A Princess Party

To celebrate Brooke's fifth birthday we had us a little princess party. 

 

This was our first "friend" party. Admittedly, I was completely stressed. I've never hosted anything like this. I didn't want anyone to be bored. I worried that they wouldn't have fun if I didn't plan it well.  I poured over Pinterest and made list after list of possible games and activities.

 

Then our sweet friends started coming over, dressed in their little princess dresses, and I immediately stopped worrying.  Really, what was I thinking?  The girls would have fun if I hadn't planned a thing. 

 

 

We started in on the activities. Everybody knows a princess must have a crown, so we started off with some crown decorating.

 



We hunted for Cinderella's lost shoe in the backyard and played Pin the Kiss on the Frog.

 

Next, the moment we'd all been waiting for...Princess Belle!  Yes, the real, live Princess Belle was coming to the party! 

 

We waited for Belle to arrive. 

 

Then we waited some more. 

 

Then her Royal Highness called to let us know she'd be thirty minutes late. Do you know how long thirty minutes is when you're entertaining 8 little girls?  It's long.  I sort of panicked. 

 

Thankfully, two fourth grade girls, Grace and Charly, were at the party.  They were a huge help. Grace and Charly painted the girls' faces and organized some outdoor games.  For these reasons and others, I would please like a fourth grade girl for Christmas.

 

And then...finally...Belle arrived! (Which I missed because I was feeding Eli...sigh.) 

I do love the face on this one...

Turns out, Belle is a pretty fun girl.  She read a book, did the limbo, and played Freeze Dance with the girls, which was a big hit.  She took some pictures with the girls, too.

What's a birthday party without cake?

 

 

It was such a fun and memorable day!  Brooke is still talking about it three weeks later. And do you know what her favorite part was?  She says her favorite part was having her friends here...seriously.  That's how awesome our friends are.  Even better than Belle and cake and gifts like Barbie and My Little Pony. 

 

And that's saying something.





When You Were Four

When you were four...

You wanted to marry Daddy.

Your clothes were a major annoyance.

You learned that baby boys aren't so bad, after all.

Your laugh was infectious.

You (still) loved a good mess.

You dreamed of one day being a mama with three girls.

You learned how to be a really good friend and big sister.

You shared your Papa's love of fancy words.

You thanked God for "parades and parade candy and getting parade candy" and asked God to please make Mama's hydrangeas feel better.

Your creative, artistic side really began to shine.

You picked every weed you could find and gave most of them to me.

You started every other sentence with "Pretend that I'm a princess and...."

You sang like no one was listening...

...and danced like no one was watching.

 Oh, what a sweet year!  Now on to five!!

Happy birthday, Brooke!! What a blessing you are to us! :-)

First Day of Preschool!

Both of my big kids are going to preschool this year!!  I can hardly believe it. They are getting so big.  Oh, how I wish I could bottle them up and keep them just like they are today!!

Soup's On!

At long last, it's time for Eli to start eating food.

After six months of nursing (and refusing to take a bottle at all), Eli is officially ready to branch out into the exciting world of mush. That means I can leave the house for more than two hours and know I won't return to a mad baby.  Woot!!

Eli entertained while Daddy prepared the grub.  First, he showed us how to make raspberries.

Next, screaming at the top of his lungs for no reason but because he can.

(The big kids think this is HIGH-larious.)

Okay, on with the show.  Don't be scared.

Well, be a little scared.  Rice cereal. Yuck.

Let the feeding begin.

He liked it...okay...I guess.  He ate a couple of tablespoons, anyway.

  Eating Lesson #1:  Do not make raspberries while eating.

A good daddy knows how to make the "feeding the baby" face.



 



Feeding the baby=entertainment the whole family will enjoy.  Who knew?

Making Room

With baby number one, you're ready. You have the nursery planned to every last detail. Maybe you even have a little mural painted on the wall. You buy one of those bedding sets where you can only use 2 of the 6 pieces (but you don't know that yet). You own at least one of every baby gizmo ever created and things are done weeks and weeks before your due date.

But number three...number three is different. When our number three turned 5 months old, we realized it was time to figure out where the heck to put this kid.

So, a couple of weeks ago we bumped Nate to Brooke's room and Eli took over. I risked waking him to take a few sleeping baby pictures. Aren't sleeping babies the best?

G'night!

Birthday Party!

Nate got two parties this year!

Okay, so the first was a little thrown together. We met some friends at a nearby cupcake shop.  This is Nate with his most favorite person in the world, Bryce.  Bryce is a "bigger boy."  He probably gets tired of hearing his own name when Nate is around.  He's a good sport about it, though.

The second was our usual small family gathering.  You won't find anything Pin-worthy here, but it is such a sweet time.  We order a cake and balloons and the kiddos can't wait for the grandparents to come.  Here's my mom sneaking Nate a pre-birthday-cake cookie.

This year Nathan wanted a Spiderman party.  We've never seen any Spiderman movies or shows and, until recently, didn't own any Spiderman books.  I have no idea how he even knew what Spiderman was.  But once he decided he wanted Spiderman, all of Mama's cutesie tractor party ideas were out the window. 

To get icing this bright add 56 parts food coloring to 1 part icing.

Nate blew out the candles like a champ! It was so, so fun to watch.

A birthday kiss from the sister.

At the end of the day, he said blowing out the candles on his cake was his favorite part of the day.  Every time we ate leftover cake he asked us to get out the candles and sing. :-)  I love him.    

Then...presents!

Brooke made Nate a bracelet and book and wrapped it.  She couldn't wait to finally give it to him.

Can you tell I had planned on a tractor party?  Oh, well.
Such a fun day celebrating three sweet years!!  Thank you so much to the grandparents.  And happy birthday to you, Nathan!! :-)  We love you so much, buddy.