Birthday Breakfast

Here is another tradition for our family, but this one goes a long way back in my family. I don't even know how far. I think my Mom's family did it. I really wonder how it got started. Anyhow, I couldn't make a decent 3 so I just cut it out.

Emily hasn't been wanting to smile for pictures lately. I tried a couple times and then she was shaking her head and saying and signing "all done".

"All Done" (Maybe Mom will understand better if I sign it for her). LOL

Party

We had a little party for Emily with another family. Emily had a lot of fun with the older girls. I was happy too, because they were talking to Emily (which she needs alot of conversation so she'll talk too) and Emily will play with some of the toys now that she didn't know what to do with before (it's not good enough if Mommy shows her). I'm sad to say that we didn't take pictures of the party, but we got a picture of Emily blowing out the candle, and you can see one little girl with the witches hat on (I leave that out for Halloween decorations so the girls can have some fun with it.)

This was before the party. Can you see her bow on top? I didn't get a good picture of it I'm afraid. Just as I was starting to take pictures our guests arrived. It's a bow with fish on it. The ribbon was blue with fish that I found at Wal-Mart.

Trying to sneak some before the party.

I have alot of fun dressing the girls up with the bows and flowers.

The Fishy Birthday Cake

So, here is my attempt at a cool birthday cake. This is the first time I have ever done something like this. There are definitely some things that I will do differently and that I should do some research on before the next time. But considering I just saw a picture of something like this and made a pattern myself (which Nathan threw away while he was cleaning up the kitchen while I was getting everything out to decorate the cake. Let's just say I panicked for about a minute until I found it. LOL) and put it together without any other information, it's pretty darn good. And it was tasty to boot.

Stroller Chasing

The girls chased each other around with the strollers. Meredith for some reason got to use the new stroller. When Meredith saw the new dolly she wanted it, so we went and got the old one for her. We have two old ones, and one of them looks like it has been very loved (not in the sense that it was well taken care of) and that was the one that we found. Emily wanted that one and Meredith got the other. But, it looks pretty dirty and I can't keep clothes on that baby, so I quietly took it away and I either have to sew clothes onto the doll to keep it on or just throw it away because without clothes on it looks pretty dirty. (I did clean it up, and it has been through a couple rounds in the wash so it is clean.) So for a 3-year-old, new isn't always better. Oh well, I didn't get the present for the doll. I got it for the cute furniture that she really likes.

Birthday (Morning - opening presents)

When she woke up we went and opened gifts. (She's too young to open gifts with friends. Young children don't understand that you should just look. For them every toy is up for grabs.)

I love that little smile on her face. She was so pleased. She liked her gift (This is the first one she opened.)

She had to play with it for a little bit before we gave her the next one.

I like that she was still holding her spoon from the last present when she was unwrapping the next one.

Emily's 3rd Birthday (Decorations)

Emily was so excited when she saw the decorations for her Birthday. Nathan and I decorated the night before and she walks into the Living Room (her and Meredith) and she says "wow". Then Meredith repeated her "wow". So cute. I thought I got it on the camera (on video), but when I downloaded the pictures it wasn't there. Oh well.

Here's Emily's present from us. I had fun with it. I found little fish foamies at Wal-Mart and I put to bows together (a green one and a blue one). There was the start of our fishy theme.















There's some of the decorations (found that cute little princess balloon at the dollar store and I thought she would like it. She did.)








I took these pictures the night before, right after we decorated. I wanted to start a new tradition for our family. Decorating the night before the birthday so that they could wake up to all of the decorations. That was definitely exciting for her (me too).

Happy Birthday! sweet little 3-year-old (wow, time flies. I can't believe she's 3).

Birthday Cards and Halloween coloring pages

I found some cute Halloween coloring pages and birthday cards in my email. So, I'm going to post them here to #1 help me remember, and #2 just in case you (whoever spends the time reading this blog) want to use it. We love coloring pages at our house.
Birthday Cards and Halloween Coloring Pages

Meredith's Birthday Pictures

I went and got Meredith's birthday pictures (about a month ago) and I'm finally posting them. She was so grumpy and I was afraid of what the pictures would be like when I saw them. I was pleasantly surprised considering how uncooperative she was.

Meredith's First Birthday

Meredith is one! She loved opening presents. Her face just lit up when she opened her presents. She was so cute. I have no idea where all that time went. She is always discovering something new. Since the last time I wrote in my blog she has done so many new things. She folded her arms for the prayer for the first time about two weeks ago, and then wouldn't repeat it again for a little while. Now when we say "it's prayer time", or "time for a blessing" she just folds her little arms. And then at the end of the prayer she'll say "amen" with us. It's so fun to see her volunteer to do this. She sees sister say her prayers every night, and a last week she wanted to try to say her prayers too. So, I tried to help her and she repeated what I was saying (to the best of her ability). The one word I could really decipher was "amen" at the end. She follows Emily into every mess. I am finally just keeping the bathrooms locked so I don't have to dig stuff out of the toilet and clean toilet water hands.

We got Meredith the Little People Zoo set for her birthday. She loves to push the button on the train that makes music and then she dances to it. Her dancing is bouncing up and down.

The girls love to dance. Emily will point to the cd player and say "dance, please". Meredith will start bouncing (dancing) as soon as she says it. They both want to dance with me at that point, which usually creates jealousy, but most of the time I find some way to dance together, or we create a train and dance around the living room.

They are so much fun. I'm so glad I get to stay at home with them and see all of their progress and the new things they do every day. I love the way the girls' faces light up when they see me. I am so blessed.