Our FOUR year old!

Well we are the proud parents of a four year old. Happy Birthday Arielle! Now you are FOUR!!!! We had a small, FUN birthday party for her the Saturday before the actual big day. There were six girls total (2 of which belong to us) which was totally manageable. They all had parents here too. Even more doable! Bathing suits, sun block, squirt guns, dress ups, cup cakes, nail polish, piggy-back rides (correction: it was a buffalo, a bull and a horse that the girls were riding upon), a dance off, water colors, and presents including a new bike from Mom & Dad!

It was a full day and a fantastic celebration! It was actually the easiest birthday party we’ve ever thrown. I think it’s because I’m pregnant and I sort of boycotted another birthday party this year unless we only invited a few children and Nathan was responsible for almost everything… I’ll have to remember to do it this way again. My grandmother says you should only invite as many children as the age of the child being celebrated. In this case because Ari is turning four so we should only invite four children. I like that advice. I guess we did it “right” this time!

Mateja was a bit disappointed that Daddy didn’t buy her a bike for her birthday back in February. Looks like she will be getting a bike too now (probably this weekend) & we'll have to get helmets of course & then Nathan & I will have to get bikes too in order to keep up with them! It’s going to be a fun summer!

Here are a few photos of the celebration as well as the day of her birthday and a few other things we did to celebrate the girl. Enjoy!

Happy Birthday Ari!

What a weekend! My baby is 3 now! I think she has finally decided that she is no longer a baby. I think. This year I just couldn't get it together to throw her a party. Not at all. So we took the kids to a festival in San Francisco over the weekend with some friends of ours (Nathan and Lindsey F.) and their little ones. Upon arriving at the festival, Ari shouted, "It's my party!" I couldn't have planned it better if I tried! And I'm so glad I didn't try. The kids had an absolute blast.

So, I think I've decided from hence forth that I'll plan birthday parties in sync with childrens' festivals. Although Mateja did say to me at the end of the day, "That was a fun birthday party, Mom, but we didn't actually know any of the kids that were there." Ah, well. That's OK, isn't it?

Tea Time

This morning I set out my English China set to have a special breakfast with the girls. I suppose it was an addition to Mateja's ongoing birthday celebrations. We gave the girls tea (Mateja requested peppermint, Ari got another decaf bag Daddy picked for her) & mini-pancakes. Quick shout-out to Jenn G. for recommending the Organic Batter Blaster (or whatever it's called) which my mom purchased and stuck in our refrigerator. What a crazy great idea for a special FAST and easy-to-clean-up meal. I made mini-pancakes with it. It was awesome. I'm going to have to purchase it again (omg - it's sooo against my religion!) soon - I might make a special trip to the grocer's just to find it, it was that awesome. I can't say that I ate any of the pancakes, so I won't vouch for their taste myself, but the girls ate every last one that I made for them.

Anyway, after a few sips on her hot peppermint tea, Mateja began asking me for some sugar. Sugar is something we use only for baking and even then we use it in smaller-than-called-for amounts. That said, I really didn't know where the sugar was as my baking goods haven't been unpacked yet. I kept going back and forth with Mateja about the sugar. I was NOT going to look for it and really... she didn't need it (there's my religion again). After realizing she wasn't getting anywhere with me, she began the conversation with her dad who reappeared in the kitchen soon thereafter. The conversation went something like this:

***
M - Dad, can I have sugar in my tea?
dad - No. you don't put sugar in your tea.
M - Why not?
dad - Well, in England you don't put sugar in your tea. (he knows this is a fallacy)
~ here she paused, somewhat perplexed and then responded ~
M -But we're not in England. We're in California. So I want sugar in my tea.