HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAGGIE!

It's hard to believe our darling is now two years old! We had quite the celebration for such an auspicious occasion. On the day of her birthday, we had a lunch playdate with the neighbors. Since we've spent so much time at the Gardens this Fall and Winter, we had a flower theme. Here are the PB&J and Cheese sandwiches that we served for lunch:

That night we had another family over for dinner. Maggie had a lot of fun playing with her friend, Will (or "Whoa!" as she calls him).

The following weekend we had a family party at Ben's folks. My parents, Ben's aunt and my middle sister, Kathy, and her family were able to attend. Here's a nice group photo. . . . notice Kathy showing off her new baby tummy. She's due in June!

Over Christmas, Maggie got to try Grandmother's coconut cake and she LOVED it. We were all surprised because Maggie is very picky about texture and doesn't like frosting at all. So we convinced Grandmother to make another for Maggie's birthday. Here she is wolfing down a nice slice. We colored the coconut on top of the cake green and used butter cookies and gumdrops to make flowers on the top.

Of course we had fun opening gifts at her parties and other neighbors and friends brought Maggie gifts too. We're very blessed to have some many people who love Maggie!

Now my biggest challenge is finding a place for all her new toys, books, crayons, paper, etc. etc. etc. :-) A young visitor to our home once complained that we didn't have very many toys. That is no longer the case! :-)

Perhaps the best part of the whole thing was hearing Maggie respond to the question "How old are you?". She would look up and smile real big and say "two!" in the cutest voice you've ever heard. Not that I'm biased or anything.

Ben and I are excited to see what this year holds for our family. I'm sure there will be many joys and struggles ahead. I'm still surprised sometimes by just how very much I love her. Thank you to all of our friends and family who have supported, prayed, laughed and cried with us this year! You are SUCH a blessing to us, especially to me personally - sometimes I need all the help I can get. :-)

Self Awareness is a double-edged sword

Ben said that one morning at breakfast and I couldn't agree more! Maggie is now doing more and more on her own - she even started potty training herself before Christmas. Along with that come the inevitable pint-sized attitude and firm (but still cute) "No!" which is now heard frequently in our house. She is struggling more with sharing, and more insistant that she do things on her own now. It's fascinating to watch, and a little sad too. "Our baby's growing up!" However, I will be thrilled to death when she gets the potty training thing down. :-)

Small Milestones

Maggie and I stayed home from church today since she's getting over a cold. I was doing a load of laundry when she walked into the hallway with her fancy shoes on - which she had put on by herself! To my knowledge this is the first time she has put on her shoes without any assistance, so we celebrated with a photo and and extra glass of milk. :-)

Maggie's Got a Star!

When we arrived home from our fall vacation, we found a special letter waiting for us from the hospital where Maggie was born. Their nursery features a huge mural covered with gold stars. Every year the hospital auxillary randomly selects 12 babies to put on the stars - one for each month. Maggie's name was drawn out of the over 80 babies born in January 2006 at that hospital! So today we took a little drive to see Maggie's star and had lots of fun reliving memories from almost 2 years ago! I'm so excited to have her name there and to think that she'll be able to come back years from now and find her name on that wall.

Maggie's star highlighted:

Daddy helps Maggie find her star:

Maggie's a SuperStar!

Family Fest

Our church has an annual Family Fest on Oct 31 and for the first time they moved it indoors. Somehow I got asked to coordinate the decorations for the event, so I called on some good friends to help. Lori arranged for hay and mums, which I used to create some displays like this:

Joy got a great team of ladies together before the event to make some fun decorations for the insides of the building - these sunflowers and pumpkins were fabulous!

Dottie put together a wonderful photo area which was just beautiful!

Thanks to everyone to helped on these teams. . . Mike, Jennie, Toni, Nancy, Holly, Lori Ba., Susan, Toy, Myra, Rachel, Dee Ann, and anyone else I've missed! You're such a blessing!

Scarecrows!

Our local Garden is having their annual scarecrow contest so our playgroup went for a visit. We had a fun time exploring with the kids.

Maggie's friend Will was there and they were so cute! They held hands through the Rose Garden and Maggie led the way. I guess she's not the submissive type. haha. They also enjoyed looking at the fountain. . .

Maggie B, Superstar!

It's official - daddy's a sucker for his little girl. We walked past these sunglasses in Wal-mart and Maggie tried them on and that was all she wrote.