a nice day, basketball and grant's birthday part one

a day you can be outside in february without a coat is a day worth celebrating. swinging, playing with sticks and just running around enjoying the sunshine are some of the favorites. it makes me wish for spring-

not to worry-the ball they were using was as soft as a cotton ball. ben is in no danger :)

basketball season is coming to a close-emily had her last game a week or so ago. grant still has games to play for piper and a GABL tournament. basketball season is a good one-i like the fast pace of the games and the energy packed into the short 45 minutes.

 grant's 9th birthday falls on president's day this year. they have some time off of school-so i want to take the opportunity to go down and celebrate at the ranch house. sharon and tom are usually in texas for his birthday-but this year they decided to stay for the winter. we had a traditional lockwood family party complete with lots of basketball and football playing. grant didn't even eat any pumpkin pie or ice cream because he was too busy.

 he did take the time to open a few gifts.

 park and kim gave him a bag of plastic fruit. kim explained that when she had watched the kids a few weeks ago she was trying to feed ben the packet of squeezable baby food i had packed. she wasn't familiar with this type of baby food and was trying to get him to suck it up like a straw. she said grant gave her a look that she would never forget and asked 'what are you doing?'. she proceeded to explain that she was feeding ben and asked 'how does your mom usually do this?' he gave her another look and said 'she squeezes it in a bowl and uses a spoon.' this is a long explanation for why she gave him the plastic fruit. she enjoyed that look so much she was trying to get him to do it again :)

za

zach and lexie came with us after the party and spent the night. the girls had fun exploring the next day. more pics to come...