Lia's 5-Year Photos

Since Lia had her five-year check up yesterday at the doctor's office, she had to get three shots and one finger prick (for a blood draw).  As a result, she was still "ailing" today which means that she was milking this minor set-back for everything it was worth!  So I wasn't sure how she would behave today during her five-year photo shoot.  However, thanks to the bribing power of a Belle Squinkie, Lia pulled it together, put on her game face, and pumped out a group of decent photos in record time!  Thank heavens for the power of bribery and thank heavens for little girls!

Daddy Daughter Dance!

For the first time, our stake decided to host a Daddy Daughter Dance for all the girls ages three to eleven.  When I heard about it, I was so excited and then quickly got very disappointed when I realized that it was on the second night when Ron had to host a basketball tournament at his high school.  As a result, I never mentioned it to Lia because I knew how sad she would be when she found out that she couldn't go.  However, a week ago, Lia's good friend told her that she got to go dress shopping for the Daddy Daughter Dance.  This, of course, set off a chain of events that I was trying to avoid.  After explaining several times that she couldn't go, I decided that I was just going to crash this dance and be the only mother in a sea of fathers....however, there was only one problem....what do I do with Logan?  Since we still don't trust leaving him with teenager babysitters (between the stairs and plethora of choke-worthy items in our house) and my parents are out of the country on vacation, I wasn't able to come up with a good solution.  However, it was during this time that Ron finally gave in and emailed his principal, asking him to cover the second game.  Fortunately his boss said, "Yes," which meant that Lia could go!  Hooray!  So, Saturday turned out to be a busy day for our girl with swim lessons, her friend birthday party, and then the dance.  We got her dressed after dinner and she and Ron rushed out the door moments after he rushed in the door from work.  Although she fell asleep in the car ride over to the church (remember, the busy day), she perked right up when they got there.  Lia had a great time dancing with her daddy, drinking strawberry milk and eating cookies, getting her picture taken, and running around the gym with her beloved friend, Kaylee.  I think the latter was her favorite of the four activities, but we won't tell her daddy that.  :-) 

All dressed up and ready to go!

Lia and her best friend, Kaylee, eating their refreshments.



 

The professional picture they had taken at the dance.  I don't know what happened to Lia's bow or WHY Ron was wearing the boa, but it's still cute, right?!

Lia's 5th Birthday!

Today we wrapped up a marathon birthday weekend for Lia after four separate events!  Overall, it was a very successful two days.  I worked extra hard to make sure that my girl's fifth birthday was a special one and I think she was quite pleased with everything.  However, I wonder if I will still be keeping this up ten years from now as I sure was exhausted by Saturday night.  :-)  Here is a play-by-play of Lia's big day (or two).

 

Fortunately, preschool fell on Lia's actually birthday--Friday, February 22nd.  As a result, she got to be line leader, snack helper, and do show-and-tell all on her special day.  We made mini cupcakes frosted in her two, favorite colors of purple and turquoise for the snack and she brought her Ariel music box and Ariel necklace for show-in-tell.  Lia was SO excited to head out the door yesterday morning.  Here she is waiting in line at the beginning of preschool.

 

It is the tradition in my family to always eat a birthday dinner of your choice in the dining room. Although Ron had the week of Lia's birthday off for midwinter break, he was in charge of a huge basketball tournament at his school from 2 til 10:30 p.m. on her actually birthday (major bummer). As are result, we bumped everything up and had a birthday lunch in the dining room. When I asked Lia what she wanted a few days earlier, she informed me that she wanted a tortilla, carrot sticks, and blueberry yogurt. Luckily, Ron was able to convince her to trade out the tortilla for pizza. So, here we are eating our pizza lunch before cake and gift opening.

 

Since Lia's main birthday cake was coming the next day at her friend's party, we decided to have cupcakes instead for her birthday lunch.  Here she is about to blow out her candle! 

 

Blowing it out!

 

 

We then moved into the next room for the opening of gifts from Ron and me.  Lia was so excited!  Here she is opening up a present that had two outfits for her American Girl doll.

 

 

Posing with her Snow White pillow doll and Barbie Mermaidia book after all of the gifts had been unwrapped. 

After the presents were opened and Ron left for work, I had to do something else to make the rest of Lia's birthday seem special.  So I did something we never do--we went out to dinner at McDonalds!  Yes, that's right, we NEVER eat at this restaurant unless we are on road trips.  Here is Lia happily enjoying her Happy Meal that conveniently came with a Barbie ballerina toy.  I couldn't have planned that better!

 

Logan, who ate dinner before we came to McDonalds, sat patiently in his stroller the entire time.  Such a good boy (except when he sticks his tongue out at me while trying to take a picture). :-)

 

On Saturday, February 23rd, we hosted Lia's first friend birthday party.  It was hand's down the biggest event of the four and it really went off without a hitch.  We had nine girls under the age of five (three from church--Kaylee, Aliza, and Ellie and five from preschool--Sienna, Taylor, Addyson, Jayd, and Mila) in our home for two hours and they were all so well behaved and polite.  Believe it or not, Ron and I really had an enjoyable time hosting these cute girls.  In fact, the only problem we had the entire time was our birthday girl who had a majorly embarrassing meltdown as her friends were leaving.  Oh well.  At least she saved it until the end. 

 

Ron helped me deck out the house in Ariel themed decorations.  Here is our kitchen all decked out with Ariel place settings, Ariel confetti, Ariel birthday cake, Ariel streamers, and turquoise, purple, and lime green balloons.

 

A close-up photo of the Ariel cake that Lia requested months ago.   She is sitting on a rock in the ocean that is covered with starfish, shells, sea flowers, and seaweed.  As cute as it turned out, I spent way too many hours on this one. 

 

I also took the Ariel doll that Lia had just received for a birthday gift from her grandparents to decorate a corner of the kitchen.  The treasure chest was full of candies that were used as prizes for some of the games we played later.

After all of these cute girls arrived, we moved into the family room to color some Ariel coloring pages. 

 

We then had the girls move into the kitchen to choose two Disney princess tattoos to have put on them.  Here is the tattoo expert himself applying one to Kaylee's arm!

 

We then played three games back in the family room.  The first one was called "Pass the Mermaid."  We had the girls pass around an Ariel Barbie doll while Ron played "Kiss the Girl" on  the CD player.  Whoever was holding the doll when the music stopped got to reach into Ariel's treasure chest and pick out a candy. 

 

 

Next, instead of playing "Pin the Tail on the Donkey," we played "Give Ariel her Seashell."  One at at time, the girls had to try to place a shell sticker in the palm of Ariel's hand while being blindfolded. 

 

Lastly, I took a family favorite, "Hide the Thimble," and tweaked it to "Hide the Seashell."  One at a time, the girls were able to hide a little shell in plain sight for the rest of the group to find.  Here they are looking for it during one of the many rounds we played.  It was super cute and fun to watch.

We then moved to the gift opening portion of the party.  All of the girls were so generous in the gifts they gave and so well behaved while they politely watched Lia open them.  I'm so grateful that Lia has such nice friends from church and preschool. 

 

I just love this picture of them all lined up in a row watching the birthday girl open her loot!

 

 

We finished off the party with cake and ice cream.  Here is Taylor watching Lia right before she blows out the candles on her behemoth Ariel cake!

 

 

The group pauses for a photo while eating their cake and ice cream.

 

Lia had such a fun time talking to all of her friends while eating her dessert.  It was so cute to watch her.  I got several pictures of her like this....just talking and eating!  She is such a social butterfly when it comes to being around little girls. 

 

Happy Birthday, Lia!  We love sure do love you!

Shelved.

This is how I found Mr. Logan playing the other day--on the lower shelf of our cupboards in the family room.  I guess he should be taking advantage of his little, compact body as it won't be long before he outgrows this little play space!

12 Months and Counting!

I did this post for Lia, so I couldn't resist doing the same for Logan.  Although all twelve of his monthly pictures have already been posted on the blog, I think it's fascinating to see them all together as it makes the changes in his appearance so evident.  Oh, how they grow the first year of life!  This is my take on how Logan looked his first year--the first month, he looked like someone else's child, the second, third, and fourth month, he looked like a chubby, Asian baby, and from five months on, he looked like the cute baby we know and love today.  Take a gander at the photo gallery below!