"I'm Free!"

Each time the phone rang today and Kylie got to talk to someone else that called to say Happy Birthday she'd proudly proclaim, "I'm free, I not two ennymore!" I love how her little mind works. I mean, we've been telling her for weeks that she's about to be three, but we never told her specifically that means she'll no longer be two.

We started the day with an extra long snuggle in bed while Daddy went to go fix the breakfast of her choice, oatmeal. Her smile when I told her Happy Birthday is one that I'm sure is stored up in heaven for me. Then she giggled, pulled the covers over our heads and said, "It's Daddy and Ta-eb's pecial time makin bekfest and it's our pecial time to snuggie!" How lucky was I?

After breakfast Kylie and Caleb watched Diego and then it was time to make cupcakes. We made her favorite kind, "the choc-ete dat you make wif the orange tuff." (Devil's food cake mixed with one can of pumpkin and a cup of water). First came mixing...
...and then quality control.
We played with cars and puzzles while the cupcakes baked and then took a walk around the neighborhood while the cupcakes cooled. Our excursion made us "very hungy!" so we made pizzas out of some whole grain English muffins, leftover spaghetti sauce, random veggies and cheese. It had been years since I made those, but man were they good! The kids played with sidewalk chalk on our back deck while I cleaned up the kitchen (during which point both stripped down, but at least Kylie left on her Elmo undies ~ Caleb had even taken off his diaper, man are the neighbors gonna be talking about me...) and then it was nap time.

This was the only struggle of the day. I suppose Kylie was a bit keyed up about the fact it was her birthday AND the amount of cupcake batter she sampled couldn't have helped, and she was NOT having any part of taking a rest. I even resorted to calling Ian and having him tell her that no nap meant no going to "kabobs" for dinner, but she just smiled impishly and kept getting off the bed. Finally in desperation (a "no nap Kylie" is NOT a happy Kylie come evening and I really didn't want to skip dinner) I told her that I was going to throw her cupcakes in the trash. She was asleep within two minutes. Either that makes me evil, or a super genius, or perhaps an evil super genius...

Anyway, after a 2 1/2 hour nap she put on her birthday outfit and we headed to pick Ian up from work and then off to "kabobs" (which is what she calls her favorite Mediterranean restaurant ~ same place she picked for her Forever Family day celebration last month). She ordered a "taco" (actually a gyro, but in her defense, it does look rather like a taco!) and ate over half of it! Add to that the fact that we let her have "sparkly lemonade" (3 parts pink lemonade and 1 part Sierra Mist) and she was quite happy about her birthday meal! When Ian was bringing our plates over to the table she caught sight of her taco and squealed, "Oh my doodness!" and everyone at nearby tables smiled and laughed along with us. Trust me, she does have her "tanky" moments, but when she is all smiles she is quite captivating!

Being the stellarly prepared parents we are, at that point we realized that we had no candles for her cupcakes at home, so my little shopper was thrilled to add a Target run to her birthday celebration. She even thought it was cool to pick out her own candles...

May we all always be this excited at the idea of a gift!
And then of course it was time for cake, but only after she tried on her gift.

It doesn't all show, but it is a VT polo style dress. You may remember her dilemma for the Orange Bowl (click here if you don't) when Kylie wanted to wear a dress but also wanted to wear Hokie colors. We figured this would be a good solution for game days in the fall! Funny thing is that she remembered that she had Hokie hair bows and wanted to have them match her dress!

And finally our wish to you when you read about Kylie's big day, May your day be as sweet as eating your cupcake on the day you turn three!