Finley at 6

A few weeks after Finley turned six we finally got around to taking his 6 year old portraits. 

We always use these pictures to turn into little photo books for our parents for Mother's Day so we had to get these done before it was too late!

We tried out a new location: the Bog Garden. 

It was really pretty and fun, but the lighting was a bit hard because of all the trees and shade. Plus for the second year in a row we decided to take our pictures on prom night so we had to battle for our photo locations to avoid the crowds and having other people in our shots! We really need to plan better in the future!

Luckily we still got some good ones in! Now for a little survey with the birthday boy.

Here is a little bit more about our Fin man at six:

What do you like about school? PE with Mr. Rice

What don’t you like about school?  Work

Five things that make you happy: playing my video games, sleeping, buying characters (for Disney Infinity), birthdays, and building Lego's with my dad.

Would you like to play a musical instrument?  Yes, the trumpet

What kind of job would you like to have?  biologist

What’s the most important thing that you do? Listen at school.

What’s the best dessert in the whole world? Cotton candy (purple and green)

Who is your best friend? Juliet and Barrett

What kind of car would you like to drive? Honda

What’s the coolest place you’ve ever visited? Legoland

What’s the most exciting adventure you’ve ever had? Digging up quartz in my backyard.

What is the silliest thing you’ve ever done? Run and jump and be upside down.

If you could have a pet, what would it be? A lion. 

One thing you’re really good at: Playing my video games.

One thing you wish you were better at:  Doing math problems.

What scares you most?  Nothing!

If you had a million dollars, what would you buy first? All the video games in the world!

Finley has grown about two inches since his last birthday. He is the second to smallest kid in his class, but he doesn't seem to mind. He loves playing soccer and just started taking tennis lessons. He also loves to jump and frequently asks to go to the bouncy house. He is happy 95% of the time and is usually pretty easy going. Let's hope this continues forever! 

Finley has become quite the reader and has just started reading The Magic Tree House series all on his own. He is a very sweet, confident boy and is quick to make new friends. Even though he is getting bigger, he still asks us to cuddle with him at bed time and help him with getting ready in the morning. Now that he is six years old Finley is looking forward to going fishing and buildling a tree house. This summer he plans to play with cousin Gabi, buy a zombie strike crossbow and gun, and learning how to swim. 

We can't get enough of this sweet little boy! We love you Finley and Happy Birthday again! 

Minecraft Party

Last weekend we were able to have a celebration for our big 6 year old!

He has been really into Minecraft these days so that is the direction we went! Here is his creeper invitation. 

The day before the party we made some cupcakes that looked like Endermen. 

And cupcakes that looked like creepers. I used melted chocolate for the faces and 'painted' them on. It was a little messy and not perfect, but you get the idea. 

For these take home creeper Rice Krispies I painted the melted chocolate onto wax paper and then let them harden before putting them on the Rice Krispies. These were tricky as well because when I was taking the faces off the wax paper they kept breaking into pieces because I hadn't made them thick enough! Oh well, not a complete pinterest fail, they still kinda look like creepers right? 

Here were our goodie bags we put together. 

We bought rock candy to look like the gems, stones, and ore you mine for. 

We made bookmarks and Minecraft themed perler magnets. We also threw in the creeper Rice Krispies, some coloring sheets, and of course some home made Lego crayons. 

For the cake I went super simple and made a grass block from the game. I got this cute grass tip to use with the icing and I am so glad I did. It made a huge difference!

The bottom half of the cake completely fell apart when I took it out of the cake pan so I had to patch it together with icing before adding the top layer. Luckily it didn't fall apart until I cut it so that was good! 

We hosted the party at Bricks 4 Kidz again this year. They have a new smaller location inside an office building which was a bit strange, but we still had fun. We started the party off by doing some Lego spin art. 

And having a free play/build. 

Finley loves building things and then having races to see whose creation is the fastest. 

These huge Minecraft heads were a big hit!

To get things going each guest at the party had to introduce themselves and tell one thing that they liked about the birthday boy. The girls were always so thoughtful and had well composed answers while the boys would simply repeat what was said before them. This part always cracks me up. 

Then we divided into groups and had two stations. At one station the kids got the build their own Lego creeper to take home. 

So cute!

And the other station involved using Lego catapaults to launch Lego pieces at a huge creeper head. 

They had a lot of fun trying to hit the creeper and make it into the buckets. 

Here is Finley concentrating! 

We were very happy that Mimi and Pop Pop were able to join us for the day which not only included the birthday party, but also Finley's last soccer game of the season. 

Next up the kids took turn tweaking and creating these cars that when turned on would crash into each other. 

The goal was to create a design that would end up out lasting and pushing back the other person's vehicle. 

Grammie and Abuelo also joined us for the festivities!

Our last activity was a fun freeze dance. Watching the kids dance was also pretty funny. 

We had the snacks and treats in a separate little party area. 

I found some fun food ideas online and printed some labels to identify the "Minecraft" food. We had carrots, Swedish fish, melon aka watermelon, and blue jello cut into squares to represent 'water.'

Some pretzel sticks for sticks, Herseys chocolate for gold, and twizzlers for some TNT. 

Of course we can't for get the cake! Since Finley doesn't like to eat chocolate cake I needed to make lemon cupcakes which he really likes (he actually ate the cake part and not just the icing for once!).

I ended up decorating the cake with some of his Minecraft toys which made things super easy. 

And we decorated the tables with theses awesome paper Minecraft blocks that Auntie Michelle had given Finley at Christmas time. 

Creeper goodie bags all lined up!

We had a great time and were so glad so many of our friends could make it. 

Happy Birthday again Fin man!