Big Boy is FIVE!!!

We now have a FIVE-YEAR OLD at our house.  Older, wiser and suddenly able to do things that he "couldn't do when he was four...!"  We celebrated the big day with a K-State football themed party at our house with family and close friends.  All stemming from the fact that the weekend before we were able to go to a game as a family.  Ben is part of the Jr. Wildcat club that KSU athletics offers so he was able to meet Willie the Wildcat and even walk around the field pre-game... what a treat for an almost five-year old!

And since we have PLENTY of K-State gear, pulling together a K-State football party was pretty easy.  Decorations were mostly things we already had around the house for our YEARS of being faithful Wildcat fans.  I also put together a picture garland of Ben in all of his K-State gear over the last five years...including the day he was born!

We decided to have the party just two hours before the K-State game would be on and served game day food...burgers, brats, chips and dip, little smokies, etc...  And of course, a KSU football cake and cupcakes with player numbers on them (corresponding to the kids' ages!)

Everyone had a great time but unfortunately our Cats could not pull off a win that night!  We still cheered our hardest!



And here are some pictures of our birthday boy over the years...my how he's grown!!!

Happy Birthday to the biggest K-State fan there is!

 

 



A new family tradition

Two weekends ago, we decided to make the trek to Kansas City to watch our Cats play in the Big 12 basketball tournament.  It was meant to be a fun-filled weekend; basketball, family time as we were staying with my brother and his wife, and alone time for Matt and me (along with thousands of other basketball fans at the Power and Light district).

As usual, our boys decided to throw a bit of a wrench in things!  We started by making it just in time to watch the Cats play in the first round.

 They won so we were pretty excited for the next round!  The plan was to hopefully leave the boys with my dad and stepmom or possibly with my brother and his wife.  No such luck!  Both boys ended up with quite the stomach bug the next day so while my husband had a nice "date" with everyone at the P&L, I was cleaning up...well, you can imagine.

Luckily it hit 80 degrees that day because this is how Cooper spent most of Friday evening - poor kid!  I was just trying to imagine what people were thinking if they happened to walk by my brother's house and Cooper was standing at the front door in his (almost) birthday suit!



Saturday was a much better day for everyone so we gave bowling a try.  It was surprisingly not busy so we had a great time letting the boys get out of the house for awhile!  Excuse the shot of Ben in front of the bar area, apparently it's the only picture I was able to get of him that day!

Overall it was a pretty good weekend - just not one I want to replicate anytime soon!  I am hoping to make the Big 12 tournament a new family tradition however because both boys had a great time watching for Willie and doing their KSU cheer for everyone around!



Fiesta Bowl...

Matt and I started out 2013 by traveling to sunny Arizona to watch our Wildcats in the Fiesta Bowl.  The night before we left, it was -4 degrees in Iowa.  Needless to say, we were anxious to get to sunnier skies and a warmer climate!

The highs were only in the 60's which was apparently "cold" to the natives! Our car rental helper even had gloves on as he handed us the keys to our bright cherry-red convertible (only one of those things is true...!)

We stayed at a resort in Scottsdale and I must say that Matt did an EXCELLENT job booking this one! Since it was still close to Christmas, the palm trees and orange trees were still lit up with beautiful lights along the driveway as we pulled in.

We had a chance to explore Old Town Scottsdale for a few hours before the game and I made my poor husband take a picture next to a cactus. . . we did not notice the STOP sign until afterwards - oh well! Then we were off to the game.

K-State fans were EVERYWHERE and I haven't had that much fun tailgating in a long time!

And even though the game ended up as a total bust for our Wildcats, we had a great time getting away together. . . with 50,000 of our closest friends!

Lovin' Our Cats!

Our K-State Wildcats are having an AWESOME year!  As of today, our team is 10-0 and #1 in the nation! About a month ago, we were lucky enough to make the trip over to Ames with our best friends (Cylcone fans) to watch our team in a stadium different than what we are used to.  We got seats on the hill so that we didn't have to try and wrangle four young boys in the stands for 3 hours!

We actually drove over the night before and had just as much fun in the hotel rooms as we did at the game the next day. Our rooms were adjoining so once all the boys were in their PJs, chaos ensued before bedtime!  Aren't they fun?!?!

Tailgating in the rain

Blurry because he is JUST SO FAST!!!

Looking for Willie

Tuckered out after the game!

The boys were incredibly good the whole time and if we ever go again, we know the hill is the way to go!

Halloween...after the madness!

I'm obviously way behind on posting Halloween pictures...especially since these days if you don't have your children's pictures on Facebook by the time they go to bed that night, you are a "bad mom!"  Well, here it is two weeks later and I'm just getting around to it!

We had a Wild Kratt and a Wildcat this year!  Ben wore his Creature Power Suit from his birthday and Cooper wore a KState football player outfit we already had.

We got together with our good friends for some photo ops...especially since Ben and his friend's suit went together - they were the Kratt Bros! Then it was off to Trick-or-Treating!

We first stopped at Ben's teacher's house and that definitely got things started off right.  Cooper would not wear his helmet in the car but as soon as he realized that it was part of his costume and in order to get candy he needed to be in costume, he was more than happy to wear it!

Matt caught me a bit by surprise in this picture...but the others were blurry :(

Overall it was a great evening...my favorite Halloween so far with the boys!  As you can see, I was Cooper's super-fan!  We are still so excited our team is 10-0 and #1 in the nation!  Go Cats!!!

A right of passage...

Last weekend, Cooper got to do something that we've been waiting quite awhile to do with him. His first K-State football game!  I don't know who was more excited, Coop or Daddy!? We had originally planned on taking Ben but he came down with bronchitis and the beginning of pneumonia so we wisely thought that a college football game might not be the best idea for him!

So that left an excited Daddy, ready to take his youngest son to experience what every young K-State fan should be able to experience . . . a Wildcat victory!

Cooper did a pretty good job most of the game but started to get a bit restless during the 4th quarter. Luckily we had room for him to play with his cars in front of us!

He was also happily distracted by some nachos for a little while too!

We also got the much anticipated K-State picture with out little guy. Now to just get both boys to a game at the same time!