Jack's Party and ...SNOW!!!

We wanted to post a few pictures from Jack's actual birthday...since we had such a nice time as a family with Jake and Sarah here!  We went downtown in the early afternoon to take some photos by the river...a favorite spot for our family to hang out, this time with some hot chocolate!

I just love this picture!  We placed the kids near the trait that seemed strongest for them!  

Trying to get a shot of Jack and Mommy together...but a certain little Georgie snuck in!  (How can anyone resist that face??!!)

And here...the Meyer Patriarch with his crew!

Mama and her firstborn.

And all five of our blessings!

Jake (and little brothers who try to do everything he does) decided to try to run up the waterless fountain, American-Ninja-Warrior-Warp-Wall style!  It didn't quite work...but the boys got quite the looks from passersby!

Classic Meyer action shots..."jumping" into the river!

As mentioned in our last post, we had a Wild Kratts-themed birthday party for Jack.  The boys love the PBS show and often pretend that they are the Kratt brothers.  They know so many facts about animals and habitats from that show...and their love for the animal kingdom has grown by leaps and bounds!  Thankfully, I had sewing sister Sarah here to help me finish out each of the boys' own "Creature Power Suits".  I made some creature power discs and laminated them (thanks to some other crafty moms online) and we played games associated with some of the animals on the discs.

Our first game was for the Polar Bear disc: the boys had to jump from ice floe to ice floe without landing in the water.

Next:  Cheetah powers!  Dad pretended to be a zebra and the boys had to use their cheetah speed to pull his tail off!

After that, they put in their Large-Mouth Bass power discs and "fished" for salamanders.  (Just take a look at Joe's face in this...priceless!  Holding on for dear life!)

Onto Monarch Butterflies next.  Each of the boys was wrapped in a toilet paper "chrysalis", then had to break free to fly away!

Such cute butterflies!

We incorporated the Beaver Power disc into our lunch.  The boys had to build a beaver dam with pretzels and peanut butter.

For his cake, I made the Tortuga - the flying Turtle ship that the Wild Kratts team travels around in on the show.  Jack was thrilled!

Decorating was pretty easy...since we have lots of animal toys the boys love to play with.  I made some animal fact placemats to go along with the theme.

 For dinner, Jack asked if we could go back to Marion's pizza...where we celebrated his 5th birthday!  It is a family favorite because they serve Bacon Pizza...and because there is a small arcade, which the boys love.

 Silly brothers!

 Back at home, we had cake with Zebra stripe ice cream and opened presents.  It was a great day!

And...today...we had our first SNOW DAY!!!  Joe was up first in the morning, and when I took him to the window to look out, he was amazed!

Check out his awesome bed-head!!!

The boys could hardly wait to finish breakfast and run outside to shovel snow.  They started shoveling just as the snow fall became heavier...but they didn't mind.  This year, Georgie was out there as long as Jack and actually helped!!  He really enjoyed the snow.

 Joe, on the other hand, was happier to stay inside and look at it through the window!

 Jack...in his element again!

 So beautiful!

The Meyer men all helping shovel! 

The boys requested that we make snow ice cream again, like we did last year.

 Later in the day, we all went outside to trek in the backyard.  It was about 23 degrees and COLD, so we didn't last long...but we got some fun shots before heading back to the warm house!

 Silly, silly boys!

 I just love the way the snow rests on the tree branches and gives a lacy appearance to everything.

Tonight we are supposed to drop to about 13 degrees...with a high of only 22 tomorrow.  So, we'll probably just stay warm and toasty indoors.  But it was sure fun to get some winter play in this early in the season!