Carly's third birthday

Actually happened: March, 2013

I am smack-dap in the middle of planning Carly's fourth birthday. 

So, let's take a minute to flash back to Carly's third birthday. 

It was an art party that was supposed to take place on our back porch, but the wind was so out of control that day that we had to move the party into the garage. 

Of course, the color scheme was the entire rainbow! Even the fruit was arranged according to the color spectrum. 

        

Canvases weren't the only things that the kids got to decorate - their cupcakes were works of art, too!

 Carly had a lot friends and family there to celebrate with her. 

We hired a company to "teach" the "art lesson", so that gave us the opportunity visit. The kids seemed to love the Jackson Pollock art lesson and they left with their artwork. 

After the party, lots of people stuck around and the kids played in the back yard. It was so fun to watch all of my new and old friends interacting and all of our kids playing together. 

We did something different this birthday. Instead of presents, we asked guests to make a donation to Cook Children's. It's called the Peter Pan Birthday Club (at Cook Children's). Since Carly didn't NEED anything, this was perfect! She raised lots of money for sick kids, especially after applying for the $100 gift from the national organization. This is definitely a new tradition. 

Resolve to Return

It's February. I should have already started working toward my New Year's Resolution. So, here I am - blogging again. I have a year. An ENTIRE year to catch up on. Better late than never, right?

I realize that no one has been checking in on my blog daily - or even weekly or monthly - patiently waiting for me to return to the blogging world. My blogs aren't full of cool craft projects, recipes or parenting tips. I am not blogging for a following (though it is nice to read sweet comments). I am returning to blogging so that I can chronicle our life. So that I can turn my blogs into coffee table books, which are much easier than scrapbooking.

Another major reason for my return to blogging is that I have noticed that I have stopped taking as many pictures. And that ain't cool.

Bear with me. The next...I don't know how many blogs will be about things that happened months ago. In fact, I know that I will be blogging about people who have gotten pregnant and delivered babies since the last time that I blogged. Hopefully it won't take me too long to catch up.

So, here goes.

This is my grandpa. I was a grandpa's girl, so when he passed away in February, I took it pretty hard. I adored him. I am a lot like him. I felt a great peace with his passing, but it was still very hard for me. 

I still think of him as alive, and then have to remind myself that he left months ago to be with the Lord, my grandma and my aunt. 

He adored my grandma, that has been obvious to me my entire life. When she passed away last fall, I knew that he would follow her soon, with a broken heart. He just wanted to be with her, I know that. 

My grandpa never met a stranger. In fact, he met friends in the craziest, most obscure circumstances. 

I remember visiting Minnesota when I was little, year after year. We would walk to McDonalds for breakfast and just about everyone in that restaurant knew him. It was his thing. 

My grandpa was strong-willed, faithful, loving, loyal, captivating and honest. I loved him very much.

This is one of my favorite memories with my grandpa, reading Bernstein Bears, Bears in the Night. He was so animated and I loved it. I bought this book for Carly. I only wish that I would have thought to have him read it to her. 

I inherited many of his traits, and for that I am grateful because he was a great man. 

I hope that I am half as good to Freddy as he was to my grandma. 

Minnesota

Alright. It has been long enough. I need to face the months of non-blogging and just do it! So, let's start with February. 

Carly, my sisters, brother and I flew to Minnesota (my parents drove) for my grandfather's funeral. More about him in my next post. 

Carly's hat and mitten finally got put to use! Burr...It was cold there!

We made it to the Mall of America and even rode a ride!

Carly was less than thrilled. Freddy may not be able to count on her as his roller coaster buddy when she grows up.

She got a bed all to herself. This time she didn't even fall out!

Mickey Mouse pancakes at Perkins, of course. I loved chocolate chip pancakes when I was little, so I ordered them for her. She didn't inhale them like I used to, even in the shape of her favorite cartoon character.

Despite the circumstances, we had some good family time. I always loved to see my uncle and cousins.  

Elmo Live

Back in February...ish...Some sweet friends of ours gave us tickets to Elmo Live.

So we invited Cheryl and Davis along.

We walked in just as the show was starting and the noise of it all really had Carly freaked out. She kept telling me that she didn't want to go in. Davis, on the other hand, had no problems at all. Being the good mom that I am, I just picked her up and carried her to her seat where she promptly played the "I pee" card. Dangit! Nothing you can do about that one, so we were off to the bathroom where I also gave her a pep talk.

She wasn't sold on the idea of going back in, but I somehow tricked her into it. She eventually got caught up in the show and really enjoyed it. Except for when Elmo was off stage. She didn't like that at all.

Next up: Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Live.

T-Tiny smiles for the camera

I have discovered something wonderful. I have discovered how to upload entire blogs worth of pictures from Picasa in a matter of seconds. No more adding them one by one and waiting MINUTES for them to upload. It is GLORIOUS. I was able to upload a bunch of pictures on to blogs and save them as drafts so that, when I found time, I could just type out the commentary and hit publish.

Seriously, this is greatness. Now that I have discovered this shortcut, I won't procrastinate on blogging just because it is a whip to upload pictures.

Anyway...As I was looking through my 25 blog post drafts, I found this. This unpublished post that is full of totally cute pictures of our t-tiny. She must have been around 7 months old, I am guessing.

So, enjoy this flashback to cuteness.

Bye-Bye Nursery

As Carly's third birthday creeped closer and closer, I decided it was time to say goodbye to the nursery. And then I realized that I never did take any pictures of the...nursery...Wow, it seems weird to call it that now. I guess because it is hard to remember her as a newborn, a baby.

Anyway...Here are some of the "nursery" that was slowly turning into a big girl room - see the big girl toys?

The stripes are gone now and I thought that it would be more difficult (emotionally) to paint over them than it was.

I have a few more things that I would like to do to her big girl room, but once I do, I PROMISE to post pictures. I promise.