Celebrating More Birthdays

Sunday after worship we headed down as a family to Tampa for a family birthday celebration for Grandmommy, Uncle Kelly and Aunt Barbara. For the last couple of years, Uncle Kelly and Uncle Nam have hosted the September birthdays at their house on Lake Magdalene. That way, Grandmommy who cooks for everyone else's birthdays, doesn't have to cook for her own! They were kind enough to include my mom in the invitation so we got a chance to spend some time with her as well. Literally, Uncle Kelly and Uncle Nam live about 4 houses down and on the other side of the street from where my mom grew up on Lake Magdalene. While the neighborhood and the houses look completely different, she loves to go back and see her old stomping grounds. 

The kids all love to visit here because the yard has koi ponds in the front and back and inside there are two cool staircases. This time we just drank in all the tropical Asian touches in the yard. Between visiting their house and soaking in the smells at an Asian grocery store, we could almost pretend we were back in China. 

Lunch was awesome and then it was time to celebrate the birthday people. They each got special cupcakes and then the rest of us split a small regular cake and a cheesecake wheel. We got Grandmommy a charm for her grandchild bracelet with Davis' name and birthdate.

And then we just had fun hanging out. Some of the group went for a walk around the neighborhood to the duck pond. When they got back the kids played charades and then settled in for a movie. Davis got some snuggle time with cousin Micah.

Parker's turn at charades - falling down off a snowboard, as demonstrated in the video below. 

And we played show and taste with food. When we mentioned trying lychee fruit in China and avoiding the durian fruit, Uncle Kelly pulled this out of the refrigerator. Not quite sure what it was called, but it almost tasted like a pear. 

Before we left we took some time for a few family pictures out in the front yard. 

Our gracious hosts for the day.

Brothers!

The Allen cousins.  

We had a wonderful day of family celebrations and time spent together. Next family birthdays to celebrate are Wesley and Daryl in November when we're home for Thanksgiving! And someone will be celebrating a big milestone birthday........