Quiet Sunday at home

After all the events of the last weeks, we were happy to have a Sunday with absolutely nothing scheduled. In fact, except for a neighborhood bike ride, we did not leave the family compound for the entire day! It seems that it's when we spend all that time at home together, is when all the craziness happens.

Cake and Piñata

Daphne preferred the tricycle to all the candy and toys from the piñata...

Jujy, checking out her loot...

The Great Zuke

The Great Zucchini came for Emma's party -- the kids were cracking up and laughing the whole time:

Emma's Birthday Party

The weather was practically perfect for Emma's Birthday party. We had been suffering from 90+ humid days just a few days before and were dodging mosquitoes every time we stepped outside. I prayed to the weather gods for a 75 and breezy day. And I pretty much got that! It was pretty windy, but that ensured that there were no bugs flying around and annoying us. Here are the kids as they arrive, playing on toys and jumping on the moon bounce. Emma is already having a blast having all her friends at her house!

Cupcakes at School

We brought in the cupcakes today. Emma was so excited for this, but when the class started singing Happy Birthday, she suddenly turned all shy about it! Here are some pics of her and her friends enjoying the cupcakes:

I had to take this picture of Lex because she got pretty comfortable in Emma's classroom. She kicked off her Crocs, sat crosslegged, and snacked on her cake and juice. Ah, how relaxing!

Emma has been coming home lately talking about how she and her friends take turns being a dog. I got to witness the game firsthand today. Here, Emma has taken links and made them into a leash. In the picture below, her "dog" is Kaitlyn Burke (the girl on her hands and knees, following Emma). All the kids were doing this, taking turns being dogs. It was pretty funny to watch.

Cupcake Decorating

We decorated cupcakes yesterday for Emma's class. We mixed different food colorings into white icing to create different colors, which the girls found fascinating. Then they iced the cupcakes and covered them with sprinkles. By the end of this, there was icing and sprinkles EVERYWHERE.

The best part is that they each got a spoonful of leftover icing when we were done! Sugar high!

Pixie Sticks

Yesterday the girls had Pixie Sticks for the first time. Emma got the hang of it, but Alexa sucked her stick to the end. They still both enjoyed it though!

Got Schwinn? (aka, Shhh. Happy Birthday Emma!)

For her birthday, my parents got Emma a brand new bike with a matching helmet. It's the ultimate girly girl bike with pink and purple tassles. Emma is still getting the hang of it, but she LOVES it. She still tends to careen perilessly down hills near our home (with one or several adults trailing behind her shouting, "Stop Emma! Slow down!" with increasing alarm), but she is so antsy to get out to ride it as often as she can.

Emma refuses to believe that today is her birthday. She is adamant that she is already 4. So we stopped trying to convince her and just let today be any other day. Still, she didn't mind singing Happy Birthday and blowing out candles tonight over a peach cobbler...

Alexa and Gong Gong

My parents drove down from NY today to visit us. I took the opportunity to also test out the new 50 mm lens that we got, on the advice of Howard. So these are "practice" shots, still working on getting better lighting and steadiness.

We went to Chili's for dinner. Here are Alexa and Gong Gong, having a good time together:

Note the HUGE bowl of Mac and Cheese sitting in front of Alexa. Note that 15 minutes later, this bowl was EMPTY, except for the 2-3 bites that Emma took from it. Me thinks Alexa will be in the Coney Island Hot Dog Eating Contest one day. Make me a proud mama.