As always, once December hits things start happening quickly. For starters, we were approaching Reese's fifth birthday. We have a picture of Sarah and Callie on her last night as a four-year-old so we wanted to capture the same moment with Reese. There is a lot of excitement in this picture.
For her birthday dinner Reese requested spaghetti and meatballs. Apparently this is not because she knows how to eat it neatly but because she loves the taste. And with Sharon and Chris in the house she certainly wanted to ham it up. That is without a doubt something Reese has mastered in her five years.
After dinner Reese had the opportunity to open up presents from family and friends sent from all over the country. This magnetic map of the United States came from Kate and Ashlynn, which provided a great visual aid when talking about where all the uncles, aunties, cousins, and grandparents live.
In the Bowes household you get your first friend birthday party at the age of 5. Because Reese's birthday is in December we coordinated an indoor party at The Mad Potter here in Lexington. Reese's birthday extravaganza included Olaf, hot cocoa, and all the fixings to turn a cupcake into a snowman. On top of that everyone got to paint their own mug.
This was also the first time that Callie got to help out her little sister and all of her friends at a birthday party. She did a great job making sure that everything was ready and that the little kids had the help they needed with all the different projects.
We had reserved the room for two hours, because we figured it would take an especially long time for the kids to paint their mugs. Much to our surprise/dismay, they tore through this activity in about 15 minutes. Apparently 4-5 year-olds don't exactly take their time to make sure every area is covered, and you can forget about the recommendation for 2-3 coats of paint.
Thankfully we had another activity planned for the group so that we didn't have to call for an end to the party after 20 minutes. Each kid could pick from marshmallows, candy corns, pretzel sticks, chocolate chips, and icing to use to form their ideal snowman. There were quite an amazing array of interpretations of this theme. The kids did seem to enjoy the project, but enjoyed even more that they got to eat their creations.
The party seemed to continue at warp speed until we were looking for anything that might extend the celebrations to at least an hour and a half. Sarah decided it was the perfect time to use the slo-motion video function on her phone to capture the kids jumping together. So in the picture here she is showing them the video, not taking a selfie.
The good part about ending early on this day was that it was during basketball season and UK was playing. In other words, most parents did not mind that they could head out early and catch more of the game. And that meant Reese and Callie had more time to put the finishing touches on their mugs and reflect on the fun they had had over the previous two hours.
Another Bowes tradition is that when you turn five you can finally have chewing gum. Outside of that one time in Chicago over the summer, which was certainly a special circumstance, Reese had not had any gum. But here, on Saturday, December 12, 2016, upon finishing her swim lessons, she finally achieved gum chewing status.
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