Joey's (Early) Birthday + Early Christmas = Lots of Presents!

Since Joey's birthday was just a week away, we had decided that we should take advantage of the fact that all the Shibata's were together and have an early birthday party for him the day after Thanksgiving. He didn't seem to mind too much and I'm sure he won't mind having another celebration next week. I'm guessing that the whole birthday concept will be confusing to him, since he was continually asked on Friday, "Whose birthday is it?" and the answer considered to be correct was "Joey's!" even though his actual birthday is still a week away. He is catching on to the fact that he is supposed to say, "Two" when asked how old he will be, even though he routinely says "Three" or "Five".

All of the kids (and some parents) patiently waited until after lunch to enjoy Joey's birthday cake, an M&M Dairy Queen cake with a toy Lightning McQueen on it. What could be better?!? It took a few tries, but Joey did successfully blow out his own candles.


Then it was on to the presents, which he had been talking about since arriving at Grandma and Grandpa's two days earlier. He had lots of help and he was definitely not the only one very excited about what was being unwrapped. Needless to say, there was plenty to entertain the kids later that afternoon.



Since most of the Shibata's will not be together on Christmas this year, it had also been decided that Thanksgiving would be a good weekend to bring and exchange Christmas presents for the kids. Since we were on a present roll (and quite frankly the presents pack and travel better unwrapped), it was determined that we should go ahead and let the kids unwrap their Christmas presents as well. So, after naps and supper, it was on to more destruction of festive paper and bows. It was a flurry, as I'm sure you can imagine, of kids opening, seeing what they and their cousins got, and parents trying to keep track of what was received and from whom while wondering "How in the world are we going to get all this stuff home?"





And so, there was even more to entertain the kids for the rest of the weekend. And, I think I only heard once or twice a question about there being more presents. [Sigh]