Hugo is 5

Per usual, our attempt to keep birthday craziness in check resulted in four seperate birthday celebrations for Hugo. But who's counting?

Pre-Party Daddy Trip to Munich

Paul and Hugo went to meet our friends from Portland - Claudia, Jorge, and Lucia - in Munich for a couple days. Hugo was a little bigger than the last time we made that trip.

Ten day old Hugo

Crosby had to stay back in school, and Carmen is a bit more of a handful on a 4.5 hour train, so they stayed back with me in Berlin. While Hugo was doing this:

Living his best Bavarian life.

Carmen and Crosby were doing this:

Eating last night's salad on the bike ride to school and Kita.

Ninja Faux Pas Party

The first party was a major German faux pas: celebrating a day before the actual day. The concept of the party revolved around Grandpa and Abuela's much loved Ninja outfit gifted during their last visit. Hugo's idea was to invite one of his other ninja friends for pizza and a piñata.

My friend Anja's middle school Spanish class just happened to be selling their recently made piñatas for a class fundraiser. Thankfully the kids thought "Ninja Sword" instead of "Sword of Domocles". 

As is our tradition, we only invited one family. As such, a piñata completely full of candy seemed like a little overkill. I took the opportunity to "mommy sabotage" by filling the piñata with useful, yet still fun things - bath colors, bandaids, tooth brushes, fruit bars, and yes...some candy too. 

Birthday Miracle: mommy sabotage was well received by all parties involved. 

Val's Dino Cake

It wouldn't be a party without our neighbor Val on Hugo's actual birthday. 

Per usual, Val's cakes are the gifts that keep on giving. The next day we made cinnamon rolls with the left over buttercream frosting.

As you can see from Crosby's skilled elbow cough, this was one of our activities being home sick with colds.

The up side of being sick after a birthday is we had some exciting new additions to our toy reperatoir. Other sick day activities included:

Rounds of Looping Louie Board Game (Thanks Papa and Coco)

Team art inspired by Auntie Joy's PJ Mask Birthday Card

Legomania (also courtesy of Papa). Hugo's superhero ladder climbing skills in his new snowsuit, not pictured.

Rice Krispie Treats at Kita

Yesterday the kids were looking like they were going to turn the corner so we put the cooker to work preparing his Kita birthday treat to share with his friends.

I swear I used a recipe, but somehow the marshmallow ratio is way too high. Let's just say Hugo will likely be popular among his Kita friends today.