Happy Birthday Natalie!

What a fun day for my little birthday girl! We started the day with a morning walk to the neighborhood park. Both Natalie and Nixon enjoyed their time entertaining several school girls waiting for the bus while I enjoyed just watching Natalie - my little ONE year old baby! I took close to a billion photos, but here are a couple of Natalie in her cute little jogging suit.

I tried to convince Natalie that a swing is fun, but couldn't...at least not yet! So, I just took a few more pictures of her sitting in it.

A while later we had some lunch. Here's Natalie dropping food onto the floor...

...and then in classic Natalie fashion asking me "where is it"? (As if she doesn't know-haha!)


Unfortunately Natalie was still suffering from her cold, so I took her to the doctor to make sure it wasn't developing into something worse. Here she is playing with the (germ infested) office toys.


And looking at the COOL fish!


And looking at the WILD Bearded Dragon!


Good thing we wasted some time there...well, at least I found out she was okay! :)

Natalie's B-day party started at 6:30 pm. Unfortunately, I wasn't ready for the (23) guests and spent most of the night preparing food as they ate it...and if it weren't for the much needed help from Grandma Fern, Christa, Sally, Aunt Vikki and Noni, no one would have eaten a thing! Nevertheless, by Natalie's request, we had all of her favorites- Appetizers: Ritz and Cheese sandwich crackers and pizza bites. Dinner: Gnocchi (both red and cream sauce), cornbread souffle, zucchini and cheese and (garlic) bread. Dessert: Bing Soo, a Korean dessert made of fresh fruits (we had blueberries, strawberries, apples, grapes, kiwis, mangos and pineapple), ice cream, shaved ice, condensed milk and fruit puree - Natalie LOVES fruit. We also had, of course, her birthday cake, as seen below. I pulled teddy bear cake creations off the internet to get this idea. Alisa (my sister) and Noni (Mike's Grandma) helped me put it together. We did this while everyone was eating dinner and fortunately finished it just in time! I also made cupcakes with a peppermint patty and three huge chocolate chips to make a paw print on them. I can't believe I don't have a picture of it! (Maybe Mike's mom does...I'll have to get a copy of all the pictures she took that night.)


Here we are, enjoying Natalie blow out her birthday candle and eating some birthday cake. This was the highlight of my night! I can't believe I have a baby celebrating a birthday! This is happiness.




Notice, I took her clothes off before I let her dive into the cake...heaven forbid she gets her clothes dirty on her birthday!





We decided to put her in her highchair so she could enjoy her cake a little more...check out her hands! Eating all that cake made her pretty thirsty, too.


Here she is trying to share some with Dad.


Let's pose for a picture...nope, she's still thirsty!


What a day! It went fast and was more work than I could have EVER imagined! (I hear it only gets worse, and now understand why cooking-and-cleaning-free-party-places like Chucky Cheese stay in business!) But all the work was worth it! Happy Birthday my little yet big girl! Your Mom and Dad LOVE the snot out of you!!!