Celebration time!!

Ainsleigh's birthday was a little spread out this year with the move. Her birthday was on a Tuesday and we moved the following Saturday. My family wanted to come for a party, but they're far enough away it has to be on a Saturday. So, we put her party off and had it after we were moved in and somewhat settled. I worked on her actual birthday, I think i'll ask for it off next year, so we took special treats for snack time at "school" - she picked them out, brownies and Capri Sun. She really liked that. While we were walking through the grocery store I kept telling her it was her birthday and she was 3. She would get excited over it being her birthday, singing to herself and repeating, "oh yeah, it's my birthday." But, she was not yet convinced that she was 3. She kept telling me, "no mommy, I be 3 in March." It took a few days to convince her, but now she agrees she is 3. With turning another year older she got to move up in classes at daycare/school. I was concerned this would be a really hard adjustment for her - one of her 1 year classroom teachers moved up to the 2's not long before she did, but this time it was all new and a much higher student to teacher ratio. But she has done awesome. It helps that she already knows many of the kids from the past two classes, and that her best friend McKenzie has her birthday just before Ains. I'm grateful it has been an easy transition for her and that she is almost always happy when I drop her off. Nothing makes you feel worse than when they cry every day as you drop them off.

Present from Papa & Nana Pack - Her first gift was from Papa & Nana Pack, it was a set of Hello Kitty scrubs that she demanded to put on immediately and wear to bed, but i'm not sure why I didn't get a picture of them - they're super cute. We let her open it the night before so we could both be there without her having to wait 2 days after. Now she thinks any package that comes to the house can potentially be a gift for her and she can't wait to open them.



The card she got from them was super cool and had this crown in it. She couldn't wait for me to cut it out for her - she loves anything at all princess like right now!


Party at our house. We had a family party Saturday the 21st with all of my immediate family and Rachel and Brady and boys. They had lots of fun, Ains loved having all of the other kids to play with. She is a little timid about tearing paper on gifts, so she asked the other kids to help her. It was such a mass of kids standing around it was hard to get good pictures of her opening gifts, but that's okay.

The cake was kind of funny. My original plan was to make an ice cream cake, lately she only eats the icing off of cake. Then a week or so before her birthday she asked if we could make cupcakes and they decorate them themselves. Great, no time necessary for me to decorate anything :). The morning of her party she decided she had to have a cake, that it wouldn't be a birthday without it. So I made a cake and very quickly decorated - it was very fitting of a 3 year old, it basically looked like she had iced & decorated it. But it still tasted good. She also said we needed to decorate the house for her birthday. I wish I had had balloons and streamers because I think she would have totally gotten into it. I included the top picture of me lighting the candles because this was in the middle of the song. As soon as I lit them the first time, even before we started singing she blew them out, so I lit them again and she got to blow them out twice!


Her birthday outfit was pretty cute - she wanted to wear her pink dress that desperately needed ironing, but was not allowed, and her princess pajama pants. They played dress up at some point during the day, and she kept this dress on through the rest of the party.