We began the day with bacon, eggs and bagels at home, followed immediately by presents, of course - when you let the kid choose when to open his gifts, he's not going to choose to wait all day! Aidan received some truly terrific gifts - an RC Lego train from Grandma Margie, a book about the Grand Canyon - complete with cool activities - from Danielle, the set of 5 Fudge books and the Lego Crystal King set from Grandpa and Grandma, a very cool electronics set from Aunt Melissa and Uncle Ryan, and from Dad and Mom an Indiana Jones Lego set, and a few Cars the movie toys. He's very grateful and having so much fun he hasn't turned the computer on for two days.
Grandpa and Grandma got here shortly after breakfast, and spent the whole day with us! Yay! We drove to the Otsego area to the Gilmore Car Museum to take Aidan's birthday portraits. We'd planned on the beach, but we're having a spell of unseasonably cool and wet weather here in Michigan, and the beach just wasn't the ideal location this weekend. Gilmore turned out to be the perfect place for pictures...Jim took about 550 shots, the best of which are below. We stopped for lunch on the way home at Jimmy John's in Wayland.
Back at home, we chilled for a while, Aidan worked on Legos for a bit, and then we went to Craig's Cruisers. Loads of fun. On the indoor track, Aidan and I drove single karts and Papa gave Esme a ride in a double kart. Then Esme took a spin in a kiddie kart outside, while Aidan and I went on the outdoor track. It must have been a good day for it - we ran into several of Aidan's third-grade classmates! After karting, Jim, Aidan and I played laser tag. It was very, very cool.
We headed to Pietro's for dinner, where our waiter, Bob, entertained us all handsomely. He was really funny and even had my shy, unassuming parents laughing and making silly comments. Aidan had fettuccine alfredo. We came back home for dessert - Aidan's requested chocolate chip cookie and blueberries - and then Grandma and Grandpa had to head home. We let Aidan stay up playing with his Legos and electronics set until his birth time - 8:08 pm - when he "officially" turned nine years old. What a terrific birthday!!! We love you, pal!
