Double Boy Birthday

Birthday parties always stress me out.  I get worried about whether anyone else will come and then whether everyone including the birthday boys will have a good time.  So, in order to make my life and everyone around me's life a little less stressful, we decided to just do one big birthday party this year.

Since both boys have recently started to get really into drawing with chalk on the driveway and other artistic endeavors, we decided to have a big art party where everyone would get to do a bunch of art activities.  We had canvases to paint, a driveway to decorate with chalk, sock puppets to make, scratch off ornaments to make, and a big cardboard rocket ship to decorate with all manner of stickers and markers.  I even put glitter in the sandbox and worked with the boys to make a backdrop where people could dress up and take silly portraits.  We were ready to have some fun!

So, on Saturday June 1 about 30 people invaded our little house including both sets of grandparents.  The house was cleaned within an inch of its life and balloons had been hung in every little corner we could find.  They boys were excited and the celebrating was on!

It actually went very smoothly and a good time was had by all.  Evan immediately paired up with his friend Nathan, whizzed through every art activity (only half completing most), and then asked me what else there was to do.  Fortunately, they managed to find things to do for the rest of the party.  Benny found his buddy Izzy who will carry him around at any request, so she worked with him to have lots of art fun.  Of course, his favorite was the glitter sandbox.

We feasted on rainbow fruit skewers, rainbow goldfish, and hot dogs that could be topped with toppings in every color of the rainbow (of course).  Ian's beautiful cake creation for this year was a layered cake covered in chocolate ganache.  He was disappointed because he tried to make multicolored paint splashes on the top of the cake and they didn't turn out as he wanted.  However, he still got the gasps from the crowd when he cut into the cake and everyone could see the six layers of different colors that he had managed. The boys loved it and devoured it quickly.

Even though it's a lot of work to bring everyone together for these parties, it's so much fun to see all of Evan and Ben's favorite people together in one place.  The boys didn't mind sharing their big day at all, and I think this might turn in to a nice tradition.  However, I am very glad I don't have to worry about birthday celebrations until next year!

Happy birthday to Evan and Ben!  Here are a few of our favorite pictures from the big day!