Happy 4th Birthday Princess Norah!

My darling baby girl turned four today. Every year I say the same thing, but with every year I feel it a little more than the last; life is going by in the blink of an eye. There is nothing better than to see your children grow into intellectual young people :) They catch you by surprise, like when you ask them if they had fun at their friend's birthday party and they tell you "Yeah - it was fun Mom. It was also interesting and exciting." 

To celebrate today we went to the brand new park they just finished building at Lake Harriet to play and to have a picnic dinner. We heard it was a super fun playground. The First thing Norah and I did was go down a slide together because she was a little nervous. Turns out it would have been less scary going separately! Her leg got caught in between my leg and the edge of the slide and burned her poor little skin off of her toe and leg. There was plenty of screaming and crocodile tears before dad noticed that the Trolley was running and said "Who wants to ride the train!?" Then there was more screaming, but this time it was excited "MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" screams. So we took a ride on the trolley which was even more fun than the park and we had our picnic dinner at the lake with fancy cupcakes for desert. It was a perfect evening, minus the missing skin.

Yesterday was the big party day. We had a princess bash for her and her friends. This year we mixed our very dear forever friends along with a couple of Norah's bestest girlfriends from school and our awesome new neighbors who have two boys about the same age. I think everyone had a pretty good time - we even had a lot of fun at our own party! 

That calls for a HUGE thank you to Grandma Renee and Grandpa Mike. Grandma Renee cleaned my house TWICE (Yes twice)! She came over the day I made the cake and without a word she scrubbed my house from top to bottom! I just wanted some company and an emergency companion in case for when I panicked and screwed up the frosting. Then she did all the dishes and cleaned the kitchen after the party was over! Grandpa Mike took charge of the grill and Colin and I were free to socialize, take photos and run the kids games. It was fantastic. You guys are the best!! 

Oh and the games... Auntie Tegan made all these fun games for the kids and bought a million little prizes for them. They went crazy over this stuff and were screaming and jumping over the moon when they won :) You are also the best Auntie Tegan - Thank you!

Thanks to my hubba hubba love who took over the camera for a bit so I could be in the moment at the party instead of viewing it through a looking glass - while I am a photography junkie, it is nice to take a break once in a while :)




























Love ~ Renee