11 September 2023 - Happy, happy birthday to our best guy, Sam! It's kind of special to have a birthday in another state! And we packed in the fun! First off, presents! We didn't bring gift bags or wrapping paper (but we did bring gifts!), so we had to get creative in our wrapping. Cal suggested using our reusable shopping bags, which was a brilliant idea so that's what we did. Sam wanted us to hide his gifts, so we set the pile on Gregg's "desk" (aka ironing board) in our room and it took him a minute to find them. Then he dove right in to opening!
 |
| Cal made a few cute little paintings and game booklets. |
 |
| And she picked out something she knew he'd love. |
 |
| Minecraft legos! |
 |
| Yes! |
 |
| Cover Your Assets card game is one he loves to play with cousins Bradley and Grace and Ev. Now we can play as a fam! |
 |
| A pile of books. (As usual.) (Also in the photo, but didn't get one of him opening it: a STEM genius box kit.) |
 |
| A pixelated scripture case (with personalized scriptures inside) - he is 8, after all. |
 |
| A new disc! |
 |
| Birthday breakfast! (And poster - Cal and Gregg worked together on that and it turned out great!) |
After breakfast, we all hopped in the car for a day in Stowe. Gregg needed to be in the office getting things arranged for his conference this week, so we dropped him off and then headed to Shaw's grocery store to pick up a few items we needed. Then: the library. (Are you really surprised?) We spent a couple hours there while it was misty and moisty outside, reading and playing on the computers.
 |
| At Shaw's, Cal found the "perfect pumpkin" on display. |
 |
| Star Wars + LEGO + the library = 💓 |
 |
| An unusual reading position for Cal. |
 |
| This is funny because, yes, it's funny. But also because my friend Erin sent me a pic she found online that was another sign in another library that said essentially the same thing. So to see it in real life here just made us all laugh. |
 |
| Gary Schmidt's brand new book! I had started this on my kindle app on this trip already, but to find it on the shelf in hardback form was fantastic. I read a few chapters in a big cozy chair here in the library and it was glorious. (P.S. I finished it later this week back on my kindle app on my phone, and I just gotta say, it was wonderful! Told again from the perspective of a kid (this time 7th grader Hercules), full of heart, and hard things, and family and good teachers, and gardening and Greek mythology! And taking place on Cape Cod, which is close to where we are, made it extra fun to read right now! Gary Schmidt has done it again! I love his stuff!) |
 |
| Center Chains Disc Golf - a new one for us. Gregg has played here before, but it was super fun for Sam and me to explore. |
 |
| Hole 8 for the 8 year old! |
Just a couple more minutes down the road was our next stop: Ben and Jerry's! I mean, why not on a birthday, right?! We bought tickets for the next factory tour, and with the few minutes we had till it started, we played on the playground, went potty, and browsed the gift shop. The tour was fun and educational, and we got to sample some cookie dough balls and a surprise ice cream flavor at the end. But, of course, that wasn't quite enough ice cream, so we bought scoops at the shop, too. Yum! Cal got Cherry Garcia, Sam got Mint Chocolate Chance and I got Maple Walnut (an exclusive flavor to this factory and store only!).
 |
| How many pints high are you? |
 |
| The ceiling in the gift shop and the tops of the hanging racks match! |
 |
| The flavor lab was really fun - we got to taste the flavor of the day and see where all kinds of new and crazy combos are invented. |
 |
| Today's sample: Broccoli Cheddar Chunk! |
 |
| Just kidding! (But they said they have wacky flavors like that on April Fool's Day!) We actually got Dirt Cake, which was very much like cookies and cream and was delicious. |
 |
| New flavors on display. |
 |
| Ha! |
 |
| We love this place! |
 |
| Happy birthday ice cream! |
By the time we had our ice cream, Gregg was done with his stuff at the office, so we drove back to Stowe and picked him up. Then we drove up the road to Trapp Family Lodge's Disc Golf Course. We all played 18 holes there, and all agree that it's probably our favorite course we've played. It was super fun!
 |
| This course at Trapp Family Lodge was really interesting terrain-wise. Forests and fields and bridges and hills. Great fun! |
 |
| Cal doesn't usually like to play when we all play, so to have her play the whole course was a special birthday present, I think. |
 |
| Clover! Vermont's state flower. And fun to spot after we noticed it in the Ben and Jerry's shop. Haha. |
 |
| Second Hole 8 of the day. |
 |
| Can't stop. Won't stop. |
Those of us who had ice cream in the middle of the day were doing okay, but Gregg, who didn't have a mid-day treat, was pretty hungry by this time. It was time for dinner! We drove over Smuggler's Notch into Jeffersonville and got dinner at Burger Barn. We always forget that it's cash only, but luckily I had $30 in my wallet and Cal let us borrow $15 that she had brought along and we got our dinner paid for without a trip to the ATM down the road. Such delicious burgers! Yummy birthday dinner.
 |
| Burger bar and rootbeer! It must be a birthday! |
 |
| Cal's barn burger. Amazing! |
 |
| Sam got fish and chips - and there were enough chips to feed the whole fam! |
 |
| My Samuel de Champlain. I'm sure I've gotten this before, but I still love it. No, those are not tomatoes. They're cooked apples!! And a cranberry mayo sauce. So good! |
 |
| Gregg got the reuben burger. Always a good choice. |
Back at the condo, we facetimed with grandparents and ate birthday cake (Sam requested Texas Sheet Cake). A fitting end, to a pretty great day, celebrating this awesome dude!
 |
| He actually had this new LEGO kit finished before breakfast! |
 |
| Glad we could celebrate for a minute with the grandparents on the phone. |
And now is the part where I list all the super-Sammy things about our favorite boy. (I feel bad that I never got a birthday post up last year, since I got so behind in my blogging and haven't made up those few months yet.). Interestingly, a lot of the things on his six-year-old list still hold true today!
- He's a LEGO lover. He loves building and reading and collecting everything LEGO.
- He's a Minecraft maniac. He loves building and reading and watching and playing everything Minecraft. (Sometimes he'll even use his Minecraft time to watch youtube videos of other people playing Minecraft (I don't really get it, but whatever).)
- He loves the library. Any library. All the books, computers, friends, librarians, classes, clubs. All of it!
- He is awesome at disc golf! He can beat me on many holes/courses and has quite the beautiful back hand throw that is so impressive. He loves watching it on youtube with Gregg, too.
- He loves and excels at all the sports: He was on a baseball kick this summer, and soccer every evening for a while. Basketball at Grandma's. Biking. Running. Tennis. Badminton. Swimming!
- He's still got some speech issues that aren't super concerning, but we notice them. Still the lisp and some mumbling and stuttering. He can speak clearly when he remembers, so we just keep reminding.
- He likes to play card and board games with the fam again (there was a time when he'd rather just play something else by himself when we were playing a game).
- He's a math whiz.
- He's a great reader.
- He's figuring out spelling.
- He's still an awesome sleeper.
- He gets bloody noses fairly often, which is weird compared to Cal who has never had one, but very similar to my childhood, so I'm not worried.
- He can make delicious pancakes.
- He loves going to Activity Days with the boys in primary.
- He's getting better around dogs, especially if he has a little time to get used to them.
- He picks Star Wars every time he gets to choose the movie. And he absolutely loves the soundtrack (anything by John Williams, really!) - he'll sing it at random times during the day while working on other things.
- He's a super singer! I love to hear him sing in our morning time for school, so full of energy and enthusiasm. He will sing all the hymns in church, too, which just makes me so happy to hear.
- He's missing his two front teeth and I just love his pumpkin smile!
- A few things on his poster that he loves that Cal thought of and drew: Minecraft books, hotwheels tracks, donuts, disc golf, swimming/diving toys, endermen, chicken nuggets (oh yes! Def his fav food - orders it at nearly every restaurant we go to), LEGO
No comments:
Post a Comment