Birthday Season

We celebrated Hannah's 4th birthday this weekend!  We are officially back in Birthday season; I wish we were in Spring season.  But alas, it's still snowing or sleeting or spewing something frozen and wet from the sky.

Back to Hannah's Birthday.  It's been a long weekend since we had Presidents' Day today, but it has been jam packed with fun.  I'll back up a little.  Hannah's actual birthday was Wednesday, and we sang to her and served her donuts for breakfast.  The best part was right after we sang to her, she gave her sister's a donut!  How sweet!  Then Friday was preparation day.  While Emma napped, Hannah and I put together goody bags and packed some items up for the party.  Saturday, I went to town to get Hannah's Rapunzel cake and some balloons at Kroger.

Then we packed up and headed to the Bouncy House.  They do such a good job with parties there.  Hannah had so much fun!  She bounced on all of the stuff and played with the balls and ran around playing with her friends.  I think she had a blast.  Here she is playing with her buddy Quinny.  She just loves Quinny!

Laura and Avery.

Here is the whole group.

Emma wanted to be right up with the big kids the whole time.  My sister took her in one of the bouncy tents to play.  And the attendant took her up the big slide several times.  She was totally fearless on that slide.  She would fly down it so fast and end up upside down.  She just loved it!  Even when we got into the party room, she was right in the thick of things.  She sat in the midst of Hannah's friends at the table and wanted to sit in the group when they did presents.  She wants to be a big kid so bad!

So after the bouncing part, we went back the party room where we had cake and juice.  Then Hannah opened her gifts.  It was awesome.  She liked sitting up in the the big air-filled chair. Emma really wanted up there, but eventually she settled next to Laura.  After presents we handed out goody bags and balloons.  I think the kids really like the balloons better than the goody bags.  Hannah was cute handing them to her friends.  It went really fast, but it was a good time.

After the party we met my parents up at their church and went to Mass.  Then we went to their house to have a little celebration.  They had some pizzas there, and we had cake and ice cream again.  Hannah got to open presents again.  I think she just enjoyed hanging at Grammy and Papa's more than anything though.  At the end of the evening, all three girls were asleep on Grammy and Papa's couch.  A perfect end to a perfect

day!

Sunday and today have been recovery days, and we are still not caught up.  I should be doing thank you notes, but I'm blogging instead.  Blogging doesn't count as procrastination, right?!  We opened up lots of toys yesterday, and Hannah and the girls played with the new stuff.  Today we went to the store.  All three took a nice nap today.  I think they are still worn out.  But back at it tomorrow!

Hannah in her new Elsa costume.
                                          

P.S.  We had an awesome Valentine's day too.  The kids had fun parties, and Matt made us an awesome Shrimp Fettuccine Alfredo!  It was divine.

January's Over.

Whew!!  We made it through January.  I know, I didn't post one single time in January, and I apologize.  But we were in survival mode in January and are sincerely hoping for some relief in February.  As I write this, I think there might be a snow storm forecasted for mid next week.  I'm just in denial about it right now.

I'll give you the highlights for January without focusing too much on the negative (who are we kidding?!!).

The biggest highlight was my sister's wedding last weekend.  It was held at Via Vecchia in the Brewery District.  Laura and Hannah were flower girls, and this event was probably the high point of their year.  I'm not exaggerating.  They took their responsibilities very seriously and enjoyed being looked at as princesses.  Whenever people were taking pictures, they posed as if they were royalty.  Before the ceremony, Hannah practiced going down the aisle several times.  During the ceremony they walked down the aisle and sprinkled flower petals with the utmost precision and grace.  It was awesome!  Then during the reception, they literally danced until they dropped.  They really enjoyed spending time with Beth's and Jenny's (Kahle) kids.  Ellen also had at least two college friends who also had girls their age there.  So their was no shortage of 3-6 year old girls.  Even little Emma was in prime form for the event.  She danced with her cousin, Brady.  And she enjoyed Beth's little girl, Hallie completely.  At dinner Emma and Hallie were chatting just like their Grandma's Nan and Carla.  It was the cutest thing!  To sum up, we had an enjoyable evening with family and friends.

Pictures of the girls getting their hair done.

Wedding pics

Another highlight was New Years Eve!!  My sister was gracious enough to take my girls over night on New Years Eve this year.  We haven't been out on NYE for several years, and we made the most of it.  We went with our friends, Rachel and Steve.  We started the evening at G. Michael's Bistro, which was divine. That place is amazing for anyone in the Columbus area that hasn't tried it.  Everything I've tried there has been decadent.  I had the fillet for NYE, and it did not disappoint.  Then we headed over to World of Beers around the corner to bring in the New Year.  I might have gotten excessively intoxicated, but who's counting?  It was a superbly fun night.

We also did a couple of other post-holiday celebrations with friends.  I always like having holiday celebrations after the holiday for two reasons: (1) it extends the holiday season, which goes way too fast and (2)we aren't feeling super stressed trying to squeeze in way too many gatherings into a short period and in turn, we don't get to spend true quality time with those friends.  Doing these gatherings after the holiday is so much more practical and less stressful.

So back to the downside of the first month of 2014.  I am so so so so so glad it's over.  We have had exceedingly cold weather and snow which of course had caused school to be cancelled and sick kids intermittently.  It seems we can't get through one work week without having something happen!!!  It is really hard for us two parent working families to get into a groove or function at all when there is this much disruption to our schedule.  Thank goodness for my mom who has done a large amount of babysitting this month to help us get through.  (She is probably re-thinking her move closer to us :))

OK. Well off to February, and this is Hannah's birthday month!!!  As you can imagine, she is super excited.  We have her party planned at the bouncy house, and her cake is ordered.  She wants Rapunzel again this year.  Speaking of birthdays, I have made an executive decision around here.  We are not having big kid birthday parties until our kids turn 10.  The toddler parties are just out of control.  It has been the culture at our school unfortunately, and our kids just expect them because everybody in their class has them too.  But they are expensive, and I think it will be more special if they have something big to look forward to when they hit one of those land mark ages.  Any thoughts on this?  I would welcome anybody's opinion.

A random picture of Laura's and Hannah's snowman, "Olaf".