Sam's 4th Birthday Party!

Sam was supposed to celebrate his birthday last weekend, but an icy winter storm led to cancellation. We just didn't want to risk people getting hurt on the roads. So we picked up his Batman birthday cake and took it to Grandma Janet's.

The nice people at Monkey Joe's allowed us to reschedule at the last minute, so yesterday we were at Monkey Joe's with eight wild four year olds. The only casualty was a busted lip (Sam's).

I always hear about all these boys that Sam is friends with at school. His class is pretty much all boys except for one girl who is now his "girlfriend". Every day I hear the tales of their adventures playing Avengers. When I pick him up at school he is always playing and happy, but I have never really seen them in action.

Oh.my.goodness.

It is such a joy to see Sam with his buddies. They are a great little group of kids, and they just ran around the play place in a pack, switching off which kids were buddying up for different bounce houses. They were all just so happy and delighted and excited to be there together. I so much appreciated the sheer childish delight that I saw. It makes me so happy knowing that every day he goes to school he is spending time with kids he really enjoys. And a lot of them will be going to his same elementary school!

We made it through the party without incident. Only upset moment was when his friend who is our neighbor burst into tears. He was at a disadvantage not knowing the other kids besides Sam, so they turned on him as the "bad guy". After trying to get Sam to tell everyone he wasn't the bad guy (at that moment Sam was in tears about his busted lip) poor F broke down crying. I quickly made all the kids at the table tell him he wasn't the bad guy and the tears subsided. Whew. Crisis averted.

Happy Birthday, my Sam. You are such a crazy ray of sunshine, happiness and optimism. You balance out the rest of us in the family that may have a tendency to be a little darker, sensitive and dramatic. You live your life with a constant mischievous twinkle in your eye - and while this is sometimes leading to trouble, I wouldn't change you for anything!