3.

 

My sweet, sweet Sylvie girl, you are THree.  (You make sure to really pronounce that TH at the beginning, you are very proud of pronouncing it correctly.)  Of course, most of the time when we ask you how old you are, you are four or seven, or ten.  Not just yet sweet girl.  One year at a time.

 

 

As a birthday surprise your Nana and Grandpa came in town.  I didn’t tell you they were coming, and when they showed up you were over the moon.

Other than that, my goal for your birthday was to have LOTS of purple.  Purple is absolutely your favorite color, and you love anything that happens to be purple.  It’s a part of your three-year-old self.

 

We went to IHOP for a special birthday breakfast, and hung out with your Nana and Grandpa all day.

 

I decorated the kitchen in purple balloons and streamers, but your sisters got very excited and decided they wanted to help decorate for you too. 

So…it wasn’t the most put together decorating job, but it was very unique, and chock full of love for you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Daddy and I you got a purple Ukulele. (A guitar, as far as you’re concerned)  You love playing Daddy’s guitar with him at night during our family devotions, so we thought you’d enjoy getting to play along with him.

 

In your new veterinarian dress up costume from Nana and Grandpa.

 

 

 

Playing with your pink and purple princess Duplo set from Nana and Grandpa.  By far the favorite present.  Because while you love purple, pink and princesses, you also absolutely have an engineer’s mind.  Lego was happy to oblige both.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Birthday sweet girl.  You are getting so big.  It’s so much fun to talk with you now and to hear what is going on in your little mind.  You are so clever.  You are quite the negotiator – so much so that I think by the time your are 7 or 8 you might be able to out-reason me.  Makes me a little nervous. 

You love your sisters so much and you play together constantly.  Not without bickering and annoying each other – but that’s part of being sisters.  Most of the time, in the morning when Naomi wakes up, before I can get in there you are out of bed and talking to her at the edge of her crib.  You are so sweet – “It’s ok Naomi, sissy is here, I won’t leave you.”  You try to give her things to make her happy and you love it when it works.  You and Tootaw play together all day as if you never spent a day of your lives apart. 

 

I would definitely say that if there is something that defines your personality it is joy.  I have said that since you were born, and it has endured.

You are an optimist, and you are happy in almost any circumstance (as long as your sisters aren’t stealing things from you.).  I could say, “Alright girls, we’re going to the doctor to get shots now.” And I’m confident you would reply, “Oooooohhh, yeah!  I bet that we’ll get stickers at the end!!!”  You can search out the joy in anything.  I hope that you can hold on to that as you get older.  It is beautiful.

 

You are a little bit of a home-body, which has surprised me as you’ve gotten older.  You love playing with friends, or going to their houses, but you’d really rather just be here with me and Daddy.  It’s not that you aren’t social.  Anyone who has met you knows that your are, by all means, social.  But, when I take you to a friend’s house for a couple of hours, you are always concerned as to when I will pick you up, and most often you tell me you’d rather just play with me.  I love it.  I love that you love home and our family.  In fact, when I asked you if you’d like to have friends over for your birthday, or have it just be our family you said you’d rather it just be us. 

 

At night you want me to lay down with you while you fall asleep – a pretty new phase.  I figure it won’t be much longer that you’ll want me to do that, so I oblige.  You have me tell you a story, and then you tell me a story.  Back and forth until my imagination has run out.  Then you roll over and squeeze my face and whisper, “I love you Mommy!”

And that is the best part of my day.

I love you more than you know.  I pray for you always, and I only hope that I can teach you the meaning of grace, and what it truly means to love other people, and Jesus. 

I am so, so blessed to be your Mommy.  Here’s to 3, and hoping that it goes by slowly enough that I can always remember what a joy you are.

Tootaw’s Birthday.

Tootaw turned the big 0-3 on the 7th!  This extends the streak of our kids having birthdays within a week of moving in with us.  That always makes it difficult to feel like we have a well thought out celebration, or to figure out what it is that would make them feel super special.

I knew that Tootaw really enjoyed bowling at Horn Creek (she talked about it more than anything else we did.) so I thought it would be fun for us all to go bowling together.

Sisters.

Of course, most of the game of bowling was spent anticipating opening the presents…

Earlier in the day we went to the grocery store, and I asked Tootaw if she’d like to pick out what kind of cake we could make together for her birthday.  She said “No!” indignantly, as if it were the worst idea ever.  Puzzled, I asked why not.  “Because I want tuptakes!”

Mmmmmm.

I wish I could post more pictures, but most of them have the girls’ faces in them!

Our friends, the Ketters, joined us to celebrate – which made for lots of little girls enjoying cupcakes!

Happy Birthday, sweet girl.  We love you, and are so blessed to have gotten to help you celebrate your third birthday.  I hope you know how much you are loved, and that you are a cherished part of our family.  I hope you loved the “bowding” and the “tuptakes”.  I pray for you everyday, that God would capture your heart and lead you into the little girl, and someday big girl, and someday woman, that he created you to be. 

Love you, love you, love you,

  Mama Maggie

Celebrating Naomi-Roo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Everybody singing Happy Birthday.

 

 

She wasn’t sure what to think about all that singing, but she ended up giving a super cheesy grin.

 

No fewer than 18 kids there all 7 (?)  and under.

 

Getting started on that dirt cake.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bella got to be there!

 

 

Naomi in her gift from Nana and Grandpa.  She thought she was big stuff.

 

 

 

Great BBQ, whiffle ball, dirt cake, and fun were had by all.  Can’t believe my little baby is one year old.  We had so much fun celebrating her first year!

Celebrating Two.

  I was so excited to celebrate Sylvia’s second birthday.  And we did.  It was  exciting and completely filled me with joy to watch her soak up her birthday fun.  We didn’t do any huge, themed party with coordinating everything (gasp!) but we had a lot of fun and spent a lot of time together.

 

We filled the hallway outside of her door with balloons so that they’d flood through her door when she opened it!

 

 

Bella, Naomi, Sylvia, and I made brownies together in the morning to have after dinner that night.  Then we went to the park and had a special lunch.  Unfortunately, Bella had her visit that afternoon, so she was gone from 1 until after 6:30 – but it did give us a little bit of time to give Sylvie some one on one lovin’.  (Of course, Naomi was there, but she’s really pretty easy!) 

 

Brian came home from work a little early to celebrate.

 

We went to Deanna Rose (a children’s farmstead with lots of playgrounds) for the afternoon.

 

  Then we headed downtown to go to Fritz’s for dinner (the choo-choo resteraunt).

 

 

 

That night, after Bella got home, we had cake, brownies, and ice cream.  Of course, this was the girls’ favorite part of the day.

 

 

Happy birthday, babe.  We love you.