Even though Mason's birthday isn't until next Friday, we decided to have his birthday party this past weekend. Historically we've found two things about Mason's birthday parties: the closer to Christmas it gets, the fewer people show up (due to holiday obligations) and the worse the weather gets. Unless Mason's birthday falls directly on a weekend, we've been trying to get a jump on the date and have his party the prior weekend.

Mason had half a dozen places in mind for his party, but the one that made the most sense was the skating rink, so we settled on that one. Half a dozen of his friends and the whole family came out to hang out at Yukon on Wheels for a couple of hours to watch the kids skate, open presents, and eat cake.

Here's Mason with one of his more unique gifts -- a fish. Surprisingly, the fish ("Rocky") is still alive. Don Piano (the cat) has not noticed him yet.

Mason and his friends had a good time skating but I'd say they spent close to half of their time over at the arcade games, which is silly because I officially have 6x as many arcade games as Yukon on Wheels (my 30 to their 5) and I have better games! That didn't seem to matter, and if you scroll through the birthday gallery you'll find an awful lot of air hockey pictures.

Mason had a really good time skating and playing with all his friends and got some really cool presents. He's at that age where he's started getting presents that the two of us can do together, from Lego sets and building kits to Nerf guns, books and ... fish.

Click Here to view all the birthday photos.