Ryker's Birthday

Ryker scored. His birthday this year was one of the coolest ones we've had around here, and we know how to party! First off, he got TWO cakes! He wanted an American flag airplane cake for his birthday this year. My mom (who begged for things she could do to help make the party a little easier on me--they get a bit busy sometimes) made two 13X9 cakes and a huge thing of frosting. I started cutting up one of the cakes into an airplane and was able to make the whole thing out of just one cake. What to do with the other cake? Well, I'd had two ideas for how to do an airplane cake and Ryker wanted the one where the cake was shaped like an airplane, so I used the second cake for my other idea:

Then he opened his gifts. He's been really enjoying playing baseball with Daddy lately and Raelin/Mimi & Papa got him a tee-ball bat and ball. He'd been using a regular metal bat that's way too big and heavy for him. Hitting things is also something that helps him with his "sensory diet." Good choice!

Do you remember those toys where you would hammer pegs through a board back and forth from one side to the other? He got one of those from Grammie and Granddad--another great sensory toy. He also got several books, more balls and TWO sets of Trio blocks (we love these blocks!) and an intricately wrapped bag of candy (Layers and layers of wrapping made this a super exciting gift to open, much to the delight of everyone watching--Ryker is SO funny! He would get all excited, the suspense would build... and then... another kind of wrapping! He would laugh and so would everyone else and he would dive into the next layer of wrapping. It was great!)

Then for the grand finale, we took him upstairs to his room that had previously looked like this:

but now looks like this:

With lots of help, we turned Ryker's room into "the jungle room." LOTS of sensory activities going on here, and a whole lot of fun. In case the pictures don't show everything very well, I made a swing hammock that's convertible from a laying down position into a sitting position. Then there's a climbing rope hanging down in the center of the room. There's a rope ladder going up one side of the room and monkey bars across the ceiling. Oh, and we painted the room green and light brown (colors that are supposed to have a calming effect) and Ryker didn't notice until someone mentioned it when he was almost all the way up the rope ladder with his face less than a foot away from the wall! He said, "WHOA! You guys painted my walls!?!?!?!" He's so funny!)

In the near future there will be rock climbing hand-holds going up the wall at the other end of the monkey bars. We put a couple of bean bag chairs in there for jumping on or laying in (both good for sensory input). We have a couple of other ideas of things we might add later on down the road, but for now, that is the jungle room and the kids LOVE it (who wouldn't?)!