fire trucks and blue cupcakes

My big boy is three!!!!

And he really is a big boy. Eli is potty trained (Yay) and has a big boy bed too. He is 39 inches tall and is trying to eat more so that he can grow one more inch before we go to Disneyland in June (a surprisingly good motivation to get my boy to eat something-anything for dinner.)

We celebrated Eli's birthday on March 6th. See how happy he is?

Eli loved all of his presents. The coloring book is from Ella. The firetruck is from me. (As the one who buys all the presents I get to choose the best gift to be from me.)

Chris gave Eli this fishing pole. This was the first time he had seen the present since I am the lucky one who gets to plan these birthday things while Chris gets to work all the time. I was glad he enjoyed the present as much as Eli did. Sadly the $2 fishing pole lasted only two days before Eli managed to destroy it.

Eli cannot blow out candles. If you look closely you can see that his blowing technique is sub par. He ended up needing help to blow them out.

Eli wanted blue cupcakes for his birthday. He decided this at Ella's birthday party back in November because she had pink cupcakes. I was shocked that he remembered his request, but he was adamant that he get them. So I decided to use blue food coloring. And apparently I need to go back to preschool because I added blue food dye to yellow cake mix and made green cupcakes. Eli didn't care though because the frosting (white frosting plus blue dye) was blue.

A few side bar comments: Yes, Eli is wearing a tank top in March -we do live in Tucson. But really he had to wear this shirt because it has Spider-man on it. Also I am glad that he loves his firetruck. Really, I am relieved that I was able to give it to him. He started asking for one in January and I, luckily, had already bought him one in December. When does a mother's plan coincide with her son's desire? I should mention that it is not a good idea to let your son bring his toy firetruck on car rides since he will push the buttons that make loud fire truck noises and give you a panic attack when you think that you are being pulled over by an invisible police car.

my gymnists

Ella and Eli love to go to gymnastics. Eli has an outlet for all his energy, has learned to do summersaults, and is working on his balance on the balance beam. Ella has gained a lot of arm strength as she practices her hand stands and cartwheels. She is (in my opinion) impressively good at the balance beam.

They recently had an observation day and I took a lot of video. But I feel lazy and won't be loading the video for you to see (unless you request it). Here are the three pictures I did take:

See how happy he is to do gymnastics?

This is Ella on the balance beam. I thought the lighting was cool in this shot.

You can see some of the gym equipment in the background. It is a great facility.

I sure hope that we can find a gym in Corpus Christi.