Bean's Big Birthday

Back in August Bean turned 6!  Fastest 6 years of my life...

We've sort of turned the birthday planning over to our kids--Boy still needs a little help but Bean has it all figured out.  This year she wanted to go out to breakfast so we went to The Original Pancake House.  It was delicious!

Then we went bowling.  It was our first time taking our kids.  S and I like to go on our own but we realized we enjoy it as a family, too.

It was hilarious to watch Boy lug around the bowling ball on his own.  He insisted he didn't need help!

That evening we invited grandmas and grandpas over for a spaghetti dinner, cake and ice cream, and (of course) presents.

Boy took full advantage of the deflated balloons the following day.  He ran circles all morning long...

If you remember from Boy's birthday post we decided to throw Bean her first big kid friend party.  It was a blast!  I figured 6 years is the perfect age to just invite a bunch of kids over and let them entertain themselves...which is what we did.  We set up a waterslide, our kiddie pool and a few slip-n-slides.  That's it.  They played for an hour, ate pizza, had cupcakes, and Bean opened presents.  Super easy!

The most effort I put into her party were these cupcakes.  And as adorable as they turned out, they weren't even that hard!

The BEST part of the party though was when the firefighters showed up.  S asked our community firefighters to come soak the kids.  They LOVED IT!!

Bean's friend O was a trooper--he braved the hose the entire time!

We freaked out a few of our neighbors (and parents coming to pick up their kids!) but it was such a fun party.  A few of her friends parents might have come up to me the next day at church and said their kid said it was the best party ever...

Bean spent the rest of the day in post-party bliss.

And of course we couldn't let a perfectly good slip-n-slide go to waste so after dinner S and I put our swimsuits on and joined the kids.  It was an awesome way to end our summer vacation.