Happy Birthday Isabella!

Isabella turned 3 today! We celebrated with 3 days of festivities. Saturday we went to Greenfield Village to ride Thomas the Train.


They also had many other activities for the kids, like magic shows, tents with games and train tables, and a fun race track with pedal powered cars and tractors.


Of course, my kids always love the carousel and the horse drawn carriages.



Sunday was Mother's Day, so I got some recognition too, but we sang to Bella in Nursery and we spent the afternoon at the park. Then today we had cake and opened presents right when the kids woke up. They had been so excited about the birthday that they both went to bed with their outfits on so they'd be ready! She mostly got Disney princess stuff because she's crazy about "girly things" as she calls them. She also got a princess cake. I'd taken Bella to the store to pick out her birthday cake and she passed up the $40 Disney princess cake with all the princesses on it and chose the $6 Belle cake. Gotta love that girl.


Then we went to a farm and spent nearly the whole day there. Bella got to ride a horse, milk a cow, bottle feed pigs and goats, hold kittens, chicks, and ducklings, and go on a hay ride. She had a wonderful time. I was proud of her for being so brave. Some of those animals were very big but she showed no fear or hesitation. She's a tough girl.




Benjamin had a blast too.




For dinner, Bella chose to go to IHOP because she loves the pancake with the face made of fruit and the yogurt hair that she can design. It's where she wanted to go for her second birthday too. Look at how little she looked just one year go!


However, they'd run out of ice cream so they couldn't give her a birthday treat. When asked what she'd like to have instead, she decided on Mac'n Cheese! So they brought out a bowl of mac'n cheese and sang to her. She was all smiles.

Christian entertained himself by sucking on lemon wedges. We gave him one just as a joke to watch his reaction, but he loved it! He happily sucked on lemons throughout dinner. Even when Benjamin was messing around and one of those large coffee pitchers (which are behind him in the picutre) fell on Christian's head, we simply handed him another lemon and he instantly stopped crying, laughed, and happily went on sucking. I should always keep a lemon in my diaper bag!



This evening, as the birthday finale, Bella got a big girl bed with (what else?) princess sheets and her own room back. We'd had Benjamin and Bella share a room while Christian was little and waking up a lot at night. But now that they're all sleeping through, it made more sense to have a boy's and a girl's room. Mostly for the fact that Bella is a chatterbox and would keep Benjamin up every night with her incessant talking. He'd come out each night multiple times declaring, "Bella's STILL talking!!" So, tonight she chattered and sang to her heart's content while the boys snoozed. It worked out beautifully. She was also so excited to not have to share a closet with anyone. All the more room for beautiful dresses.

Happy Birthday Bella! You are a beautiful girl, inside and out. We love you so much.