Anna helps with the frosting on her birthday cake for the party

We are into the first week of October now and that means only one thing in our house: Anna’s birthday is almost here. This year Anna decided she wanted to do an ice skating party. She invited all the girls from her first grade class as well as a few other select school friends and we headed to the DU ice rink late on Saturday afternoon.

Skating at Anna’s birthday party

We had about 16 kids join Anna on the ice, some were complete beginners while others had skated many times like Anna. But everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, especially Anna who was so excited all day about having her party.

Anna and her friends at the skating rink

After an hour on the ice it was upstairs for some dinner and cake. Anna chose Chipotle, so the food was good a hit with pretty much everyone. We all sang Happy Birthday, Anna blew out her candles and we all enjoyed some of Marcy’s delicious home made vanilla cake with vanilla frosting, per Anna’s request.

Just after Anna had blown out her candles

By 7pm it was all over and we had to leave. The DU staff were fantastic, they were all current students and they were friendly and very efficient and proactive. Most importantly, Anna had a great time.

Anna about to taste her birthday cake

Jude has been very patient with all this attention on Anna, much more so than in previous years. He really gets it this year, that the attention will move to him after Anna’s party but right now Anna is the center of attention a lot of the time.

Enjoying the ice at the DU hockey rink

This weekend wasn’t all about Anna. Jude had his regular soccer game on Saturday and flag football on Sunday. Their soccer team had their best game of the season and recorded their first win. Jude played quite well, but more importantly he had a good time.

Then today Jude had his best game of flag football ever. He was on fire. On the second play of the game Jude took a handoff all the way to the end zone for a touchdown. On their next possession Jude caught a pass and scored a key first down. Then shortly after that he scored another touchdown, this time on a pass, and he had to evade several defenders after the catch to reach the end zone. He also had several key defensive plays, two of which saved likely touchdowns. Jude’s team won and his coach named him MVP of the game. A good way to wrap up the weekend.