Birthday the Third

Anda turned 3 on Tuesday this week. I'm becoming one of those people who can't believe they have a kid as old as they do--I was looking at blog posts of things we did just last year, and it feels like a month ago to me, but her growth definitely says otherwise.

We started the day by going to McDonald's for pancakes. I was going to make her some pancakes, but the sleep deprivation and Nana's power of suggestion got the better of me, plus Anda loves the little play area.

She was lucky enough to have both sets of grandparents in town on her birthday (for Lilah's blessing), so we had a little family party that evening. We met up with everyone at the Kangaroo Zoo. I think she had a good time.

The grown ups mostly sat around and played Trivial Pursuit. We had a good time too.

Then, since Anda doesn't really eat food but we know she likes breadsticks, we all went to the Pizza Factory.

I was really surprised when, after months of making me do Google image searches for princess cakes, she told me she wanted a Blue's Clues cake for her birthday.  I got overly ambitious and, long story short, the Blue's Clues cake ended up being a decorative/smash cake and the actual birthday treat ended up being our traditional cupcakes from the Cocoa Bean.

She had a hard time with the candles this year.

But she did not have a hard time eating Blue off the top.

This might be my favorite picture from the whole event. I can't help imagining Olivia whispering, "My precioussssss..."

Then we did presents. Everyone was very generous and we will definitely need to make some kind of toy donation with some of her old toys in the near future.

Especially since she had even more presents waiting at home.

Well, she may be spoiled, but I think everyone deserves at least one day a year that's all about them. Why not on their birthday? We should make that a tradition. Write to your congressman.

We were all wiped out by the end of the day, so it must have been a good one. I'll do a more personal post about Anda being a big 3 year old soon, but the review of the party will have to do for now.

Happy birthday, little chicken!