The last of my sons
is now 16 years old.
When Jake was a little boy we called him
"The Little Prince"
because he reminded us of, well,
the Little Prince
in the way
he thought about things
and did things
and his blondish curls
and because he was
our littlest prince.
The last son.
And he is now 16.
Working on becoming a man.
When we lived in Virginia
I came up with a tradition involving
what I called
The Birthday Bunnies.
I cross-stitched some bunnies
and made a banner with them
and would make a card for the birthday person
and hang it on the banner.
(Abbie's card this year)
When Nick was going to turn 16 I started a new tradition
with the Birthday Bunnies
along the lines of the
12 Days of Christmas.
Only this was the 16 Days of 16.
So every day leading up to the 16th birthday
the Birthday Bunnies would bring something:
16 oz. of hair gel
15 oz. bag of potato chips
2 tee shirts for 14 dollars.
You get the idea.
It is kind of hard work coming up with things.
And can get expensive if I'm not careful.
Sometimes I have to be
quite creative
and really stretch the connection.
But its always good
for a laugh.
The First Day of 16,
which is the actual birthday,
is always
1 Money Tree
with lots smalls bills rolled up
and tied to the tree.
It has been a fun thing
for Nick, Sam, Fred,
and now Jake.
This year Abbie made a card
(yipee! a daughter I can pass
the card-making torch to!)
about how money doesn't grow on trees
-except on your 16th birthday...
Jake's birthday
dinner-of-choice
was home made pizza
(I made 5)
and he ate it delicately
for the picture
I tried my hand at making this cake
except with chocolate frosting
(more on this later).
And Jake made his wish
and blew out his candles
but most of us were too full
of pizza
to eat cake last night!
We played a few rounds of "Pounce"
and had a few laughs
and enjoyed our
Jakester-Meister.
It was a good celebration
for our
not-so-little
Prince of a Son!
