After the day of the birthday party, we had a family birthday dinner at Grandpatty and Grandpappy's house.
Grandpatty knows that fun candles and pretty frosting are important to girls...
Bekah...
Abby...
I love having family members love my kiddos. So fulfilling...
Paul taught them about making a wish and never telling it to anyone. Man, what excitement came when they got to make their wish! Abby still hasn't told me hers, but every now and then she'll say something like... "Mom! We got to have our favorite treat tonight! (with a sly grin...) But that wasn't my birthday wish... !!"
Blowing out candles...
And they know our family and share our obsessions...
Also from family members: cool crayons, markers, and paper! Tiny princess jewlry! Books! FUN!
This is the day they got to open their presents from us. Clothes, art supplies... and the thing that I talked Paul into... PAINT!! for their rooms. They got to pick the color, I got to pick the shade. And they were so, so, so excited to paint with mommy. (more to come on that...)
Orange for Bekah... (geesh!)
and purple for Abby...
During all the excitement, Ella decided to busy herself with her own project of changing the toy giraffe's diaper...
She was very serious and deliberate about the whole thing with the wet wipes and all.
Oh, Abby and Bekah... when did you get so old?? Certainly some days it seemed like this time would never come. That I would always be changing your diapers, nursing you, feeding you squishy food, or pushing that clunky double stroller everywhere. Now I am reminding you to flush the toilet, helping you clean the food you spill at each meal, perpetually restocking the markers and paper supply, reminding you to keep your seat belts on, and filling out your kindergarten registration forms. When did it all happen?? 5 just seems too old.
But you don't think so... 5 is just right!! You'd been anticipating birthday number five for months and months. In the fall, I would name all the holidays from Thanksgiving to Valentine's Day, telling you that after the New Year and just before Valentine's Day we would get to celebrate. The cake choices ranged from Sleeping Beauty, Kitties, 5-tiered tall cakes with lots of candles, butterflies, flowers... then finally a few days before the big day... a decision was made: Rainbows. A big rainbow cake for Abby, and lots of rainbow cupcakes for Bekah. Thanks for giving me a couple of days to pull together a rainbow themed day.
But be forewarned that I will try to talk you out of any cake that requires me to mix and make 8 colors of frosting. It just takes too long...
But I didn't mind the extra late night too much. You loved seeing the finished products. And that is always worth it.
(with a "cloud" missing due to Ella's careful fingers...)
You invited some of your funnest friends to celebrate with you. They were a lot of fun.
We played the game you requested to play: Duck, duck goose... but we changed it to orange, orange, purple... your favorite colors.
Grandpatty made delicious flower sugar cookies to decorate in rainbow colors.
Aunt Hannah bought a rainbow of nail polish choices to decorate your fingers and toes.
You requested a dance party and chose your favorite songs. "Halo", "You are my only" (Down), "Single Ladies", and "Broken Heart."
We sang Happy Birthday to you, and your candle blowing was a success!
We enjoyed a rainbow of snacks and opened fun presents.
Then we ended with your most anticipated and favorite activity... a Pinata!!! I hope it all went the way you daydreamed. The rainbow unicorn delighted you both when we found it, and Bekah declared "this is the best ever!" as we filled it with the treats and toys we picked out. You planned for it to be the crowning event at your party... and I think it was!
And if you don't want to watch a bunch of kids whacking away at a pinata, you simply must see what a fun daddy these girls have. After resisting and resenting, Paul finally resigned and in the end REJOICED and fully embraced the joys of the pinata.
Here is a video of pinata time. I'm so glad no one got hurt! Phew! If you don't want to wade through all the kids and their hits, you smiply must go to minute 2:40 to see how Paul finally embraced the spirit of the pinata. :)
No wonder you girls love your Daddy.
I loved seeing you both delight together as you shared your special day. You have become such good friends and special sisters. And while you know which buttons to push to send each other into a whirlwind of fury and emotional madness... you also know each other's favorites, save seats for each other, congratulate each other on the good things you do, and take turns being the princess or the mommy or the baby or the kitty.
As I watch the novelty of a twin sister relationship, I feel a little envious. Being raised as the oldest with 5 younger brothers, I always wanted a sister to pal around with and be friends with. You each declare the other as your best friend, and I always hope it stays this way. You deserve each other, and I hope you always look after each other and remain a blessing to each other.
You are definitely a blessing to me. You've taught me so much about myself. You've blessed me by showing me my weaknesses and giving me chances to make them stronger. You delight in girly things, and have opened up a world that was not fully discovered in a house full of boys... a world of embraced frills and fanciness and fun. We help each other to be emotionally honest, and deal with it all in a hopefully healthy way. I hope we always express and share in ways that help us become better.
Certainly the craziness of twin girls is still rampant in our home. I think I've become resigned to know that it always will be. But with the changing years, there is a change in which joys and challenges you bring. The last 5 years have been quite a ride... I can't wait to see where we're going next!
after 10 years, a blown engine room, discounts and a postponement we finally did it. we celebrated our 10th anniversary in our 11th year of marriage. after the first cancellation it felt like it might never happen. and now that we're home and back in the routine of daily life i doesn't feel like it actually happened (aside from the occasional tricks my balance center plays on me as it tries to pitch my center of gravity forward to counter the coming wave...)
it was a beautiful time. great food. great company. great activities. one of a kind.
thank you amy for a beautiful trip and for 10 beautiful years.
beware of the video...it is longer than 10 beautiful minutes.
two of the neighborhood boys came over to play with ells bells the other day and she took matters into her own hands. i am generally supportive of a healthy sense of self esteem and self defense in my girls and this was great.
she is so cute right now. her favorite part of bowling was the shoes. she's asked about bowling shoes several times since our bowling trip.
today at the grocery store she kneeled in the grocery cart on all fours and said she was a dog. she asked to be driven by different items so she could sniff them and bark at them. for her nap she has a set 'playlist' that i am to sing to her, 'rudolph', 'temple', 'church', and 'child of God'. i love it (and her.)
we were graced with the presence of a production/direction duo of nyc hipsters (stephen and hadleigh) on sunday night when amy and i held our first ever oscars party...it just randomly happened that they were out filming a documentary on the weekend of the oscars and we were lucky to find them at our house during the oscar night magic.
as the kids slowly went to bed one by one upstairs, i printed out the ballots and we fast-forwarded through much of the red-carpet hoopla to more award show hoopla.
our ballots can be seen below. a circle indicates one's preferred winner and a check indicates a prediction of whom the academy will choose. we will compare our award show to that of the academy...
the tick marks at the top of the page indicate the number guessed correctly. the night was tense as we vied for the top predictive position, but it soon became apparent that stephen was pulling away on the strength of his guesses in the shorts and documentarys. i barely pulled from last place to a tie for last with my wife amy (who had only seen 4 of the 9 best picture nominees.)
one caveat before we unveil the winners from our own prestigious academy, 3 of us had seen eight of the nine best picture nominees. amy had seen four. stephen is vowing not to see king's speech on some undefined, undecipherable moral stance. and the winners are...
on the strength of hipster voting, major discrepancies were found. winner of best picture to social network and best director david fincher (also social network.)
i voted for king's speech as best picture and amy voted for toy story (although she cynically predicted that black swan would win the academy's hearts.)
for best actress natalie portman was the unanimous winner in our balloting (although amy abstained not having seen any of the actresses ply their wares.)
and lastly, on the strength of resident highland voters colin firth took home the top male acting prize while the hipsters split for jesse eisenberg and jeff bridges (with a nod to 'the dude'.)
and there you have it. the moment you've been waiting for. do you agree? did the academy get it right. one of the best moments of the night came when trent reznor won an oscar for his score in the social network. it was sad to see the social network flounder so thoroughly. it was a unique and fascinating look at the rise of facebook and its founder that was probably deserving of a few more accolades...
that being said, the king's speech was the best movie i saw all year (followed closely by 'how to train a dragon')
