Gingerbread houses

I seriously love the way baking homemade gingerbread houses makes our house smell. We invited a few friends over for the big kids once weekend then the next Monday Bruce had a few little preschool co-op friends over to decorate some more with him.

I love how much Bruce loved vets to help me bake

A little motley looking but I think I prefer that to the store bought look

Ellie and Alexia

Pretty sure Ellie ended up with more buttercream in her mouth than on her gingerbread house

Kenny making his santa

Hot cocoa makes gingerbread decorating that much better // Bruce working hard on his gingerbread man

Felix and Carolina

The two and three year olds on Monday

Such a fun little group

Bruce was definitely more interested in eating the candy than decorating this time around

Patrick had fun leaning and reaching whatever he could get his little hands on.

 

Kenny's Pokémon Party

I can't believe we have planned ten different birthday parties for Kenny as of this year. I always said I'd make them alternate years or something, but then I realized planning parties is one of my favorite hobbies so the madness continues year after year. One of the other main reasons we continue the parties is that it really seems to help Kenny with friends. It's difficult to maintain close friends in miami with everyone living so far apart and the craziness of everyone's schedules. Having his birthday parties seems to give Kenny extra confidence in the friend department. This year Kenny's latest obsession is obviously Pokémon. With the release of the new Pokémon go app its become a pretty widespread obsession among kids.

Kenny ready for a fun night dressed as Ash (a Pokémon trainer) with his pikachu phone in hand.

I call it the Pokémon explosion cake. It was really fun to assemble and quite different from cakes I'd done in the past.

Our little pokecrew minus the sleeping bulbasaur.

I turned Kenny's favorite treat from chocolate fashion into poke balls

Pokeball cake pops

Gotta catch em all

The primary president, sister Belnap, crocheted this amazing ball for Kenny.

My favorite party elements are always what the kids help with. Kenny had been working on his Pokémon drawings for the weeks leading up to his party and the made a fabulous backdrop

Ash and charizard // playing Pokémon go with one of his berliners

Cake details are always my favorite

Grandma Patty has managed to be here for all of Kenny's birthdays. I'm not sure how that tradition will keep going with so many more grandchildren!

The cake was real pretty inside with red velvet, chocolate and vanilla layers, but I never got a great picture of it.

The cups up front are banana pudding cups Kenny asked for from the magnolia bakery bake book.

Party on!

Kenny loves a captive audience, and Lucia was just eating it up.

Playing Pokémon games

The night ended in a backyard movie per Kenny's request. They watched ghostbusters, which all the other parents were surprisingly ok with. As we watched it we realized it may not have been the best choice for kids...

 

Meow

Ellie wanted to host a black cat party with some girls from her class to kickoff the Halloween season. It was so cute seeing her so excited for it and having her help me with all the details. Ellie was losing sleep the nights leading up to it because she was so excited. Haha.

Ada, Ellie, Alexia, Lucia

Decorating sugar cookies

Cute cute Ellie // what fun is a cat party without a little mouse to snack on?!

We love our donut cat I grew up with that grandma Patty made

Sprinkles!!

Alexia