Isaiah's Birthday ... 12 years old!

My two middle boys have birthdays just 6 days apart.  2 years and 6 days.  For many years they have had joint parties and that worked well.  This year though, we just let them choose what they wanted to do for their birthday and this was fun too!

We have done this in the past for Isaiah - and he really enjoyed it.  It wasn't a surprise then though (I wanted a photo).  This year was!  What fun to wake up and find something you didn't expect - and really enjoy!

I loved being able to start off his day in this fun way!  And green is his favorite color.  :-)

Food is always the choice of the birthday person.  Isaiah wanted pancakes with blueberry syrup and sausage cheese balls.  Oh, and chocolate milk.  Yum!

One of the first activities was a treasure hunt.  I have a great book from Klutz with already designed hunts that I use often.  It is a great resource with some hunts good for pre-readers and other more challenging ones for older children.  I love that it tells you where to hide each clue on the back of the clue!  Super easy and I highly recommend The Treasure Hunt Book.

One of his gifts was a fishing box filled with all sorts of things and a new pole.  He had asked to go fishing on his birthday and this seemed an appropriate gift for him.

It was a gorgeous day and we headed out to Harris Lake County Park to go fishing.

Ready to fish!

They first tried fishing on the pier.

Eliana became quickly tired of it all and we took a walk.

There is a great playground here and we headed over there.

Love seeing the sweet smiles!

After no luck on the pier, they headed out to fish near the woods.  Only one person caught a fish ... the birthday boy!  I was so glad it was him.  :-)

Christopher met us for lunch.  Isaiah picked take-out Chinese.

More gifts.  Slim jims are a huge hit.

And a fun movie too!

For dinner, Isaiah wanted to have a cooking contest.  We gathered ingredients for nachos and then split into 3 teams.  Each team had time to make their food and prepare something to say about the food.

Some of the presentations were very creative.

Both the words.

The gestures.

And the food.  (Can you tell that this one is an I?  For the one judge - Isaiah!)

The foods were judged on appearance, presentation and taste.  A few had secret ingredients (such as bacon and ranch dressing).

After sampling all of them and learning who the winning team was (the all girl team), everyone took time to make their own plate of nachos to their liking.  It was a lot of fun and yummy too!

Happy 12th birthday Isaiah!  You are a delight to our whole family!  We love your creativity, wit and humor.  I'm thankful for your willingness to serve and help others.  I love that you are a hugger and am so very thankful you are my son!  I love you so very much!

Blessings
Leslie