Camp Lincoln || turning 6

i know everybody says this every time one of their kids has a birthday, but...how did this happen?? i seriously feel like he skipped straight from 3 years old to 6. and now kindergarten is on the horizon. barf. he's the only one of our three that i've got to stay home with & it's been hard & wonderful & oh so quick. i say this almost daily...i'm going to miss him next year.

we're still doing the smaller birthdays-just as we did with the girls last year. at our home. immediate fam. we don't have a lot of room to entertain so keeping it small is as much an intentional decision as it is a necessity. it's nice & intimate.

when we were thinking about birthday theme ideas, i realized i had thrifted a pretty good collection of camp-ware...enamel pans, iron skillet, oil lantern & such. i also had a lot of natural items from around our house to add to an overall camp theme...logs & feathers. i have been trying to use items we already have in a creative (and ultimately cost-effective) way. soooo, with all this camp related goodness, we decided to host Camp Lincoln. he loved the idea (thank goodness).

as far as food: camp food. hotdogs (on the grill) & slim jims. we had fun with some of the other food items. emma came up with some creative labels for all our food. grapes = river rock, cheetos = campfire, pretzels = firewood, hawaiian punch = bug juice, oh & the golden grahams labeled "Don't Feed the Bears." she's precious. i love it. lincoln also decided instead of a traditional birthday cake (i am all about trading in traditional) he wanted to have donuts. um, perfect camp food substitute! so we did a donut cake & by special request, he had his own "snowy mountain" donut cake...complete with trick candles. (hehe) and just for fun...a make your own trail mix station.

as far as gifts this year, we surprised him with a helmet just like his favorite football team (marshall thundering herd), gave him a football signed by the football team & took him to a marshall university basketball game. he legit thinks he's part of the team. i guess that's what we get for naming him lincoln marshall.

nerd alert: he was also asking for a star wars lightsaber & a sonic screwdriver like doctor who. yeah. we nerd out. and thankfully his aunt is right there with us. she just got done binge-watching all of the doctor who episodes on netflix. she came up with the idea to actually create his own tardis. if you don't know what i'm talking about...google it.

ya know, it couldn't be easier to find out things you don't know than just googling it. i'm not sure why people don't do this more. people are always asking what the phone number is for this or that. or what time such & such is open. GOOGLE. IT. i flippin google EVERYTHING.

but i digress, she gave the tardis plans to my mom (Mrs. Crafty) & they made it from cereal boxes. painted it tardis blue & everything. ah-dorable. then she ordered him a sonic screwdriver and even played the tardis sound on her phone like the doctor himself had left it for lincoln. he had to go to the back deck to find it. love it. love them. happy freakin birthday, man.

also, please appreciate the lovely photo of lincoln below after he literally ate a mountain of powdered donuts. eh, you only turn 6 once, amiright?

i mean, there's no living with him now.

go herd.

happy birthday bubby.