Peter's Birthday

Happy Birthday Peter! Peter is a big 3-years-old today, and we had an opportunity to party on Friday. We first took a trip to Annapolis to watch Navy play Princeton in baseball, but the weather wasn't quite as lovely as the forcast had predicted. The sky became totally overcast, and a tremendous wind was whipping off the water. The boys toughed out 3 innings in the cold before retreating to the van.

We celebrated when we got home with a giant cookie cake, and Peter's new Bounce Around. Unfortunately, the craziness of life right now prevented me from organizing a "real" party where we could invite lots of kids, but thank goodness we have four boys--it's a party everyday in this house.

This is the beginning of birthday season in the Brown house, with Tom's birthday coming up on the 25th, and Matthew Alasdair's first birthday on 4/2. Come by and visit any time in the next two weeks, and you're certain to be served somebody's birthday cake.

Ian's Award

I'll take back everything I've said about people with those "My child is an honor student at...." bumper stickers on the backs of their cars. Ian was the recipient of the much-coveted Principal's Award at St. Paul's Lutheran School. I might be making up the much-coveted part--maybe they give them out like candy--but what can I say. It's cool to have an award winning child. Ian received this honor for the encouragement and help he gives his classmates, especially when doing puzzles. Go Ian!

A new way of getting around

As with all our children, our little Matthew Alasdair has to have his own way of doing things. Instead of traditional crawling, he prefers to scoot. Many of you will recall our Peter's method of scooting before he could walk. This is a little different as you can see. His brothers like to call him "monkey boy."

March Weather

While we enjoy 75 degree weather today, let's not forget that less than a week ago, we had the biggest snow of the season. The snow was up to Peter's knees (as you can see in the second picture) and it was still falling when we went out to play. Tom used our slide as a launching pad for the improvised sled (a plastic storage tub). The snow was very powdery, so it didn't make great snowballs at all, but we had a good time anyway.

An Andy Cantata

In this particular picture, Andy has constructed a performance of a cantata. The Lincoln Logs are organ pipes, the trains on the piano are the chamber choir, and the trains on the bench are the small orchestra (he really did specify "small" orchestra). Typical 6-year-old behavior, right?