A Birthday, Pigtails, and Bike Riding

We celebrated Tristan's 11th birthday on Thursday. We kept it pretty low key, but made it special for him. I decorated the house with streamers and balloons, made a birthday breakfast, sent in cupcakes for his class, made a cookie cake, and made dinner per his requests. We had brats and hot dogs on the BBQ. We only go him one gift since he really wanted those shoes called "Heely's" which have a wheel on the heel and are pretty pricey. Well, I guessed wrong on the size and they were too small, so he and Daniel rushed over to the store to exchange them, and Tristan ended up with a sweet pair of roller-blades instead (which in my opinion were a much better buy). Before he went to bed he told Daniel and I that he had a great day and didn't want it to end....

Adelaide has FINALLY started to grow hair on TOP of her head! She's had a full amount of curly blonde ringlets in the back, but was bare on top for a long time! Now she has enough hair on top for me to put 2 little pigtails up there. Isn't she cute?

Alicia has just recently learned how to ride her bike without the training wheels. I don't let the kids watch t.v. during the week, so when they are finished with their homework, they typically go outside to play. Alicia was starting to act like she had nothing to do outside, so I said, "Okay, how about you learn how to ride your bike without those blasted training wheels?" She wasn't very impressed. I had taken them off in the fall to try to teach her, but she really had a hard time, so we ended up just putting them back on. But this time was completely different, I have never seen a child learn how to ride a bike so quick! After about 10 minutes she could ride about 10 feet by herself. By the second session she could go the length of the driveway, but had a hard time stopping without a major crash. By the third session she could start and stop by herself and ride her bike around in circles in the driveway without falling over! Now she goes out and rides her bike every chance she gets! She likes to sing various songs from her new favorite movie, "The Sound of Music" as she goes around, and around, and around. It's actually quite entertaining to watch her....one day she'll be on Broadway!