My sweet, baby boy was born; Benjamin is TWO!!! Such an exciting day. We sang to him many times today, wished him a happy birthday over and over, took him on a long walk to the park, and we served him one of his favorite dinners: pizza, mandarin oranges, green beans, and CAKE! Every time we would say, "Happy birthday, Ben-Ben," he would reply, "Happy Birthday to you!" In a few days,we're having a big birthday bash for extended family in Marquette, Sesame Street themed, but we wanted to celebrate with daddy too. :)
Mmm, yummy cake!
And I also had to throw on a picture of Ben-Ben watching Sesame Street. So, just over a week ago, we discovered that Benjamin recognizes and says all of his ABC's. At the time we thought it was only about 2/3 that he knew, but have come to realize since, he's got them all down. Wow! It was so surprising to me because I have never tried to teach him his ABC's and didn't know he recognized even one letter, let alone all the upper case letters, and some lower case letters. I mean, he can barely even sing the song! I just had no idea that he was picking it up on his own, most likely from Sesame Street. Then, one day, he got hold of some flashcards of Anna's, and started saying the letters correctly. Crazy! I thought it was coincidence until he got about 6 of them right. :) He has shown interest in the alphabet for months now, and would always excitedly point out ABC's every time he saw them, but the letters he would say seemed pretty random. I guess he knew what he was talking about! Anyway, it was a very fun surprise.
And I think I update about my kids enough on here that I don't need to do a whole "tribute" to Benjamin, on this, his day of birth. I love him. He is my handsome, smart, funny, active, mischievous, silly, energetic, squishy, smoochy, beautiful little boy. Wow, time flies!
Easter Festivities!
Beautiful Anna. (She wanted to dress up for the Easter egg hunt...so we had Ben look nice too. :)
We did most of the Easter celebrating on Saturday, at least the non religious stuff. Saturday morning we went to Frankenmuth and the kiddies participated in a very fun Easter egg hunt. It was very well organized, plenty of eggs filled with chocolate candies to go around, and each child got to choose two prizes on the way out. Anna chose bubbles and some sidewalk chalk, and Ben-Ben chose bubbles and a rocket. I love the second picture of Anna, she looks so serious, like she's making a game plan for the hunt.
Daddy and Benjamin watching the boat in Frankenmuth.
It was such a beautiful day, and Frankenmuth is such a fun town, that we decided to stick around for a bit. We played at a local park, visited some shops, looked at all the Easter decorations that were out, and just took in the beautiful weather. It had been sunny and in the 80's for a few days leading up to this, but luckily, it was only in the 70's on Saturday.
Bunny ears = happy Anna, and sad Ben-Ben. This was taken while we were getting ready to go to Frankenmuth.
Saturday afternoon/evening, the Easter bunny left a note and clues for the kiddies. He had hidden their Easter baskets. Anna was just full of excitement, giggles, screams, and laughter as she raced around finding the clues. It started at the dining room table, then to the bathtub, to the car, to Anna's bed, to the refrigerator, to the couch, and then they found the baskets in mommy and daddy's bed. So fun! Once Ben-Ben discovered there was candy in the eggs, his mouth was continuously full until we took the basket away for the day.
Anna especially loved the magnifying glass and stick on earrings she got. And besides the candy, Benjamin like the basketball game and scrubby frog he got.
Today, Sunday, was General Conference for our church. It's a meeting broadcast from SLC, Utah. It's conveniently available on-line. After, we had Ben-Ben's birthday dinner, as mentioned above, and for scriptures, we read about the Resurrection in a children's book we have. (We had a few 'family night' lessons centered on the meaning of Easter leading up to this weekend too...trying to teach Anna about the significant aspect of the holiday.) I love all the fun traditions that accompany Easter, but even more, I love the strong focus we are given to remember that the Savior lives, cares about us, and loves us. It is such a comfort to know that, and fills me with peace. Happy Easter to all my family and friends!
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