Happy 11th Birthday, R.!

Yesterday was R.'s birthday, but due to family schedules, we celebrated this afternoon. Since we're still not at a point where we can ask R. what her preferred meal is, we decided to order take-out Chinese. It was a hit. Then, I bought a cake, because she has been aware of fancy cakes and we thought she would be happy with a fancy one. I think she was. Some pictures.

She couldn't quite get the candles blown out...

so M. stepped in and helped.

Then it was time for presents.

The benefit of celebrating today was that everyone could be here, including my mom.

Does it surprise you that G. spent the present opening in B.'s arms?

I have now reinvested in some quality early childhood toys. 

This present was particularly interesting.

Notice Y. and her camera right there?

Checking out the new toy.

I am in love with the gift my mom gave R. (Y. is a little in love with it as well, and that not-so-friendly green-eyed monster has made several appearances over the course of the afternoon.) It's a Three Bears house, complete with porridge, bears, and Goldilocks. It fits together like a puzzle, thus can be stored flat if it needs to be put away for a while. Isn't is adorable? It will be great for acting out fairy tales. Plus there are two other story houses that can be added... The Three Little Pigs and Hansel and Gretel.

We think R. had a good time with her birthday celebration. She is particularly taken with the little house that has the locks which open the doors, and has even been successful with figuring out which key goes to which lock and how to manipulate the locks. It doesn't stop her from asking us to help her every three minutes, but she is doing it on her own which is a pretty big win in our book these days.

Happy Birthday, dear girl. I look forward to watching you grow and develop and to really learning who you are in there. I love you.

Then, because we had everyone here (a very rare occurrence these days), and because tomorrow is Mother's Day, I insisted asked that we get a family picture.

This is the only way we can do a family picture... spur of the moment before anyone can think about it too much and start to complain (or not participate). No matching outfits. Heck, some of the children don't even have on clothes that match. It started out OK. Nearly everyone is looking at the camera... sort of.

So you try another, and each time you miss one or two people.

So you try again. This one is actually pretty good.

But then you let it go too long and people start to become tired of it. Keep an eye on L. in the bottom left corner.

And then we did one with everyone, including Me and J. It's our first family picture of all 14 of us.