Jacob's Birthday

Another delicious cake

In a lot of ways, Jacob's birthday looked a lot like Alex's birthday: we spent the day at Happy Hollow after church. Notable exceptions: some of our friends joined us at Happy Hollow and I went to Jacob's birthday celebration at school. Also the cake was chocolate, with Nutella buttercream frosting, in the shape of a 5, with monster trucks.

This year instead of taking cupcakes for their birthday treats at school, they took cheddar crackers and cheese. I made the crackers and cut them with the appropriate number shaped cookie cutters. The boys loved them. The teachers were thrilled - especially since there have been so many celebrations during this time period at school. The day Alex took his birthday snack there was even another kid in his class with a birthday celebration that day. There really is such a thing as too many cupcakes. The classmates - at least in Jacob's class - were less than impressed.

Birthday Circle in Ms. Kathy's class

In Jacob's class they do a special "birthday circle" and although family is invited, I've never gone. It's in the afternoon at a tricky time of year and frankly I don't want to mess with the regular school schedule any more than is necessary. But this would be the last chance to see it since he starts Kindergarten in the fall. The ceremony was very nice: the kids all sit in a circle and in the middle the teacher put a candle surrounded by cards with the months of the year. The birthday boy was given a cloth flower for each year he'd been alive and he gave each one to a friend that he picked. The teacher lit the candle(!) and gave Jacob a little globe. He walked around the "sun" while all the kids sang a little song about how it takes "12 months, 52 weeks, or 365 days" to get to a birthday. One friend put his flower into a vase and they talked about the things Jacob did when he was one. And the process was repeated up until he go to five years. It was very sweet. I had figured Jacob would want to come home with me but he decided he wanted to stay at school. Which was good because I wanted to go home and clean up! Jacob's best friends (Dashiel and Zane) and their parents were coming over for dinner and although I know they appreciate the chaos that is our house, I wanted to make things a little less chaotic.

We don't really do big birthday parties. I didn't grow up that way and with birthdays falling smack in the middle of the holidays it becomes just one more thing. But we do have one birthday tradition: the birthday person picks what is for dinner. Which in this case (for each boy) meant macaroni and cheese and hot dogs. Jacob added glazed carrots. (Yes, I did suggest the carrots, but had he said no I would have honored it!)

Again, many cool presents including the "football guys" which are basically toy soldiers who are football players instead of soldiers.