Gabe is 5......that's right....I said 5

Rob and I can hardly believe that Gabe, our little Robert Gabriel, is 5. What a strange thing that is. The night before his birthday (Tuesday) we were reminiscing about the night before he was born and how surreal of an experience it was. He was a scheduled c-section and we knew that before 8:00AM the following morning we would be parents and there would be no turning back. We we so anxious and excited at the same time. My mom sent us to dinner at Carrabas (an expensive Italian restaurant) and then we went to a dollar movie. When we finally got home we were exhausted but scared to go to sleep because this was our very last night alone.....FOR ETERNITY. So.... we stayed up until 11:30PM playing tetris together on our GAME BOY's even though we had to be AT the hospital by 5:30AM. When all was said and done....there was our little Gabe. What a sweet baby he was. We loved him then and we love him even more now. Ahhhh.....a walk through memory lane............. Sigh............... Anyhow....

Gabe had a fun day. We went to Chuck E Cheese (super cheap because we didn't eat there), went for a bike ride, Gabe on his new one, and enjoyed cake and ice cream after a German Pancake dinner (even I was sugar overloaded and that says a lot).

Today was Gabe's b-day party with his friends from pre-school, friends from our old ward, and cousins. We had such a good time. I was stressed out but tried to pretend to be relaxed (yeah, I know...what a joke). When it was all said and done, there was a huge mess to clean up (including dirt all over the white carpet), but the kids had a good time and Gabe was happy (did I mention he got a ton of presents?....Why did we even bother with ours? I should have just set up a gift registry for his bike and all of his guests could have bought it for us......just kidding, really!)

All-in-all it was an enlightening experience for me. I realized something. I don't dislike kids as much as I thought I did. In fact, being in Utah with all of my nieces and nephews and then throwing this b-day party (both of which I was surrounded by A LOT of kids), taught me that I actually enjoy being around them. Don't get me wrong.....I still can't stand some of them, including my own sometimes, but.......yeah......amazing.....who would have ever thought. Enlightening.....simply enlightening.

Back to Gabe......he will start Kindergarten in about a month and a half and after that....who knows........maybe he will conquer the world.