Happy Birthday, Tali!

Today our sweet girl turned THREE! How the time has flown by...

Here's a run-down of the day so that I can remember it for the future (and this probably won't be that facinating for most of ya so feel free to skip this post):

Around 7:15am this morning we heard Tali in her room singing repeatedly, "I'm three years old today!" Josh and I got Owey up and went in her room all together singing, "Happy Birthday." We gave Tali a balloon and a gift to start her day (a new book). She was all smiles.

Her birthday breakfast consisted of a smoothie made from Daddy and an english muffin w/peanut butter.

Then, our friend Karen came over and opened gifts with us. (Karen serves our family by coming over once a week to help me out however is needed...cooking, cleaning, watching the kids, folding clothes, etc. Such a blessing!) Tali opened some sweet gifts from Karen and then opened the special presents that Pops & Grammy & GG had sent from California. They were a huge hit!

She spent the morning enjoying her gifts and trying hard to share them with Owen. :)

Birthday lunch was Mac N Cheese (per her request). At the end of lunch she got a phone call from Aunt Amy and talked her ear off, especially about decorating the house with purple balloons.

Both kids were super wound up and couldn't fall asleep for naps. Eventually Owen did but Tali just sat in her bed singing songs at the top of her lungs. My favorite part was when she belted out a verse from the "To Be Like Jesus" cd. ("Presents and birthdays-Jesus is better! Forever and always-Jesus is better! Better than anything you could imagine. Jesus is better than all!") Super sweet that she was singing that today of all days.

More birthday phone calls from Pops, Grammy, and GG kept her happily entertained for the afternoon.

Papa & Grandma came and helped decorate some more and brought birthday gifts. She loved playing with them and was especially glad that Papa made it back from work in time for her party.

Our dear friends, the Kruegers, came over to party and the kids played and played. We had a little #3 treasure hunt and they did some interesting 3 year-old attempts at "hide and seek." Pasta for dinner and cupcakes & ice cream for dessert. Tali definitely loved having her friends there to celebrate.

Before bed, Tali opened her final gift: a dollhouse. She said, "Oh, I've always wanted a dollhouse! I have been wanting one for a long, long, time and now I have one on my birthday!" I think she was beside herself with joy. "Owey, you've got to be very very careful. This is my very special birthday dollhouse and I don't want it to break because I love it, Owey."

Happy birthday to our sweet 3 year old. She is such a gift of joy to our lives each and every day.