1 girl + 2 boys: Kelsey's Birthday and the Apple Harvest Festival

Time to play catch up!

Recently, it was Kelsey's birthday and we had fun celebrating. His birthday fell on a Sunday, so we got to spend the whole day together as a family. The kids began their birthday preparations the day before when they made a special mud-pie just for Daddy. It came complete with a stick candle.

Kelsey chose to have cinnamon rolls as his real birthday cake, so we had his little birthday party over breakfast.

The kids made some lovely decorations to mark the special occasion. The one on the left was done by Stella. She wrote "happy brth Day" and drew a frog eating a fly. And, of course she included her standard sun, heart, and rainbow. Colby drew a picture of Daddy on the paper on the right. Can you see the resemblance? Stella also made her daddy a birthday crown that he proudly wore during his breakfast party.

I think the kids were more excited about Daddy's presents than he was. Colby has been talking about what he was going to get Daddy for his birthday for a long time now. He could barely wait for him to open his present to see what it was.....

It was a TRANSFORMER! I think Colby had alterior motives when he chose that gift. Just a hunch.

Then came Stella's turn. She got Daddy a new radio/cd player for his workshop. We all figured he could use some tunes while he works on the cars or his bikes or who-knows-what.

It was a beautiful day, so Kelsey decided to take a family trip to the park. We brought along the baseball and bat and we took over the baseball field there. The kids love to play baseball, and Colby and Stella are actually pretty good.

Max wanted to play too, but he mostly just liked stealing the ball and running away with it. He thought this was pretty fun.

Finally, Max had his own turn up at bat and he did pretty well. He was awfully proud of himself.

We had a great day celebrating Daddy. I think he enjoyed his day.

Last weekend was the Apple Harvest Festival here in town. For our little town, it's a pretty big deal. As I mentioned before, a friend of mine talked me into running the Apple Fest 5k with her. And I'll remind you that I am in no way, shape, or form a runner. But, I did it. And, it was so fun.

I ran it with my two friends Lori and Darlene. We're all Girl Scout leaders together at the elementary school. Lori (the one in the middle) was the one who convinced Darlene and I to do this. Here we are just before the race started. We were all so nervous since none of us had ever done a 5k before.

The three of us stuck together for the entire race and we had a blast. Our two goals were to 1) finish, and 2) not be the last ones to cross the finish line. And, I'm proud to say we accomplished both of those goals.

The race course was right near our house, so Kelsey and the kids came out to cheer me on.

Here we are just after we finished. We didn't break any new land speed records, but WE DID IT! I can't wait to do another one.

Later that afternoon, we all walked back down to the Apple Harvest Fest for the big parade. We love that we can walk downtown from our house. We bring the stroller and the backpack, so the kids get an easy ride. Max had his naptime on the way down.

We went down to watch the parade, which is a pretty big one. We found a good spot and had a great time watching the bands, clowns, fire trucks, and countless floats.

Max woke up in time to see all of the parade and he thought it was the coolest thing ever. He was completely awestruck the entire time. It was cute watching him.