Dad's Birthday

Dad's birthday was last week, and we had a little party to celebrate it on Friday night. We had a pot luck dinner first. Jake and Dylan:

Brock (that thing on his chin is a wart he just got removed):

Sadie:

Mom and Dad:

Ben and Pete:

Troy:

And Nat:

Ben and Jake, being silly together:

Then we sang to Dad and had him open his presents (he's opening my card in this shot):

Dylan had a dream about a week ago about a rug in my parents' basement. In his dream, it was a mean magic carpet that ate him. This dream really freaked him out, because he was still talking about it on Friday. He told Jake about his dream, and Jake started to get really scared of the magic carpet in my parents' basement. He worried about it all evening, no matter how many times we told him that it was only in Dylan's dream. So Ben decided to put the rug on top of him and chase the kids up the stairs. I was so worried that it would really scare Jake, but it kind of helped to alleviate his magic carpet fears. Here is a picture of the kids running away from the stairs:

And Ben laughing. He is so silly:

Here's Mom, teaching Sadie how to do a somersault. She did one and really hated it, refusing to somersault anymore. She's so weird!

Then Mom taught the kids how to play Pretty Bird My Cup, What Color's Yours? It was the hit of the evening. You have a little cup of water (we used to play it with a thimble when we were kids), and you choose a color in your mind. Then you go to everyone in the circle, one by one, and say, "Pretty Bird My Cup, What Color's Yours?" The person guesses a color. If he didn't guess the color you were thinking of, you go to the next guy and ask the question again. If he guessed the color you were thinking of, you splash him with the water. The kids could have played this game for a million years. Jake kept getting so frustrated that he wasn't guessing the color and getting splashed, so we told Dylan to splash Jake, no matter what color he said. This picture was taken right before Jake got splashed:

Sadie wanted a chance to splash someone, so we let her splash Ben, which consisted of her holding out his arm and pouring the water gently on his sleeve:

This is Dylan, after I told him we had to go home. He really wanted to keep playing. You can see how drenched he is:

It was a fun night. It is so nice to be around family again. Happy Birthday, Dad! I'm sorry your birthday is right in the middle of tax season. That sucks! Mine was always during finals, in college, but that was only for five years, not for my entire working career!!