Charlie's Fire Station Birthday Party

In case you're wondering, yes - I did wash Charlie's "2" shirt so he could wear it again on Saturday :) We had Charlie's party at the fire station, which is great because it's free and so fun for toddlers. Charlie LOVES fire trucks and was so excited to see them up close.

 The birthday party was basically a tour of the station, so the firemen showed us all kinds of neat things - here the kids got to see the parts of the fireman uniform when they go out on a call. The ambulance did have to go out on a call, but luckily the fire trucks were there the whole time for the party.

 

The kids got to try on the uniform - 

 

And they got to ring the bell -  

 And of course climb up into the driver's seat of the fire truck - 

Fireman Eli:

Fireman Charlie -  

Happy birthday boy!

 This fireman, I think his name was Steve, showed us all kinds of things on the different trucks.  

Charlie was his usual wiggly self and didn't always stay with the group for the tour... my dad was good about wrangling him in.

The kids loved pumpking the water from this can - 

 

Tired boy...

Gavyn showed up in the cutest dalmation costume, so cute for the fire station! 

After the tour, we sang to Charlie and had cupcakes.

I ordered these cute cupcake wrappers and fireman hats/dogs toppers from Meri Meri online. I made a yummy chocolate cupcake recipe from Martha Stewart. I love Martha recipes and I love homemade cupcakes. Delish. (I made this vanilla buttercream frosting for the top)

This was so do-able - we kept it short and sweet (though the tour took a full hour!!) and kept the party at the station, rather than going back to our place afterward.

The group of kids - kind of a funny mix since most aren't Charlie's exact age, but they're all kids who are nice to Charlie in the church nursery or other places (he seems to hit it off more with girls than boys, probably because they don't fight over the same toys). I always stress about who to invite, but in the end, I decided six families was plenty.

Back at home, we had lunch with my family and opened a few presents - 

My parents gave Charlie this darling car transporter toy (by Melissa & Doug). Both he and Eli love playing with it.

I have a hard time taking down our holiday cards. Maybe I'll break down and put them away this weekend :) I guess it is a month after Christmas after all. We love looking at all of the fun pictures, especially of those friends or family who live far away that we don't see very often.

My parents and Gram went in on a scooter with us for cute Charlie. He is always stealing Eli's scooter when we're at playgroup, so he was VERY excited to have his own. Green is his favorite color. Today we were at the church gym for playgroup and Charlie was so cute, scootering around super fast. He looks so tiny on there but he's really good at riding it around.

Here is a picture of our family room after Ben put the treadmill together. The box and stuffing from it made everything a huge mess. Ben and the kids built a fort with that box while I was gone for a few hours running errands, but I knew we had to get rid of the box after that day because we could barely move around the room. 

I'm determined to put stuff up on the walls now. It's been way too long and I keep putting it off!! The bookcase near the sliding glass window is down in our basement storage area, holding the toys that are out of rotation (they used to be piled on the floor in one of the storage rooms). 

Hooray for a way to exercise in the winter. I's so nice to have the option to walk or jog inside at home if there isn't time to go to the gym, though this mainly was for Ben--It's crazy expensive at the downtown Chicago Loop gyms, so this works better for him.