SURPRISE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bennett turned 10 this year, and I can't believe it.  He was really sad, because all he wanted to do for his birthday was get together with his cousins in Highland, Alexandra and Gabrielle, who we rarely see.  We just couldn't make it happen in time for his birthday, so Bennett was feeling pretty glum on his birthday.  He was being a really good sport about it all, but I could tell he was sad.  You may have noticed that we have lots of fun with birthday parties at our house, so he was bummed that we had nothing planned.  Bwa ha haaaa!!!  Little did he know I had a little trick up my sleeve!  A surprise birthday party with all his buddies!  Amazingly, nothing gave it away, and it was the ultimate surprise!  I sent him over to Natalie's, and she kept him downstairs in the basement playing x-box with Jade until I sent her a text to sent him up to the canal to look for Owen, who had supposedly run away mad.  Ha ha.  Here are all his friends, just waiting with silly string in hand for him to arrive:

Finally we heard him come riding up the street shouting for Owen.  As soon as he reached the canal he was blasted with silly string.  "Surprise!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" they all yelled, and he really was surprised.  It was so cute.

There was a lot of silly string involved in this incident.  Like 15 cans or so.

Trying in vain to escape!

The aftermath was a big, fat pain to clean up, but oh so worth it.

Sequoia is one of Bennett's best school friends.

They found a clue up by the canal that led them on an Egyptian-style treasure hunt.  Here they are in the shed, reading the second clue, which led them to...

The treehouse, which led Bennett to...

The roof of the garage!

The kids were waiting for ancient Eyptian relics to be handed out.

Their last clue armed them with flashlights and a map to an ancient Egyptian tomb.  Dun, dun, dunnnn.

The tomb happened to be in the basement of our church!  I don't know if that's church-approved, but I kept it pretty tame just in case.  Here they are in the basement of the church (pitch-black), with their flashlights.

This is the tomb of... some Egyptian king.  There was a mummy and everything, but they just took the treasure and got out of there as fast as they could!

Bennett and his golden treasure...

Only a couple of brave kids stuck around to look at the mummy:  Cole and Aidan Murray.

Spooooookyyyyyyyy!

I had decorated the walls with drawings done in gold paint pen like this:

And other Halloween/ Indiana Jones-ish stuff too:

Here they are dividing up the treasure:

And back home for presents and cake.

Bennett gave Sequoia this Barbie for his birthday, and Sequoia gave it back for Bennett's birthday!  

Jack gave him some cash in a baby diaper.  Yucky!

The lone girl at the party...

Bridger Michaelson and Bennett share the same birthday!

The 3 Amigos from school:  Mitch, Bennett and Seek.

And Bennett's choice for dinner:  Texas Roadhouse.  Yummy!

I'm in love with these pics of Finn!

Bennett's favorite gift was this monkey puppet.  It just makes me so happy.  Maybe because I just watched "Being Elmo."

Happy birthday to our amazing boy, Bennett!  We love you so much!