Benjamin is 2!!!

I think I'm still in shock over the fact that Benjamin is 2 years old.  2.  TWO!  That's insane, when did this happen and how can I make it stop??

Though in all actuality he's been acting like a 2 year old for quite sometime now, ha :-)

For lunch we took Benjamin to McDonalds and got him a happy meal, a tradition we started last year.  Normally he gets a McChicken sandwich ripped up into pieces to look like nuggets!  He was excited to be on a date with Mommy/Daddy and brother and loved his new toy car.

We also took him to get a birthday balloon and of course, he chose an Elmo one!

Benjamin shares a birthday with his best buddy Micah so we planned to celebrate together again this year.  Though it was going to be a bit more low key since we had a 10 day old baby baby that had joined our family!

We headed over to their house for homemade pizzas and playtime, then it was time to open presents.  Benjamin got some new Thomas trains from Mommy, Daddy and Jonah and he was pretty excited!

He also got some really cool helicopters and airplanes from his friends, a cd of verses put to music, some Thomas bath squirters, lots of new DVD's, a Thomas bath robe, $5, a new book, M&M's and a Pez dispenser.  Life was pretty good for this little boy!

Afterward, it was time for cake.  Or in our case sugar cookies.  Because our child is slightly mutant and doesn't like cake.  Luckily, Peter's mom was gracious enough to make the dough and roll out the cookies for me while she was here.  Trying to find time to do that in the less than 2 hours at a time that I'm not feeding a baby was almost impossible so thanks!!!  I did try to make them special though by ordering some new tractor, airplane, helicopter and train cookie cutters since that's his latest obsession.  They were by no means at all exciting visually but he loved them and they tasted great so that's all that mattered.

We sang happy birthday to both boys individually and ate our grub!

Then it was time for the Dads to take the oldest 4 of our 6 kids swimming. 

wow!  Our 2 families sure are filling up a couch quickly :-)

Benjamin was soooo excited.  I didn't get a picture because Kristen and I stayed at her house with our babies, but he had a blast.  We've got great husbands to take 4 kids swimming on their own :-)

I'll do a post soon on what Benjamin's up to physically/developmentally/etc, but for now I'm just loving my boy to pieces.  He can be quite the stinker, but I just adore him.  He really is the sunshine of my life and I thank God for letting me be his mama.

I snuck in on the night before his birthday and took one last picture of my boy as a one year old. 

I may or may not have completely teared up as I was leaving the room.  When did this all happen?  But, I also left the room with a heart full of love and joy.  Happy Birthday Benjamin, we love you to the moon and back, with all our hearts and sooooooooo much.