Amy's 4!!

It's hard to believe my little girl is already 4! We tried to make today special. She woke up to a Happy Birthday poster and presents, although we made her wait until Daddy came home from work before she could open them. The suspense was killing her, but once Ken came home she was so excited to open gifts. It might as well have been Christmas morning. She woke Ian up from his nap so she could start. She's been really into jungle and safari animals so we got her some plastic toy animals and a safari "tent" type thing to play in. Then we headed off to Chuck E. Cheese to celebrate her day as a family.

Amy at 4:

Favorite hobbies: projects, painting,

Favorite sayings: "probably, yes/no"

Favorite toys: animals & dinosaurs

Favorite movie: "Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs"

To celebrate Amy's 4th birthday we spent the evening at Chuck E. Cheese. We all had a great time!

Our Chuck E Cheese Portraits

Little Rachel is all smiles :)

The last couple weeks Rachel has started to smile.

Amy & Ian with their new sister, Rachel

Happy Birthday to Me

Yesterday I turned 31. Carrying on his family's tradition, Kenny decided to get up a little early and make me a sign to add to the birthday decor. He couldn't find a marker anywhere so he decided to use black shoe polish. He made up my little sign and hung it on the wall. What was supposed to be a nice little sign became a little more gothic as the shoe polish ran. It made me laugh everytime I walked by it. Ian told me he didn't like the sign. I guess it was a little scary for him.

4th of July Breakfast

Last year we started a little tradition to have a 4th of July breakfast in the backyard for our family. I was tempted to not bother this year, but I thought of my sister-in-law Debbie and had to do it. It's easy to make traditions happen when more family/friends are around, when invitations have been extended, etc. But when there's no accountability to anyone else but your own children who will inevitably be too young to probably even remember it's easy to skip opportunities for the magic moments. Debbie would have made the breakfast happen whether it was for Ty, Bre, and Buddy or if it was the whole extended family. So, in her honor I put out the 4th of July placemats she gave me several years ago, made little red, white, and blue yogurt parfaits and toasties and had a very simple 4th of July Breakfast with the family. Amy & Ian made sure they were wearing their 4th of July hats (by their own desire). We sang "America the Beautiful", enjoying a blustery and not-so-yummy breakfast outside (kinda hard to mess up yogurt parfaits but I learned that the Dannon or Yoplait vanilla yogurt is the only way to go - some of the other stuff is gross). We'll finish up the celebrations with fireworks. Happy 4th of July!