Abbie's 5th birthday

Easter Sunday was Abbie's 5th Birthday. It was difficult to have another birthday on a holiday since Graham and Molly's are December 26th and 27th, but what a great day to celebrate. We got to celebrate Abbie and the fact that Jesus died for us and rose from the dead! What a way to celebrate our physical life and our spiritual life in Christ!

I had asked Abbie for a while what she wanted to do for her birthday. The only thing she kept telling me was that she wanted us to have balloons and to decorate for her birthday - that was easy enough. Saturday night she was so excited to go to bed. When she saw that it was dark outside she actually started jumping up and down! After she got in bed she told me that I needed to make sure that Graham, Molly and I (daddy was going to be at church) were awake before she was so that we could tell her "surprise" in the morning:) It was really cute. Here's the "surprise" she woke up to:

Her bedroom door, she was really surprised to have streamers and balloons in her face...

Then they were all the way down the stairs...

A "Happy Birthday" sign in the doorway to the kitchen...

and finally streamers and balloons in the kitchen. (Abbie is in the picture because at this time she was running circles under the streamers - she really liked them!)

Daddy had to be at church for the morning Easter services so we let her open her new Barbie movie so she wouldn't be asking mommy all morning long to open her presents:) It was a good distraction for a few hours at least. She was very patient and absolutely wanted her daddy to be there when she opened her presents. She loves her daddy that's for sure!

Hard to believe our princess is 5!

We used the candles where the flames are colored, the purple one was pretty cool, but they had a ton of smoke when she blew them out.

I have a cute video of her opening one of her presents that I will try to post.

After lunch, presents and cake we had our Easter day activities that I'll post about later. It was a fun filled day!

Why a (or at least my) 4 year old shouldn't have lipgloss!

I let Abbie have her lipgloss in the car the other day and when we stopped this is what I found. 

Such sweet sisters

Molly decided she wanted to push Abbie on the swing tonight. I love watching my girls play together.


Molly pushing her big sister.


Molly looks so small pushing her sister.


Then Molly started pushing Abbie by holding her shirt. Abbie thought is was so funny.


Molly pushing (or pulling) Abbie by her shirt.


Then Molly had her turn to swing.

Abbie's 4th Birthday!!

Abbie turned 4 on 4/4. (yes over two weeks ago) We had a fun family celebration Friday night and had pizza and cake. When I asked her what she wanted for her birthday meal, she actually told me she wanted pizza, hot dogs and hamburgers! I thought that was a little much:) She was so funny when I was trying to ask her favorite food. I was asking about her favorite restaurant and her favorite food but at first she just kept telling me she wanted to eat "good food" at home. She asks me at every meal "mommy, are we eating good food or gross food?" We have actually had to tell her she isn't aloud to say food is gross if she doesn't like it. So back to her birthday - we had a fun little family party at home and Abbie opened her presents.


Here is Abbie blowing out her 4 candles! It was cute because she blew out each candle individually.

Then on Saturday, her actual birthday, Abbie and I went to breakfast at First Watch with Brittani and Anna. Here are the girls waiting to be seated:



Then we took the girls to pick out matching dresses. They were so adorable trying on their dresses. The girls were jumping around in the dressing room and we just kept laughing at how cute they were dancing around and giggling!


Abbie never gets to try on clothes at the store or even pick out her own clothes, so she loved this!


Birthday girl and the model:)

Then after they picked out a dress and a necklace, we went and took some pictures! I kind of just volunteered Brittani to take the pictures because she always does such a great job! Thanks for being so willing Brittani (even thought I don't know that I ever really asked), I love all the pictures!!


Mommy tickling her sweet 4 year old princess


Brittani was having Abbie do this same pose and Molly ran over and did the same thing so she could have her picture taken also. She loves her big sister and always wants to be a part of what she is doing.


I can't believe it's been 4 years!


Molly really liked swinging.


Graham decided he wanted to layout in the sun while us girls took pictures!


Anna and Abbie


When I first saw this picture, I had to look at it twice they look so much the same.


Cupcakes again. Anna kept asking where the cupcakes where. I love that kids have to have cake for it to really be someones birthday.

Daddy Daughter Dance

On Friday night Abbie and Marty went to the "Daddy Daughter Dance" at Northland. They went last year and it has definitely become a tradition to go. Next year Molly will probably go also.
Abbie was so excited to get to have time with only her and her daddy. This year she got all dressed up and was so excited to go! I asked her right before this picture "Abbie are you excited to go to the dance?"

This was her super excited "yes" response.




She loves to spin in this dress.


Abbie and her daddy all ready to go.


Kisses!


Gracie and Abbie thought it was so fun that they had almost the same dress on. Molly wanted to put on her matching dress also.


Daddy giving Abbie her pink flowers!


Abbie, Marty, Greg and Gracie leaving for the dance.


They had a great time. They got there pictures taken at the dance that we can get next week. They got to eat some cotton candy and color and make a cute tissue paper flower. Then Pastor Joel spoke for a short time and they played a video with pictures from the night. Abbie got a goodie bag with a flower pot, seeds, candy and a few other little things. I don't think that they actually even danced at the dance but they had a blast getting all dressed up and just being together!

Screaming Girls

On Friday Abbie and Molly were playing outside. I found this in one of their toy buckets:



I showed it to them and I think it scared Molly at first so she then thought is was so funny and kept running away screaming pretending to be scared of the gecko. She would run away and immediately run right back and ask to see the lizard.



They probably did this 20 times! They just thought it was so funny. You just never know what silly thing they are going to do!
This was actually the only time that they ran into each other:)

3 Girls Singing

On our vacation, Abbie and Anna loved getting to ride in the car together.  I have to say 3 girls in a car is a lot of little high pitched voices, but was lots of fun seeing the girls interact with each other.  This was just to adorable not to catch on video. Someone started singing Hannah Montana's Best of Both Worlds song and then they all joined in - too cute!!

Our Big Girl

On January 5th, our little Abbie officially became a big girl. She slept on the top bunk! Yes our 3 1/2 year old is now sleeping every night up on the top bunk. I was nervous the first night that I wouldn't be able to sleep. But she was just so excited, it made me not nervous and I slept great. I love that Abbie has something that is just her own.

Getting ready to take a nap

Abbie and Molly playing together on the top bunk

Molly has known how to climb a ladder it seems like since before she could walk but on the bunk she didn't know how to get back down at first. The first day I left the room for a second and when I came back in she was just sitting up there crying to get down. But it only took her a few days to figure out how to get back down now:)

Green Meadows Farm

On Monday, the girls and I went to Green Meadows Petting Farm with the Northland Co-op. Graham had gone with his kindergarten class last Thursday so the girls had heard all about it and were excited. At Green Meadows you go on a tour to see all the animals and you get to go in the pens with most of the animals. We saw turkeys, roosters, chickens, turkens (half turkey, half chicken), ponies, goats, lambs, wild peacocks, rode a train, rode a pony, went on a hay ride, and held baby chicks - I'm pretty sure that's all. Actually we got to feed the goats also, which I thought was totally gross cause they just slobbered all over your hands to get the food:) There were still other animals we didn't see this time. I know they also have donkeys, bulls and a zorse (half horse, half zebra). 

Abbie just seemed to be happy that Anna was there, but Molly absolutely LOVED all the animals. At one point we had to leave the chickens so Abbie could potty and Molly cried the whole time saying "chickens, chickens." She loves her animals!  I have so many pictures, but here are just a few.  We had a wonderful time and we have to plan another trip with the whole family sometime soon! (for some reason blogger posted these pictures all out of order and I'm not sure how to easily change them)

Abbie while we were having lunch (taken by Nathan Clark and he put it on Northland's blog)

Abbie after she finally came in to pet the goats. She wasn't interested in much all day.

Molly holding a duckling. She wanted to hold it all by herself, but not very gently:)

Molly went right onto the horse. I didn't have to convince her at all. She just laughed for the first half of the ride.

This was Molly's favorite - the goats! I wish you could see her face, but she did this to every one. She would look right in their face and then she would get a really excited smile on her face. She tried to pet and HUG every single goat. She also thought it was so funny feeding the goats.

Molly and I on a short little train ride. 

This is Molly grabbing her hands in excitement. I have a video of her chasing them around. I'll have to post at a later time. 

Abbie, Bradley, Anna and Brittani petting a turkey.

Anna and Abbie

Abbie and Abby

At SeaWorld there is a Sesame Street show and the characters come outside so the kids can meet them. Well, we didn't see the show but we did see the characters come out while we were eating lunch. Abbie saw Zoe and thought that was cool but when she heard Abby Cadabby was there she wanted to see her. I know when she saw someone dressed in a big Shamu costume she didn't want to get very close, but when she saw Abby Cadabby she just ran right up and gave her a big hug. Thankfully I had my camera on when we were walking over or I wouldn't have caught the sweet hug. I just love that Abbie wasn't fearful at all- yeah! She told Abby Cadabby that her name was Abbie also and the characters don't talk but her expressions were that she was excited - Abbie loved it.