Birthday Girl

Most of you know that I just returned from a long-planned trip to Scandinavia with my immediate family.  It was a wonderful trip and I'm so glad I was able to go, but one of the sad parts for me was that I missed my girl's second birthday.  She turned two on June 16th and I was off traipsing through Europe without her!  Mama guilt.  But, I guess it's better that I missed an early birthday, like two, instead of the fifth birthday or something, when she really gets it.  And maybe she made out better because it seems like we've been celebrating her birthday for the whole month of June! A couple days before we left, we had a small family party for her and she was in heaven!  She's all about Dora the Explorer right now, so we Dorified the house, ate some brats, ate some ice cream cake, and opened presents.  She loved it! Her big present was a really cute play house that lives in our backyard.  She loves it and I love watching her love it.  Whenever we pass it on the way to the garage she says, "Hey, my house!"  like she just remembered that she has her very own house.   It makes her happy.  Thanks to everyone who helped us celebrate our girl this month!  It's pretty cool for a mama to watch her friends and family love her baby.  She's got good people. :)

The day of her party we went to the Splash Pad for our Wednesday playgroup.  Her friend Alex showed her the ropes, although she wasn't too sure about the big boys with the water guns.  I wasn't either.  Even though she isn't looking, I love this photo of the two of them.  Someday we'll get one of both of them smiling.