Race to get through 2016

I am seriously doubting my ability to get through 2016 before 2107 is here. After all I take thousands of pictures each year, and that doesn't even include phone photos. Of course I won't know if I can do it until I try, so here it goes. Post 1 covering the first 9 days of 2016. Why just the first 9 days? Well, we celebrated Logan's 4th birthday at the beginning of 2016 and I was lucky enough to have a friend, Joe Allen, around to take lots of photos during the occasion. Well, let's dive right in.

Just a few photos of the first day of 2016. Some reading and apparently a marble run were on the agenda.

Let the decorating begin.

Luckily Santa brought Logan some Octonauts toys that served as decorations.

I made some Octonaut Hats.

Another yay for a room that can hold two tables. Normally a birthday party wouldn't be so big, but our cancelled cookie decorating party merged into the birthday party so we had lots of friends come celebrate with us. We did still do the cookie decorating too.

Pinterest saved the day with lots of free color page printables.

I made Logan's Creature Report.

Logan helped me make sure our kelp forest had lots of animals around.

Dad got to work on Pin the Patch on Kwazi.

Logan spent some time making an epic car track down the stairs while I decorated.

Then came the cakes. I made a chocolate one and the carrot cake below. I'm pretty proud so I took a few photos. Grandpa Jay gave Logan some more Octonauts toys for his birthday so we had most of the characters to add to the cake.

Next up was setting up the obstacle course. First they had to weave through the cones and jump the hurdle.

Next up crawl through the ocean ball pit.

Climb aboard the ship, steer it and escape via the onboard slide, roll a die and act like the sea creature that matches the die, walk the plank, and find a bandaid in the balloon filled bouncer.

Finally they had to save a sea creature in the blue water marble bin and put their bandaid on the hurt creature.

The stage was set!

After all of the games were over it was time to decorate those cookies.

We didn't forget the cake either.

Then there was the chaos left in the wake of the party. Luckily for me I had friends around to help.

That afternoon we went sledding with the Allen gang. We had a blast! I didn't get any photos of the ramp sledding, but I'll just mention that we all got to experience some air time and one of the sleds ended up cracking on the landing.

Topped off the big day with some reading. Thanks to everyone who came to celebrate our little man with us!