Happy Birthday, Kylee J!

On September 9th, we celebrated our oldest daughter's 6th birthday.  Kylee was blessed to have multiple celebrations with friends and family.  She ate it up!  Just like with most everything else she does, Kylee embraced her birthday with gusto, enjoying every moment of being surrounded by those she loves.

Grandma Carlson came for an early birthday celebration and brought with her birthday treasures from she and Grandpa Carlson.  Grandpa and Grandma gave Kylee a fuzzy robe with her name on it and a very cool magic set, which both she and Connor have enjoyed performing "tricks". Grandma also treated us to a special birthday dinner at Red Robin.  Kylee was very adamant that she did NOT want anyone to sing Happy Birthday to her under ANY circumstance.  We forgot to pass this memo along to the waitstaff at Red Robin, who not only sang to her, but rigged up a special balloon headpiece for Kylee that they had her wear while they sang.  We all watched, waiting for the meltdown, but Kylee persevered.  Maybe the prospect of the hot fudge Sunday with lots of whipped cream was worth the humiliation.

Part of our family birthday ritual is allowing the birthday kid (or adult) to pick wherever they would like to eat on their birthday.  Kylee chose blueberry muffins for her birthday breakfast and Taco Bell for her birthday dinner.  As a part of this celebration, Kylee opened a Nintendo DS and a couple games from Daddy, Mommy, Connor, and Hadley. 

 Kylee also got to celebrate with other family and friends.  Grandpa and Grandma Lori, Aunt Sarah, and Great Grandpa and Granny McKinney came for a party.  Great Grandpa and Granny were here all the way from California!  Aunt Sarah gave Kylee a ladybug pillow pet, which was number one on Kylee's birthday list.  We must confess that we do not miss her frequent pre-birthday reminders about the pillow pet being the ultimate gift: "Mom and Dad, you know I REALLY want a ladybug pillow pet, right?"  Thanks, Aunt Sarah!

Along with our biological family, we also got to celebrate with the group of kids that our kids have grown up playing with.  Hailey, Claire, Spencer, Georgia, and Lizzy, along with their parents, have been adopted into our family circle.  It isn't a birthday without them and we are so grateful that they have been on hand to celebrate ALL our kids' milestones throughout the years.

We ended the birthday madness with a trip to Build-A-Bear workshop, where Kylee celebrated with her friends from preschool.  All the girls got to pick out a stuffed animal and go through the process of stuffing and accessorizing their new friend.  We ended with birthday cake and some playtime at Zona Rosa.  It was a blast!

The girls with their special creations

The "silly pose" in the play area.

Make a Wish!

It was so much fun to celebrate with Kylee.  She brings so much color to our world each and every day.  Her passion for life, friends, and laughter is a true inspiration to us.  The way that she views the world is unique and insightful and the unabashed joy that she does everything with is such a blessing.  Her persistence, intelligence, and zest for life is something that we are so grateful for.  We love you, Miss J!

First Day of School

I am running a bit behind with the blogging lately...one might think that with the two older kids back in school I would have more time to do these sorts of things...but at the same time the older two went back to school, our littlest one started walking (as you may have seen in our earlier post), and therefore, time to sit at the computer and blog has all but disappeared in an effort to keep Hadley from ingesting things like dishwasher soap packets (a treasure she discovered last week under the kitchen sink).

It is hard to believe that the first day of school was almost a month ago.  Connor and Kylee have both had a great start to their school year.  Both were excited about who they got for their teacher (Connor got Ms. Groff and Kylee has Ms. McPherson).  There are familiar faces in both of their classes, which helped ease the transition.  Both kids were ready to start back to school after a summer filled with adventure.

Here are both the kids in the beloved "first day of school pictures on the porch" poses.  Connor wasn't interested in a new outfit for school ("I don't really care, Mom"), and Kylee chose a cute little outfit from the Gymboree outlet.  However, the main event of this ensemble are her shoes.  After months of watching commercials, we purchased a pair of Sketchers Twinkle Toes shoes.  These are the holy grail of tennis shoes if you are a girl between the ages of 5 and 10.

From the porch, our first day of school ritual has come to include frantically jumping into the van (we never leave quite when we plan to) and racing to Alexander Doniphan.  Connor didn't need us to to walk him into his classroom (that would have been totally uncool), so we snagged a picture of him outside his classroom with his teacher, Ms. Groff (We have now entered the realm of our child's teacher being younger than we are.  Now I know how parents of my college students at William Jewell feel when they see how young I am!).  We walked Kylee into her classroom and watched her put her things in her cubby.  She was a pro with the routine after being in Miss Mac's class for summer school.

The walk back out to the van is always quiet.  We move through the halls of the school and Brandon watches me closely, trying to discern if it's better to offer comforting words or just leave me alone as I struggle to hold the tears back.  This year, I found that my emotions stemmed not from sadness, but from feeling so blessed to have three great kids who are healthy and eager to learn.  Getting to spend time with them over the summer allowed us to create some wonderful memories together that I will hold onto as the years fly by.  Reflecting on these memories warmed my heart as the doors to the school closed behind us.

And, of course, God gave us this little angel, too:

Brandon's going to need a wheelbarrow to haul me out when it's Hadley's turn at Alexander Doniphan...

And Now For Her Latest Trick...

And yes, everyone knows that "ball" is another word for "balloon"!