Andrew Birthday Party Number 2

Andrew's family party also had a Treasure Island theme. The collage below shows the main treasure hunting activity.

I made a treasure map. I cut this into pieces which I hid around the kids room. First they had to find the 12 pieces, then we put it together. The kids followed the map to find where the treasure was hidden. They had to go outside through the laundry and then came back in through the ranch slider into the lounge(the photo top left shows them coming back inside) before heading down the stairs to the garage where again we had hidden metal rings in the sandpit to be exchanged for edible treasure.

We also played Pass the Parcel.

Andrew is wearing his new bumble wings he got for his birthday in this photo.

Here is Andrew's Treasure Map birthday cake.

Andrew's party Number 1

In a crazy moment I decided that we would have a preschool kids birthday party for Andrew and also a family party on the same day. As Andrew is into pirates and treasure maps at present we had a treasure island theme. Here is the story of his kids birthday party.

We started by decorating pirate hats and treasure coin and pirate biscuits.

This was followed by morning tea (served in little treasure boxes). Then it was time for birthday cake and singing "happy birthday" to Andrew.

We then down to the garage for a treaure hunt in the sandpit. The kids dug for metal rings which they were able to swap for edible treasure. We didn't get any photos of them actually digging.

We finished with playing pass the parcel.

Treasure chest birthday cake

Daddy and Mummy made Andrew a treasure chest birthday. We were rather pleased with our effort so we have given it a separate blog post.

Here is the finished cake.

The surprise comes when you cut the cake open to find the treasure.

Now how was this done. It was mostly Daddy's idea. We started with a loaf tin shaped cake. We cut both ends off to form a base for the cake. Then we put a cavity in the cake by first cutting a square about 3 cms deep and then put a slit in each side to go through where we had cut the square. Then we were able to lift the piece of cake leaving the cavity as the photo below shows. We added the piece we had removed to the ends to form a base for the cake. We did have to cut some cake off to make it level.

We filled the cavity with lollies. Then place the base pieces on top and carefully turned it over and placed on the serving plate before icing it.

Lego words

The other day Andrew said he had made an "S" out of train track. Mummy went to have a look but she couldn't see it. Howeve later that day She and Andrew made the letters that spell house together as you can see below. Mummy needs to work out how to make the other 21 letters in train track and which ones you can't make out of track.

Andrew's birthday

Andrew turned four on Wednesday, where has the time gone. Here are a selection of photos taken on Wednesday of Andrew opening and playing with his presents.

When he got in the morning there was a selection of presents wanting for him. The open card on the right end is from Rachel. She made it for him. She didn't want to draw on the front only in the middle.

Playing with his new "turn" [table] for his train track. Apparently Aleesha has one just like this one.

Another train set.

Andrew got this tool set from Great-grandma in the mail on Wednesday. It is a tool set with a drill and screwdriver that" work". Andrew is enjoying playing with it. He keeps telling me that things are broken so he needs to "fix them".Rachel likes to have a go when she gets a chance.

We gave Andrew some more Lego. He wanted Daddy to help him build just as Daddy was about to leave for work. Daddy said he would when he got home from work. At 9am Mummy got asked how much longer before daddy got home. Mummy's response was after playgroup, lunch and Rachel's sleep. Andrew then said "That's a long time". When Daddy got home Andrew wanted to start build then. Here Andrew is putting some pieces together.

Guess what this is?

Andrew made this structure this morning. He came and told me that he had a made a ... for me to use. Can you guess what this might be for?

Wisdom of Andrew

We had a couple of interesting conversation in the car today...

First, Andrew was wondering if Uncle Murray's foot was being fixed by Handy Manny. We explained it was healing on its own, post surgery, by a surgeon, not an animated handy-man.

A little later...

Andrew (obviously recalling a conversation at the dental clinic): How many teeth have I got?

Mummy: Twenty.

Andrew: And on the top?

Mummy: You've got ten teeth on the bottom, and ten on the top, and that makes twenty. They're your baby teeth, and when they fall out and you'll grow new ones in their place.

Andrew: Why?

Mummy: Because that's how God made you.

Andrew: To Fall Apart?

Rachel's birthday party

A couple of weeks ago we had Rachel's 2nd Birthday party. I thought I should blog about this with some pictures. We had a butterfly theme. So we had Butterfly dress ups, decorated butterfly biscuits and of course a butterfly cake.

The photos in this collage were taken just before people arrived and our kids were all dressed up as butterflies. In the ones with them on the mat they are pretending to be sleeping. Andrew was snoring loudly because butterflies snore.

Here is Rachel opening her presents. She knew what she should be doing.

Andrew and I had made some butterfly biscuits so all the kids(except Joe) helped to decorated the biscuits. An activity I would do again at another party as it worked.

Of course we had to have a butterfly cake. Mummy is pleased with her effort. Andrew decided we needed to use pink icing.

Here is Rachel trying to blow out her candle. I like the expression on her face. I am holding her arms to stop her putting them in the flame.