Birthday celebrations

Today, Ty woke up and ran into our bedroom and shouted "Hey, wake up! It's my birthday!"

We had such a fun day with him today! We started the day out at Hobee's with his birthday twin Jaimi (Ty's possible future mother in law) where he was thrilled to be able to order pancakes with chocolate chips. We headed straight to "The Jungle" in San Jose which is just a piece of heaven for two little boys. It is a huge play area...with nets, and tubes to crawl around in, a few ball pits, slides, etc. We set them loose into the play area and would go searching for them if it ever went too long without seeing them surface. It is so much fun! We made it home just in time for naps (and even the birthday boy took a nap after all that playing). After naps, we opened presents (and then Ty rode his new bike around for a bit) and then started watching his new movie "Beauty and the Beast".
We took a little break from the movie to go in and have Ty's dinner of choice: beef stroganoff, watermelon, and corn on the cob. Ty ate his own corn on the cob, begged for Scott's (which Scott ended up giving him since he wanted it so bad and, after all, it was his birthday) and even finished up Cam's. This kid LOVES corn on the cob.
Back to the movie to let the food settle.
Then paused the movie again to go in for cake. Ty asked for a strawberry cake with strawberries on top this year. Honestly, I let him pick any cake he wanted and thought he would totally go for the chocolate amazing looking ones. He really wanted the strawberry cake. Then we walked to the candy aisle where I told him he could pick whatever he wanted to put on top of the cake. After looking a minute he simply said "I think I'd like strawberries on top". I will take it!! Halfway through the week he said he wanted me to make the cake look like the Iron Giant. So I did my best and felt glad that when I asked him to come look at the finished product he could at least tell what it was :)

Man, I love that kid. He is so good. While we were at the restaurant this morning, a lady tapped me on the shoulder and said "Your kids are so wonderful. You should be very proud."
She couldn't have picked a better day to remind me what truly obedient, kind and just genuinely good kids I have. Especially that Tyler. He sets such a good example for Cam and he wants so deeply to do the right thing. We are so blessed to have him in our family!