Miles’ actual birthday was supposed to be super low key with his big birthday party coming up this weekend with family and some of his favorite grown-ups. Then the big blizzard of 2011 (are we DONE talking about snow yet? UGH!) happened and his birthday transformed into the best little snowed in birthday ever.

It started out with Miles waking up to a room full of balloons. Of course it was still dark out so he said, “I couldn’t see the balloons, but I could feel them!” Here he is playing in them once we got the lights on.

I think waking up to a room full of balloons would be awesome. As a matter of fact, I’ll still do it when he’s a teenager and I bet he’ll grumble about it but secretly think it’s amazing.

The night before, John got out a Thomas the Tank set from the attic that we had purchased years before from a friend. We had been holding on to the rest of the pieces for a birthday or Christmas when he was old enough to appreciate the larger pieces. Here’s John’s masterpiece. It was seriously awesome. I honestly have no idea where we will store all of this. The coffee table is currently moved to the side so he would have room to build it:

It was like Christmas morning watching Miles discover ALL the new pieces and parts and how they all did special things, like a collapsing bridge, recycling center with working chutes and a tunnel with sound effects. He was IMPRESSED! He played for hours and hours, which was perfect for a snowed in day.

Miles smiles at the sound effects when the train goes through the tunnel.

John was snowed in with us too, so he took extra time to make waffles with strawberries and blueberries on top before he retired to our office to work a bit. Then Miles played some more and then opened more gifts. We stretched out the celebrating all day long. Here he is opening his gift from Grammy & Grampy and exclaiming, “This is just like what was at Evan’s house!” (He got a toy that he loved from his friend Evan’s house.)

Time to make cupcakes! Miles has a Cat in the Hat cake coming this weekend, but for this snowed in day, it was a box mix of Funfetti cake, chosen by Miles during a last minute grocery run before the storm. Thank goodness we had some on hand to thank our sweet neighbor who always clears our driveway for us with her snowblower. Yay! Cupcakes for everybody!

It was such a great day that I feel a little silly having a party for him this weekend after a whole day of birthday fun, but hey, it’s Miles, he deserves a whole week of celebrating!

Of course, Jocelyn was just a snuggly little sweet punkin all day as well. She has enjoyed watching brother bear slap the balloons all over the house.

So while everybody was freaking out about the snow, we were snuggled in having a blast. Now today? Today I was STIR CRAZY and dying to get out of the house and well, just plain crazy grouchy at one point. That’s another post though. Just had to share our little unexpected snowed-in birthday celebration. I have to admit, I always felt a little bad for Miles having a winter birthday. But hey, the bonus of that is there’s always the chance you’ll have a snow day on your birthday!