birthday weekend

last night we went down to paul's parents to celebrate his birthday. it was so much fun. and i FINALLY got to give him his present. Here's the progression of his birthday. this is him in the morning when he was on his way to work...tatum always sits closer to paul:
then after work we all went out to his parents to grill out and we all ate dinner with birthday hats on:

and then the elastic got to tom's blood supply and he got goofy:

the kids said tom's head looked like an ice cream cone:

then he got his present:

this is the look on his face shortly after he saw his jacket:

then he tried it on...still with his birthday hat on:

and after i took the picture we realized that the back was reflective.
then we had birthday cake...dawn got one with reeses peanut butter cups in it. mmmm:


then today we all went for a hike at garden of the gods. that of course was my favorite part of the whole weekend. i LOVE hiking:

that is pike's peak behind us to the right. the mountain to the left is cameron's knob. it's not bigger than pike's peak, it was just closer. so don't be fooled. pike's peak IS still the biggest mountain in colorado.
then we bee-lined it back up to church so i could do my first week of helping in children's church. i am helping with the 2nd to 4th graders and i, of course, sat next to the naughtiest boy in all of children's church. he could not be controlled by anyone. afterwards i said to the other leaders "ok, so since this was my first week, please tell me that kid was not 'normal' for children's church." they said he was not. he was also the biggest 4th grader i've ever seen. and by that i mean, i think he was a little closer to 6th grade than he was to 4th grade. then we went out to dinner with linda and denny, the couple that gave us all their granddaughter's old toys. it was so much fun but by the time we got home tatum was glad to get out of the car. *whew* what a weekend. and it's only half over. woooohooo!