Natalie's Birthday

Natalie had her 4th birthday on Saturday. It was a packed weekend, with lots of cake and presents - which means it was a great birthday!!! Last week, Dad had another out of town trip, and he came home Friday morning, just before Grandma Phyllis and Grandpa Tom arrived. Friday was "bring your tricycle to school" day for Owen and he was very excited about that. It took Mom about 40 minutes to drop Natalie & Owen off at school Friday morning, what with getting them to their classes with their bags, then getting the tricycle out of the car, all while carrying Henry around in his carseat. He is getting very heavy! Saturday was very busy. Mom and Grandma took Natalie (and Henry) to ballet and then to the airport to pick up Karen. Dad and Grandpa took Owen to his first Gymboree class (and Dad forgot the camera). After the morning running around, Mom and Karen did some last minute birthday party preparations. Mom had to get additional cake decorations for the massive cake for Saturday night. Mom put Dad in charge of ordering the cake (which Mom planned to decorate), and we ended up with a 1/2 sheet of cake for five adults and two kids!!! So we needed more icing and princess decorations. We had an early dinner at Carrabba's for Natalie's birthday (to beat the crowds), and the wait staff sang to Natalie (and brought her a chocolate-covered cream puff!), which of course made her shy side appear. After dinner it was present and cake time. Natalie is very excited about all of her gifts. She loves her clothes and new Princess items: a throne, "laptop" with games, and art set, to name a few. Owen got some cool new toys as well, but as always he is more interested in Natalie's goods. There have been some battles over the throne. And he loves to come press as many keys of the laptop keyboard as possible when Natalie is in the middle of a game. We all enjoyed the enormous cake on Saturday night. Sunday was Natalie's birthday party with her friends from school. Karen had to get home, so we took her to the airport after breakfast. We had the party at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. It was a butterfly/bug theme. The kids did some crafts, got to pet a lizard and a snake, enjoyed some of the butterfly exhibits, and had yummy strawberry cupcakes to end the party. Sunday night we were all tired, and Mom ended up being the only one awake to watch the exciting Giant's victory in the Superbowl.

So we've been getting back into the normal routine around here. The weather has been gorgeous and we are looking forward to getting out and working on some landscaping and outdoors projects. Henry continues to work on his skills - he's been enjoying practicing sitting on his own. He continues to discover new toys to shake and chew on. He's getting so big - we're moving up in clothes size again.