He's 8?!

It's hard to believe it's been 8 years since I became a mom....a lot has happened in those eight years and it was fun to go back and look at all the pictures of Wyatt from the last 8 years (and boy were there A LOT--typical first child, right?)!

Just a few...

And now having his favorite cinnamon roll at the Machine Shed for his birthday before school! 

Everytime someone has a birthday at school, Wyatt comes home and asks, "Why does everyone bring in cupcakes? I hate cupcakes!" Don't get me wrong, he loves carbs but he doesn't like sweets much and really detests frosting. So this was what he wanted to bring for his birthday this year--donuts from Dorothy Ann's Bakery. 

And unfortunately I don't have a picture, but after the kids in his class got all that sugar, his Auntie Cam had two dozen fresh and hot chocolate chip cookies and cold milk delivered to his classroom for his birthday. He was completely surprised and all the ladies in the front office said it was the best thing they have seen delivered for a student--a HUGE thanks Auntie Cam!! (Although I'm not sure how his teacher got any work done that day!!)

Since we don't live near our families, our kids get to have 'friend parties' every other year. So this was Wyatt's year for a friend party. He thought quite a bit about it and all the fun places he might want to go, but when it came time to deciding who he'd want to invite, he looked at me and said, "Mom, I don't really like being around a lot of kids. Can I just have one friend and go up to Stormy Lake?" So that's what we did. And what a great observation about himself--he's just like his Dad and neither one of them enjoy big groups of people. Wyatt is friends with lots of kids at school but if you ask him who his friends are, he will name just one or two. Since I wouldn't be comfortable taking many kids with us for an entire weekend (and we don't even allow sleepovers except on very rare occasions), I was glad that Wyatt wanted to bring Titus (whose mom is my good friend Dixie). They were cool with it and the boys couldn't stop talking about it all week at school.

Since we knew we were going up north, my parents left gifts for Wyatt at our house (from when they had been here with the kids during our ski trip) and told Wyatt to open them before we headed up, since we wouldn't want to take them up with us. So the night before his birthday, he got to open his gifts from Nani and Pops. Do you think he was a bit excited?!

I don't know if I have ever capture excitement on his face quite like this!

And the big one....

Poor guy didn't realize that the newspaper was actually part of the wrapping and he started reading it to see what it said!!

Pops was pretty excited about this one--framed pictures and tickets from their time in Texas at the Formula 1 race. Wyatt loved it and promptly went up to his room with Matt to hang it up!

But what would a peaceful evening at home be without something going awry...like Blake splitting his head open on the corner of the wall!

(check out the blood still in his ear! It was literally gushing all over but once Matt got him in the tub and could wash it out enough to tell where it was coming from, it started clotting pretty quickly. Poor guy!)

So now back to Wyatt's actual birthday on Friday--we picked the boys up at school just after lunch and drove up to Stormy Lake. We arrived in the midst of a snow storm, which made for an interesting trip and navigating a driveway that hadn't been plowed, but the boys were so excited to get out and play in the snow. They played outside almost the entire weekend and had so much fun making up sledding runs and naming "Wyatt mountain" and "Titus hill". They did lots of sledding through the trees and thankfully there were no serious injuries! They LOVED dodging the trees with their sleds--I am just glad I wasn't out there to see much of that part of it!

This year Wyatt wanted a cookie cake--his requests for cakes keep getting easier and easier!

Grammy and Papa and Uncle Kyle and Aunt Christy were also up at Stormy to help celebrate with us.

A booklight from Titus--which he now uses every night and every morning to read with in bed.

Titus and Wyatt both reading the book Titus got him--hilarious to hear Titus say, "I don't even know what's in these gifts--my mom bought it all"

A collector hockey stick with all the WCHA teams on it (since this is the last year of the WCHA!)

Notice how quickly Blake came in and grabbed it!

A Minnesota Gopher hockey hat he had been wanting ever since going to a game with Matt back in November--let the record show that I was opposed to this but Matt keeps saying, "Our kids are going to grow up in MN Kris".....I draw the line, however, at cheering for the Vikings!

And yes, Blake quickly escaped all the excitement with Wyatt's new puck from Titus (Dixie) and his new stick from us!

Grammy and Papa got Wyatt another CARS2 Lego set since he loved his other one they got him at Christmas so much--but notice Titus, the ultimate Lego kid, already scoping it out!

And this pic is a bit blurry, but he finally got ski poles! He has been asking for poles for several years and Matt always told him he had to get better before he could actually utilize poles. You better believe he wanted to go skiing as soon as we got home!

Love the excitement on Blake's face as we started singing to Wyatt and he anticipated blowing out the candles with Wyatt.

A few more pics from the weekend---HUGE icicles to be found!

Jones Sodas at Soda Pops for lunch

Blake was entertained by the bubbles in his soda pushing his straw up repeatedly--it's the little things!

And giant burgers!!

What a great birthday Wyatt had--and in thinking about it, we spent less money than if we had done a friend party with lots of kids, Wyatt got to extend his birthday over several days, and we all had a great time! We love you Buddy and are so blessed to have you in our family! 

(We only have 10 more years with him at home--YIKES!!)