Shut the front door, my boy is 4!

I don't know why, but I'm pretty emotional about this birthday. It hasn't always been easy, but for the most part, being Gavin's mommy has been so much fun.  He really is such a special boy...he's smart, handsome, funny, well behaved (for the most part!), affectionate and sweet. He's such a great son, nephew, brother, grandson.  I think part of it is he's so big, but he's still so small.

This year we had Gavin's birthday at a bounce house and arcade.  The theme was Jeep, of course.  I made his favors, which were jeep sugar cookies, and his cake. 

The day of his party, I had to wake him up from his nap to go to his party.  He was pretty grouchy, and I was worried it was going to be a bad day.  But, my sweet boy bucked up and had a GREAT time!  He was so happy to see everyone.  He ran around like a mad man! I don't think I've ever seen him play that hard...his cheeks were fire engine red, and I had to make him take a water break.  He loved everyone singing "Happy Birthday" and all the sweets he ate! The minute the last piece of cake hit his lips, he was gone...bouncin' and runnin'!  After his party, we came home and opened presents.  He got such great presents and was so excited to play with them.  He went to sleep early that night and slept like a rock!

Water break...

All of Gavin's "loot"!

For his actual birthday, Gary took off of work.  We woke up and brought his present inside for him to find because it was too big to wrap.  It was a brand new "big boy" bike!  When Gavin saw it, he threw his arms around Gary's neck.  I can't remember if he thanked him or just hugged him, but it was a great reaction.  He wanted to go for a bike ride right away!  He rode his new bike around for a little while, but we had to come inside to eat and get dressed to go to the zoo.  Gavin requested blueberry pancakes for his birthday breakfast.  After pancakes, we got dressed and headed for the zoo.

 It was a PERFECT day for the zoo!  We walked around for awhile and caught the sea lion show.  Gigi and Alexis met us there.  Gavin was so excited to see Gigi!  Everyone else was pretty much invisible from then on. We went and played on monkey hill and got a couple of really cute pictures of Gavin and Emaline.  Then, Gavin decided to run down monkey hill.  He started off way too fast!  You could tell from his face that he couldn't stop and was scared to death!  Gigi and Emaline were standing about half way down the hill, watching.  Gigi saw the look on Gavin's face and did the only thing she could while holding a baby...she clotheslined him!  She literally stuck her arm out and tackled him bringing everyone to the ground.  Gavin wouldn't go down monkey hill anymore!  We saw the rest of the zoo, rode the carousel and played on the playground before we left.  Perfect day!

 

 

 This shall forever be known as "the incident on Monkey Hill...."

 

 

When we got home, I cooked tacos for Gavin for dinner.  After dinner, we lit his candle, stuck it in a strawberry cupcake and sang happy birthday.  He loved it! The rest of the night was pretty much the same as every night and my boy went to bed one year older.