The Birthday Boy

Today is The Boy's birthday - he woke up this morning having made it to age three against all projected odds! Hooray for him! I joke, he's really very sweet when he's not taking off all his clothes and peeing everywhere. Or throwing rocks at his sisters. Or pulling the dog's tail until he yelps. Or saying "NO!" every time you tell him to do something he doesn't want to do. Or picking up Grandma's glass of ice tea, deliberately pouring it out on the living room floor and laughing like a crazed little imp as he runs away from an enraged old lady. Yep, he's pretty lucky to still be with us.

We had a birthday party for him, which thrilled him to no end. This is the first year he really understood what was going on. He adored his Sesame Street cake and so did we. The lady that made it did a fantastic job, even making sure Elmo was on it. While the rest of us hate Elmo with a passion now, The Boy can't go a day without him. Damn you Talking Elmo, with your endless songs and stories! But I am getting off the subject now, sorry ....

Here he is seeing his cake for the first time...he seems surprised that we are actually going to let him have it. Usually we try to keep him away from the sugar. Sugar is bad. Sugar makes him go wild. Well, wilder than normal. Which is pretty wild.

He quickly cottons on that you have to blow out the candles before you can eat the cake. This ritual went much better than last year, when he insisted on grabbing the lit candle, burnt his finger, and cried through the rest of his party whimpering, "hand hurt, Mommy". Ah, fun times.

But wait! It gets better! There is cake AND presents! Will the excitement never end?







It's a puzzle, one his fave things in the world. He is quite the little problem solver; he lives to take things out of their rightful place and see if he can put them somewhere else that they're not made for. This is why our DVD no longer works as well as it used to, but that's a story for another time.


Why he is so amazed and overjoyed to get cash is something that I am still worrying about. Let's hope the answer doesn't crop up too soon.

We foolishly thought the piece de resistance gift would be the Radio Flyer tricycle we splurged on. However, once he dragged it out on the deck and posed for a picture with it, he totally ignored it in favor of the Big Bird balloon that came with it.

Still, he's a cutie, ain't he?