We have a birthday, shout hooray!

Can you tell I am in the Primary by the title up there?  Joshua's 14th birthday was this Monday and I don't know where the week has gone.  I can't believe it is Friday in a few hours...AHHHH!  (I have so much to do!)  And remember my goals in my last post?  Get to bed on time?  HA-HA!  I think I might have to save them for 2013.  It has been so busy this week!

Anyway, on to Joshua's Birthday.  He had a pretty low key birthday this year.  I didn't take very many or very good pictures, but here is a quick recap.

The celebration started the night before.  Joshua had requested ribs and homemade fries for dinner.  It was a labor of love.  :)  The ribs were actually easy as pie.  I borrowed a deep fat fryer from someone at church and we made some seriously yummy fries.  From all my years of watching cooking shows and reading blogs I had heard that they key to crisp golden brown fries is to double fry them.  We did a 5 or 6 minute fry at about 325F and then took the fries out until the oil was 375F.  They were then dunked for 1-2 more minutes until they reached golden perfection.  We hit them with some sea salt and they were so delicious! We had Grandma and Grandpa join in the celebration...

After dinner the cousins all came over to help celebrate.  Abigail's birthday is the day before Joshua's so this was actually her REAL birthday.  They didn't mind sharing the spotlight together.  Since she turned 16...yes, you heard me right, SIXTEEN, and Joshua was turning 14, I put 15 candles on the chocolate cake.  These two have lots of fun together.  I am so glad they are not only cousins, but also friends. 

Max and Lauren.  Such cute hats!

I took a picture of the whole clan at the party.  However, there were some serious underwear shots that I had not seen when I took the picture, so to protect the innocent, they are not pictured here.  

In one month there will be seven more cousins added to the mix.   We can't wait! 

The morning of Joshua's real birthday just seemed like a regular old Monday morning.  (Which are usually not our best mornings.)  We decided that to make up for it we would surprise Joshua when he came home from school.  The younger kids get home about an hour before he does.  They made all kinds of birthday signs to hang on the wall to greet him.  Then they kept running out side so they could see when the bus was getting close.  

Michael spotted the bus..."Here he comes!  Run!"

It is quite a trek up to the top of our cul-da-sac, so these guys had to wait behind the wall for a while. 

Our sweet decorations...(Surrounding our Thanksgiving Thankful Tree that my sister Heidi made us.)

Joshua pretty much loved it. 

That night we went to one of Joshua's favorite restaurants, "Pizza Pie Cafe" and then we came home and opened presents.  He received books,  a new ski helmet, money, clothes, a tub of Huckleberry Reeds Dairy Ice Cream, and the best present of all from Luke....left over Halloween Candy.  THANKS, LUKE!

Happy 14th Birthday, Joshua!  We sure do love you!  He is definitely a full-blown teenager now.  Pray for me. 

(Just kidding, he is actually a really great kid.  However, if you do want to pray for me, I will totally take the prayers.)