Fletcher turns 8

Every year instead of things calming down after the holidays, our house turns goes into hyper mode. We usually return from Texas and are immediately faced with the double whammy birthdays for Fletch and Piper.

This year Fletch took a very mature approach - he wanted to take 3 friends to the zoo in Colorado Springs and eat out. Easy! No problem! Sounds great!

And then he decided maybe he wanted to have a party at home. Maybe a Lego party - and then the dream began to grow. The guest list expanded. The wanted a homemade cake that looked like a Star Wars Lego Man. His eyes would get bigger and bigger and he came up with games and plans. And before I knew what had happened, we had a guest list of 18 boys (yes - all in my house, in the middle of winter) and a full fledged party on our hands.

Fletch made a nameplate for the door to greet people. We bought a zillion Bionicles for everyone to build. We made Lego man sugar cookies to hand out and a Lego Sharkman pinata.

His birthday began with a big family birthday breakfast and a menu of his favorite foods (let's hear it for bacon!).

That night the boys (and one girl) began to arrive. Here is the difference between boys and girls. Since many of the kids go to different schools, I had them all sit down and tell everyone their names. A room full of 8 year old boys is well... loud and smelly.

This is how an 8 year old boy introduces himself,

"My name

is" (burp)... ha, ha, ha - exCUUUUUUSe me... hit the guy next to you, "uh, my name is" (laugh, other bodily noises)... ha, ha, ha "SORRY! My name is JOE - Zoinks"!!!!

Then we get around to the only girls represented... Piper and our neighbor, Emma. They are sitting quietly on the couch holding their American Girl dolls. This is how girls introduce themselves, "Hi. My name is Emma. And I think it would be nice if we could also tell how old we are and what our favorite color is". Piper chimes in, "And can we also tell the names of our dolls."

Chris and I looked at each other - seriously! If anyone wondered about the differences of the sexes - here it is!

The girls lived (barely) through the night. The boys had a fabulous and very "boyish" time. And Fletcher went to sleep dreaming of Legos.