Happy Birthday Bean!

While we were in Michigan, my baby turned 4. Get the kleenexes. My baby cannot be 4 already.

It's hard to have a birthday on the road, but he was happy as can be to celebrate on the farm with his cousins and Grandma and Grandpa.

In fact, David and I suggested all going to a movie and he refused, stating, "I just want to be here."

Having Uncle Jon visiting that morning helped, too...

 Did I mention my baby is...4?

And there were presents! Lots of presents!

 Spidey Grandpa sneaking in on the fun!

Brothers.

And cousins!

And cake, oh my!

It's pretty awesome to be 4.

 Grandma had this Darth Vader piñata stored up for a looong time. We thought it was quite fitting for Ian to use it for his birthday, which had a theme of "every theme imaginable"...before we traveled I took him to Party City and let him pick out whatever he wanted for his birthday. He had spiderman and Monsters University plates, transformers napkins in 2 different sizes, and his crazy party hat. 

Happy little man. Take that, Pinterest. 

Ok, back to the piñata.

 Sticking with the history of all piñatas throughout generations, it ended in chaos.

But the piñata story does not end there. Fast forward to the last day of our trip. It is approximately noon. We are planning to leave before dawn the next day. Ian is showing Uncle Jon and Sarah his cool piñata from his birthday. At some point, his little 4 year old brain thought, "Wouldn't it be cool to put this on my head... 

 ...and BE Darth Vader????"

And it was cool, until he tried to use the force on the plastic adirondack stool, causing it to flip over seconds before he tripped and fell on the leg of it...busting his cheek open for all to see his chubby little cheek fat. A smooth visit to Sparrow Hospital's pediatric ER, and he was the proud owner of 3 stitches and a story you really couldn't make up if you tried.

Never fear, this brave little 4 year old (who never cried once at the hospital until we got in the car and he wanted a banana...and I didn't have one) was back on the farm and playing kickball that evening! Is this what 4 is going to be like?!