Birthday boys bash

Today we celebrated the men of our house.  Marty turned 37 yesterday (much to his disgust at being truly "late 30s" now) and our baby Luke decided he is so not a baby anymore....he is now 3. Last night Marty played wii with the kids for some fun time, Kate won at bowling (she is really good at it) and Luke had fun boxing with daddy!!

Then this morning We started off the fun by opening his present from us to keep him busy before the party. We combined his two favourite toys and got him dinosaur duplo!
I don't know who had more fun playing for the next hour, him or his sisters...but the proof that the toy was a success is that I went off and read my book for half an hour! 

Then it was off to McDonald's with some family and friends, where it was so packed we couldn't find a seat.  Then I noticed the empty (locked) party hire room.  I did my best sweet talking and smiles for management and they let us use the room....ahh...quietness in McDonald's on a Saturday. Nice! We sung to Marty here, and had yummy gluten free cake.....but Luke was NOT impressed that daddy was blowing candles out on HIS party day, so we redid the candles for him to take a turn (good thing too, no candles allowed at aquarium!).  

 Luke is able to hold up 3 fingers for his age when asked, a new clever big boy trick to show off.  He was so excited, telling us for days "EVERBODY (cue big arm circles on this word) coming to my party!!).  Well, it was like we had everybody there today, I added up 21 kids on the invite list, but due to sickness etc etc, it was more like about 12 kids and 16 adults in our aquarium group! 

We met up with the rest of the party crew at the aquarium.  We have joined up for a year pass, which is pretty much the same cost as going along twice in the year.  We had decided over a year ago on this plan (to go for his party which already was paying for half the pass!), it will be a fun rainy family day option to have with our 3, who all loved it there.  We hadn't been on a paid outing since our last trip to Auckland, so it was very very exciting! 

Highlight of the aquarium would have to have been Matt the diver, who interacted so well with all the kids, who giggled as they "fed" him party food, and made signs to hold up so he could read them, telling him it was Luke's birthday! After the fun, Matt found us when he was back in uniform to give Luke a high 5 for his birthday and to speak to the star struck kids, thanking them for being so much fun.  This kind of attention made me really glad we got the year pass. 

Luke loved his dinosaur cake and his awesome presents, and seeing all his little friends and loved ones in one spot.  It was all very special for our wee man and I loved watching him enjoy it.  While Marty had put the presents and food back in the car, Luke had been racing around in the shark tunnel - when he reappeared he looked at the now empty spot and said "hey, where's my party gone!?"

After all that fun, we popped by the golf course to see Gramps finish (and win) his golf game and to have birthday hugs all round.  Home for baths, baked beans on toast and all is silent now at just 7:30pm as my tired happy family settle down....thanks everyone for an awesome day full of shared memories.