Well, this is going to be a long one. What a fun-filled week we've had! I have a million pictures so I hope you have plenty of time to enjoy seeing them all!
I'm going to start way back on Tuesday night. We went to the Grand Blue Mile for our first time ever. It's part of the Drake Relays downtown and it was so.much.fun. I didn't know what to expect, besides a LOT of people. But Kylee has been training hard with her running club and Kael wanted to run too, so we went downtown to see what it was all about! Kase enjoyed the inflatables, balloon swords and snacks. Kylee and Kael enjoyed hanging around and warming up with their friends before the race. Then, the girls went first and Kylee had a blast! She got a PR and came in under the 7:00 mark so she was thrilled. Then, the guys went. Kael had a great race too!
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| Ready to race! |
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| Kylee and her closest running buddies. |
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| Kase just loved these inflatables and had fun diving off into the pads! |
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| Kase loved exploring the sculpture park too. The atmosphere downtown was so cool. |
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| Go, Kylee go! |
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| Go, Kael go! |
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| We love "running" into cousins! Ha. I crack me up. |
Thursday was Kase's fifth birthday! We had such a great day celebrating him. Being the third child, he had to celebrate between older siblings' sports practices and a band concert- Kase was so sweet and agreeable about waiting for us all to be together to open all of his gifts and have cake.
He woke up in just enough time to open a couple gifts before we all went off to school/work. He got to take donut balls to school for snack, so he was really excited about that!
Then later in the evening, after dinner (tacos-his pick), we had my dad and mom over for cake and he opened the rest of his gifts. Kase had a great day!
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| Lego army guys were a hit! |
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| Kael, standing in the back, and being recognized for participating in the solo concert the previous weekend. |
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| A little late night Lego-ing. |
Saturday we planned to celebrate the April birthdays with Kent's side of the family. Everyone came to our house- we did presents and had cupcakes. Kase got some pretty awesome shoes, a personalized bat and a cool remote control truck!
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| Love these guys. Kael seems like he fits right in with adults lately. |
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| Kael was so excited to make cupcakes for the event. He knew that Grandpa and Grandma liked coconut but not many others did, so he made several different kinds. I love how interested he is in baking cupcakes lately! He also had such a fun idea to make "Cupcake Brackets" like March Madness and have people pick their favorite kinds of cupcakes. We all had a blast filling out our brackets! |
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The Brothers Patterson.
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Somehow, we were able to pull off a surprise for Cindy for her 60th birthday! We planned a limo ride downtown for her for family pictures! Seeing her face when the limo pulled up to our house was just awesome. I'm so thankful for all the collaboration to get it all coordinated!
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| The kids thought riding in the limo was pretty awesome! |
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| Like, really awesome. |
I love how these pictures turned out! We are a pretty lucky family.
Then, the kids went with my parents out for dinner and for a sleepover while the rest of us adults had dinner at Exile- one of our favorite places.
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| How handsome are these guys?! |
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| Me and my love. What a fun night. |
The fun continued on Sunday! After lunch we went to Triad Gymnastics for Kase's birthday party. What a perfect place to celebrate on this cold, rainy day!
I don't have a picture of Kael that isn't blurry, but I do have a pretty cool video of him sticking a back flip that he would love for me to show you anytime you see me.
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| Happiness. |
We were so thankful and just thrilled with how many of Kase's friends and family were able to make it to the party.
Kase requested a "caked that looks like a baseball but is chocolate inside". Hy-Vee did a great job!
I am just so blown away by not only the generosity of people but also how well they know Kase! He is so excited about his new collection of Nerf guns, Power Rangers, Legos, water guns, race cars and more!
It was such a fun weekend. All the April birthday celebrating can make for a very, very busy month, but honestly I'm kind of sad to see it all come to an end! Thanks to everyone who helped make our birthdays special. Thank you to everyone who helped shuttle kids, gave us such thoughtful gifts, took family pictures, and bought us many celebratory meals and treats! Until next year, April!
