Chef Liam is 5!

Liam is my little chef. He loves to help me cook. So he decided that for his big number 5, he wanted a cooking birthday party. It was really fun. My mom helped me make chef hats for each of the kids. I love the way they make Liam's ears poke out. Like a little elf. Each chef got to make their own pizza, just the way they wanted it. They worked hard to flatten their dough. I put a little dish of flour on each table so they could add a pinch to prevent the dough from sticking to their little hands. A few ended up with a quarter inch of flour on top--yuck! Liam, Zak, and Daniel turned the flattening of the dough into a drumming session. It was pretty funny, but pretty dusty! It was fun to see what they each thought was a perfect pizza. Daniel and Liam went cheeseless (can they really be related to me?). Caleb put extra cheese on his, no meat (that's more like it). Liam insisted on olives and pepperoni. We also had mushrooms, pineapple, and canadian bacon. We had 2 kids choose to make pizza without sauce. In fact, one just had dough--I guess they just wanted bread. While the pizza cooked (in our oven as well as two great neighbors') we played some cooking games. First the kids had to carefully get ingredients (marshmellows) to the bowl without spilling them (if they fell off their spoon, they had to start again). We had a good laugh watching some kids totally competative, some who could care less, and lots cheat (mostly holding the marshmellow on with a finger). We also played a tossed salad game, where the kids had to throw food (Liam's play food) into salad bowls.

The kids all seemed happy with the way their pizzas turned out. When the meal was over we sent the kids on a treasure hunt. The treasure was a bag of treats that each of them used to decorate their own cakes.

Liam had a lot of fun with all of his friends. Since the kids all decorated their own cake, our traditional family birthday cake had to wait. Usually, we cut the cake into a shape of something that the kids especially like. This time when I asked Liam what he wanted he told me a 'chef cake'. I asked him to clarify for me (a cake in the shape of a chef??). He explained that he wanted a cake that was tall...the kind a chef makes. He also said it had to have strawberries on it and a dinosaur. What!?

We ended up having the missionaries over for his birthday dinner. He asked for mashed potatoes, salad and lemonade. He didn't want the chicken, but I told him it was mostly for the missionaries. What a crazy kid. We love you Liam.