Friday Favorites: The Week We Celebrated Alec's Birthday

We had a good week; despite some very cold temperatures and a small snow storm.



We woke to clear skies and a completely thawed lake on Friday!  It's pretty rare to look out and not see ice in January.



We did a bit of school work and made up the frosting for Alec's cupcakes.  We were all ready for his friends by the time his "party" started and then we spent the next 6 or 7 hours visiting with friends.  The boys had just as much fun with their friends as I did with all my mom friends.





Even though he hesitated to call his party a birthday party everyone still brought him presents.  He got lots and lots of new cookbooks!


We spent the night putting together Alec's new rolling kitchen cabinet.  He wanted a special place to store all his baking supplies and believe me he has nearly enough to fill this thing already.



Saturday morning Alec wanted to make waffles so I quickly ran to the store and picked up a few ingredients.


We then spent a quiet day at home preparing for a party with his grandparents.  We got a fire going in the fireplace, cooked up a turkey dinner (with rice instead of mashed potatoes-- at Alec's request) and enjoyed a quiet night with our family.




We woke to a snow covered lake on Sunday.  Luckily we didn't get more than a couple of inches.  After spending a bit of the morning on snow clean up we decided to head out for a fun family outing.  We saw Jumanji: The Next Level (which we all thought was ever better than the first one!) and went to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory using a bunch of our Christmas gift cards.





We did our schoolwork on Monday and then Ian and I went to run a bunch of errands; picking out flooring possibilities at Lowe's, picking up Valentine treats for an exchange I'm doing, etc.

Tuesday we had a short day of school and Alec and I headed out to his karate class.  We spent part of our afternoon on Universal Studios' website checking out all that had changed from our last visit.




Alec had some placement testing to do at the school he's looking at attending next year and we had to be there at 8 in the morning on Wednesday.  He was pretty nervous and we have absolutely no idea how he did on the actual test but based on some of the questions he came across on the math portion I'm thinking he did really well.  We're both just so glad to have it behind us.  I did give him the day off from math, reading, and language arts since the test was heavily focused on those subjects and just asked him to work on Duolingo while the other boys and I tackled their schoolwork.  He went out for a Birthday lunch/ dinner with my mother in law after we spent our afternoon watching Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.  My younger two have informed me we have to watch all the movies again before our trip to Universal.


Ian had a dentist appointment on Thursday and while I had planned to do a full day of school with the boys we just could not sit in the house while our temps finally warmed up (granted it was only 40 out but since it was 4 on Wednesday this was a huge improvement!).  We donned some winter gear and headed out for a nice long hour hike in the snow after lunch and set a few subjects aside for another day instead.  I am so glad we did too as it was wonderful to get outside and soak in that fresh air and sunshine!



Comments

  1. Happy Birthday to sweet Alec! I just love fresh, crisp winter air when the sun shines. Hope you guys have a great weekend!

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    1. Me too! We got out for another hour hike today.

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  2. Happy Birthday to Alec! Your January looks similar to ours although we do have ice and snow now but not frigid temps. I will take that. ;:)

    I love that he has a kitchen island for his cooking supplies! There is a great You Tube channel that my friend got me hooked on yesterday and if he loves cooking, he may like it. NYT Cooking. Lots of fun videos. Also, Pro Home Cooks. Trying to watch while on a diet has been challenging but Alec may like them!

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    Replies
    1. I'll have to pass those shows along to him. He can not wait to break out his cart; it has a large tabletop that folds down that he can rise for working with dough and he's been looking up recipes for flatbread.

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  3. Looks like a fun time for him. Love his new kitchen rolling cabinet. Those cupcakes look awesome too. My oldest wants to go see the Jumanji movie next week. We just saw the first one on TV this week and we love it.
    www.chezmireillefashiontravelmom.com

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    1. We enjoyed he second Jumanji movie even better than the first one.

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  4. Happy Birthday Alec! What a lot of fun times you all had! I loved Wizarding World of HP in Universal! I'm jealous!

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    1. We can not wait!! We loved it so much last time and my younger two super fans weren't even big enough to ride hardly anything.

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  5. Happy birthday to Alec!

    Also, totally random, I don't know if I've ever mentioned this to you before, but when you comment on my blog I can't ever respond via email because your email address isn't attached to your Blogger profile. I've been responding to all of your comments directly on my blog so I don't know if you ever see them but I just wanted to let you know that I'm not ignoring you! Haha. Happy weekend, lady!

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    1. Oh, thanks for letting me know! I have noticed a few of your responses when I re-visit an old post. I knew you weren't ignoring me but I wasn't sure why I wasn't seeing the responses.

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  6. Happy birthday to Alec! I love his enthusiasm for baking, and that baking cart is awesome!

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    1. I just love it too so I have to encourage him any way we can.

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  7. Happy Birthday to Alec. It looks like he got some great cookbooks, and I love the cooking cabinet. All that snow is beautiful, and I bet you were glad to see temperatures in the 40's instead of 4. Have a wonderful weekend!

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  8. Happy Birthday to your son!! Looks like maybe your son might be a chef or baker....Great!! Thanks so much for stopping by!!
    Hugs,
    Debbie

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    Replies
    1. Yes, he is hoping to get into a local school that offers culinary arts.

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  9. Happy belated birthday to Alec. Hope he had a fab day.
    That snow covered lake looks so pretty!
    Enjoy the rest of your weekend. :) #MMBC.

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  10. Happy Birthday to Alec! I love that he loves to bake. The weather has been crazy for us too snowing one day, 40+ degrees the next. We still haven't been to Universal Studios but we want to visit! Have a great weekend.

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    1. I love that he loves to bake too; he's really pushing me to try new things in the kitchen too.

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  11. Happy Birthday to your son! I love that he has a passion for baking! Hope you're having a wonderful weekend!

    Jill - Doused in Pink

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    1. Thank you. Wishing you a wonderful weekend as well.

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  12. Happy Birthday, Alec! I love that kitchen island and need one for my house! Sounds like a fun week for y'all!

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  13. What a fun week! I'm so glad he had a great birthday!

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  14. Aww happy Birthday to your Son :) Looks like a tasty cake, yum!! Thanks so much for sharing your post with us at 5 Adorable Photos Of The Penguins At Twycross Zoo: welcome to the weekend link up. Hope you can join us tomorrow.

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