What a Day for a Three-Year-Old!

Question: If Unicef and every other child psychologist/developmental expert says that the first three years of a child's life are the most important, then does that mean that I'm pretty much done at this point? Like, no significant harm will come if I just kind of slack off from now on, right? :-)

Okay, I jest. (Or do I?) But hooray for my big/little three-year-old!!! Here's a recap of his special day:

Weston was, I'll admit it, less than thrilled this year for his traditional birthday-morning-photo (heh heh):

But after a little while, he perked up for party time! I decided to have a casual "playdate party" this year, with just a few of his little buddies. I was pleasantly surprised that he was a fantastic host to them, with nary a yell or squabble. (Could the Terrible Two's be lessening already??)
Don't you just love that playdate insanity?? (Aww, look at Tim! That's Lucas in his lap, the son of a coworker, who was the youngest invitee and who is super cuddly once you win him over.)

And then it was time for snacks! On the menu...? Well, Cheetos and fruit snacks, of course (two things that Weston was SO excited about), along with some other snacks and a few veggies for the grown-ups:

Yum.

And then presents!! This is the first time that we've had a party where his little friends bring presents, and I realized that it's adorable. All of the kids are so eager to see what's in the bags!

Voila! His ridiculously giant Star Wars cake!! (What do you do when the birthday cake is twice as large and twice as expensive as you expected? Why, freeze half of it for your husband's birthday in March! Brilliant.)

Weston was pumped about his giant cake, and he attempted to blow out birthday candles for the first time. That last pesky candle held on for a while (despite trying to spit on it at one point), but he conquered in the end!!

Caaaaaaaaaake!

More yum.

And we got a birthday family photo, too! Huzzah!!

After everyone left, we had a family pizza party for lunch (pizza being yet another super unhealthy favorite food of Weston's):

Still more yum:

And finally... the family gift extravaganza! (I realized at about 11 PM the night before that we only had wedding gift wrap and Christmas gift wrap. So, because the wedding stuff is all shiny and expensive-looking, I went for the Christmas stuff. Hahaha! I love having a super-low-maintenance child who is still oblivious to my shortcuts.)

Happiness is.... a new, giant sword:

...a crazy Police Robot playset (that's FINALLY out of our closet after all these months, thank goodness):

...(not so much a book about becoming a big brother):

...a little cash register (which allows us to "check out" now when we play Grocery Store, instead of theoretically stealing all the play food):

...and finally, the piece de resistance, a package from Gangy, who knew EXACTLY what Weston wanted for his birthday:

Behold the Beloved Cookie Toy:

And behold the Ice Cream Toy:

Few things have ever made Weston so happy:

As a matter of fact, I'm probably going to do a whole blog post about the true nature of obsession, after witnessing Weston's behavior over the past couple months:

Ah... what a happy ending.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, FELLA!!! :-D