Sissy's Fifth Birthday.

Sissy has been talking about her fifth birthday since, well, her fourth birthday. I had a bit of anxiety that I wouldn't meet up to her expectations for the day. Many times this season she has mentioned that she's going to Hawaii for her birthday. Wow. The bar was set pretty high. After much stress and thought, Colin said that it was ok to NOT have a party for the two December kiddos this year and instead just do a special day of their favorite things. Since I have been under the weather for a few weeks, Colin took the three older kiddos to the movie "Frozen" in the morning and Abe and I napped.  Sissy dreamed of going to a movie, so this was a special treat for her. We all met at her favorite Vietnamese restaurant for lunch. She was uncharacteristically tired there, which should have alerted me that something was going on. It turns out that she was getting croup. Later her cousins (and my brother and sister-in-law) came over and had dinner. Sissy was supposed to spend the night with them as her final birthday treat, but she was barking like a seal at that point.

Here is Boss eagerly eating Sissy's birthday cake.

And Boss playing with Sissy's birthday sketch toy.

Here is my attempt at her cake. She wanted chocolate cake with purple frosting with her name in cursive, but the letters not connected. She's very specific.

Grandma Mary and Samuel at the restaurant.

She wanted blueberry pancakes for breakfast.

She turned bright pink when we sang "Happy Birthday" to her.

Perhaps Sissy's most awaited gift was her big girl car seat with butterflies on it. My mom sent it to her and she was over the moon.

What birthday would be complete without an entire collection of Jenna Hipp nail polish??

Samuel painted her nails grey and turquoise - she actually chose those colors. The fact that she didn't choose pink should have been a warning sign that she wasn't feeling well!

She ate so much rice noodle soup at the restaurant that she almost foundered on it.

At five, Sissy loves: anything pink or purple, Hello Kitty, all things princess, chewing gum, telling people she can't have cow's milk or anything almond, anything craft or art related, not napping, doing her hair, picking out jewelry to wear, shopping for clothes, working on writing her letters, making and sending people cards, eating raw veggies and not meat, and watching Dora.

December Fun

We headed out on Friday to find a Christmas tree in the balmy 20-something degree weather. I have to admit that my body seizes up a bit in the cold and needless to say, I was not the best contributor to this family outing (insert image of me sitting in the driver seat of the truck, hands held steadily over the heat vents, scarf covering the entirety of  my face). After what seemed like a few eternities, my family picked out a large tree, cut it and loaded it up in back. We spent the remainder of the day thawing out, drinking tea/hot chocolate and decorating the tree. Sissy has taken to this tree like a moth to a flame - rearranging ornaments all day long to make sure "Santa can see them all".  Every day. The older I get, the more I realize Christmas is less about everyone having a relaxed fun December full of presents and good cheer and more about Mom making sure everyone has a relaxed December full of presents and good cheer. We have Juliet's and Samuel's birthdays in December as well, so I am pretty much a basket case most of the month. Someday I will discover the secret to internal peace and harmony during this month....

Here are some pics I snapped:

Boss was really interested in the Frank Sinatra and other similar era Christmas music blasting from the kitchen stereo.

This babe was pretty much frozen at this point - we were about two minutes into our tree hunt.

Colin requested ginger snap cookies and I was all to eager to comply with anything that involved standing my a heat source. They all dipped cookies in milk or tea and enjoyed thoroughly.

Jude worked on light detangling and inspecting.

Snowsuit from the late 70's apparently.

Jude's gleeful to be headed out in the truck.

Sissy adorning the tree top with the angel.

The kiddos played in the snow earlier this week as well - Sissy was of course adorned in all pink snow gear.

She hangs the stockings with care.

Here was the prize winning tree.