One day he had a pretty wet soccer game and came home with mud splatters all over his back. Later that day, he got fresh mud splatters on fresh clothes while watching Lucy play soccer:

And of course, a sleeping pic of him, too!

How stinkin' cute is he with his little legs crossed while getting a hair cut?!

One day we hung out at St. Joe in the parking lot while Lucy practiced softball. We brought sidewalk chalk and had fun drawing sea creatures and other animals for a while but then he got really hot and really tired - seemingly all of a sudden. 
We sat in the shade on a bench until practice ended then went home. He was crying and complaining that his head hurt and as soon as we got him, he walked into the living room and threw up all over the carpet...at first we were afraid maybe he had a migraine but after some time (and a discussion with his pediatrician), we realized he'd probably gotten dehydrated.

More cuteness...he loves to swing - especially super-high on the 2-person swing at GranJan & Grandpa's house - and he sure loves teddy bears - especially super-giant ones!

One day he challenged me to a water gun fight!

These two babies of mine...they sure are creative! One day I found them having a "campout" inside my pillowcases (I mean inside their "sleeping bags!")

Another day, they decided to make their own kite. Lucy was especially into it. She cut out the shape she needed and taped some string onto it. When it wouldn't fly, she was truly confused. I told her it didn't have the cross-back structure and maybe that was why it wouldn't fly.

So she solved that problem by taping a bunch of pencils and markers in a cross on the back of their kite (this girl of mine LOVES tape - she could go through a whole roll in 4 minutes).

They tried and tried until I suggested they get their actual kites out...there was even enough wind that day to get them up in the air!