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Welcome to the KingZoo and Funny Farm, where we learn to live, laugh, and love together. Here you'll find snippets of life in our zoo, parenting tips we've learned along the way, reflections on shining God's light in this world, passions in the realm of orphan care, and our journey as parents of a visually impaired child with sensory processing disorder. Have fun!

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Birthday traditions

My oldest turns seventeen today. For him I think it's anticlimactic; sixteen was an important one, eighteen will be, too. Seventeen just kind of falls in the middle. So why is it that this birthday makes me feel so old?

Our family birthday tradition is to start the day with donuts (because we all need a sugar high to go along with the birthday buzz, right?). Since Andrew's role has always been as guinea pig in this parenting thing, I guess he'll also need to be the one to let us know how many candles constitute too many candles for a donut.

Seventeen is apparently not too many.

As in many families, another King family tradition is that the birthday child gets to pick the meal and dessert.

As I've observed through the years, the desserts have gotten less complicated, the meals more complicated. My teens don't ask for themed birthday cakes anymore. Instead they ask for desserts like Monkey Cake, Dirt Dessert, or apple crisp, all of which are much less time consuming. But while they used to request simple, inexpensive meals like hot dogs or hamburgers, now they choose homemade stromboli or steak with mashed potatoes.

No problem! Anything for the birthday child!

Age 4, Baseball was his interest

Age 5, He wanted to be an astronaut

Age 6, The year he was into bugs

Age 16, The problem with Monkey Cake is that it's best eaten warm, which of course, melts the candles.


Happy Seventeen, Andrew. Oh, and I am really sorry about that orthodontic appointment scheduled for today. Whoops. I hope you can chew your steak tonight.
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3 comments:

  1. LibraryDragon/StorykeeperMarch 13, 2012 at 9:16 AM

    What a great post. Thats not fair about the appointment. I'm guessing you are teasing. What memories he must have of all the great birthday celebration.

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    Replies
    1. CindyMarch 13, 2012 at 9:21 AM

      Unfortunately, he does have an appointment today. It was one of those situations where they needed to make an appointment within a certain time frame and we were having trouble scheduling. We'll pray for very little after-appointment pain.

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  2. Linda BMarch 13, 2012 at 12:12 PM

    What a trip through the years' memories, so cute then so handsome. Seventeen is on that cusp of bigger change I think. Maybe that's why you're sad about it. Sixteen is still around, just getting the thrill of driving, etc. But seventeen-on his way somewhere. Happy Birthday to Andrew. And-we call that 'monkey cake' monkey bread & have it for breakfast. It looks great with candles so that'll be a new thing for us sometime.

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