Liam's birthday and party

On his birthday:

We went out to eat at a restaurant with a play place, then came home for gifts and cupcakes.

For the party:

we played trains and watched Thomas the Tank Engine while waiting for guests to arrive

(Liam had just finished a megatantrum and was finally allowed to come down to the party in this picture)

Photo credits go to Uncle Mike, who was nice enough to take over the camera for me.

Then we all colored our own helicopter blades

Then we took those helicopter blades outside and raced helicopter balloons

Then each kid got to pick a car.

And we played go-cart battle, a la Mariocart

The kids each got a balloon tied to his or her ankle. 

And they proceeded to try and pop each other's balloons by stepping on them.

When your balloon got popped, you had to make a pit stop.  

Will and I were the pit crew, and we kept putting on balloons until we were out.

After we were out of balloons, we ended up with a stalemate between three kids, who were chasing each other in circles, so we declared a three-way tie.

Then presents!

There was no rhyme or reason to this.

Mostly the kids jostled to the get close to Liam and sort of hurled presents at him until they all got opened.

And then we ate cake.

Then, not pictured, we played with toys and had some monster truck races with pull-back monster trucks that the kids got to take home with them.  They also got to keep their go-carts.