My Beautiful Birthday Girl

Oh Olivia,

You are my feisty, brilliant, creative, spirited little girl.  I love you more than I could ever express.  You bring so much joy to my life and you make me work so hard at being the right kind of mother to you.  You love to learn, you love stories, you love imaginative play and I want to foster that love for as long as I can.  You also love doing things your way and on your terms and I want to do everything I can to channel that spirit into good.  I love you so much -- you and your wild hair, your strong will and your incredible beauty.  Let's make four the best year yet.

Favorite color: pink

Favorite toy:  my princesses

Favorite stuffed animal: Frenchy the dog

Favorite thing to sleep with: my ballerina doll

Favorite fruit: strawberries {and applesauce}

Favorite cereal: Trader Joe's pink cereal {Strawberry Yogurt O's}

Favorite thing to eat for breakfast: toast with Nutella

Favorite thing to eat for lunch: mexican pizza or grilled cheese

Favorite dessert: ice cream

Favorite drink: water or strawberry milk

Favorite animal: elephant

Favorite song: It's a Small World and Sofia the First songs

Favorite book: Sofia the First

Favorite game: Super Why

Favorite tv show: Sofia the First

Favorite movie:  Ariel {The Little Mermaid}

Favorite thing to do outside: play at the playground

Best friends: Kendall and Brooke

What do you want to be when you grow up: a princess*

*Maybe Princess Kate is having a boy and we will send Olivia to college in the UK. Not happening because that looks like UK as in University of Kentucky and not a chance...

If you've got 12 minutes to spare, enjoy a picture slideshow of Olivia's 4th year.

Olivia's 4th Birthday from Amanda Michelson on Vimeo.

Birthday Shenanigans

This year, we celebrated Olivia's fourth birthday at Disneyland {again!} with the pretty Pedersen ladies.  But, before we left for The Happiest Place on Earth, we had a couple of celebrations around these parts.

Because we would miss Olivia's birthday at school, we decided to celebrate there the week before.  She's allowed to bring in whatever treats she wants and my birthday girl chose donuts.  Pink donuts with sprinkles, specifically.  {You'd know I had to go to two different places to make that happen for her, but I'd do it again happily to make her birthday wish come true.}

➹ She only wore the crown for about 30 seconds. ➹

➹ Oh, Caleb.  I cannot even handle your cuteness. ➹

➹ They even sang Happy Birthday to her at Wee Worship. ➹

We wanted to make sure that friends and family were also included in her birthday festivities, so the day before we left we met up with Nana & Poppy and Uncle Hank & Aunt Patty at the Spaghetti Factory.  And we let Olivia bring her neighbor friend, Brooke, too.  

➹ Brooke puts on this sweet smile when the camera comes out and Olivia tried to mimic it.  She even tried to do it at Disneyland.  Hilarious. ➹

For the last several months, every time we would go to the grocery store, Olivia would ooh and ahhh over the princess cake display in the bakery.  It is bright and pink and full of princesses and nothing I would ever want to have as her birthday cake, but I knew how happy it would make her, so I had to.  And, she loved it.  

Stay tuned for more birthday posts...

The Big Kahuna {Not a Hawaii Post}

Because I have been trying to do at least one picture of the girls on Instagram for each day of 2013 {and I'm succeeding!}, I have been really, REALLY bad at using my nice DSLR camera to take pictures of the girls.  I used to almost exclusively use that camera -- even for pictures at the Children's Museum or the zoo.  But, man, the cell phone is just so much easier to whip out than the giant camera.  I get so used to the quality of cell phone pictures that I sometimes forget I have a camera that can take way better pictures.  Convenience vs Quality.

Well, the other day, I decided I needed to use my nice camera a lot more and it just so happened that the girls were dressed in coordinating Liberty of London {for Target} dresses.  So, these pictures happened.

Later that evening, we had a huge wind storm and David and I decided it would be fun to fly a kite in all that wind.  

It did make for some cute pictures.

So, now, I not only vow to Instagram my girls daily, but I also promise to pull out The Big Kahuna more often.  Good thing I've got gorgeous subjects!

Easter Pictures {Finally!!}

I think I will always and forever think of Easter as being April 12th.  That was my due date with Olivia. She was due on Easter Sunday even though she chose to make her debut 5 days later.  

So, if we take that into consideration, I'm really only posting our Easter pictures a day late! womp womp.  

We had a lovely celebration on Easter.  I got to go to church with my dad to see my mom sing and the girls did three different egg hunts and opened two Easter baskets.  I'd say they were showered with love for sure.  My brother was in town as well, so we had a nice family dinner together with yummy food, including a huge Edible Arrangements from Grandma and Poppa. {Turns out, the ones you get sent are way cuter than the ones you try to make yourself.}

We did our first egg hunt right around noon...basically the worst time of day to take pictures.  But, man, when you've got models as good as mine wearing coordinating dresses, it doesn't matter what time of day it is.  Your pictures will be perfection.

Hope your Easter was as sweet as ours.

The Most Random of Random Posts

This is basically just an iPhone dump.  It's 11:00 at night and I'm half asleep, so I don't even think that I can count this as a brain dump because my brain is barely functioning.  Apologies in advance for anything that doesn't make sense... Let's let the pictures do the talking, shall we?

➼ Mornings at home with the girls:

➹ Blueberries and yogurt makes the best make-up ➹

➹ She's going to make a fabulous director someday.  Here she is telling me how to play with her Little People carriage. ➹

➹ My favorite outtake of those pictures...➹

➼ Olivia has become, like, serious, like, Bee Eff Effs with the girl across the street.  They are, like, inseparable.  {And, they talk like that when they get together.}  The {very sweet} neighbor is 11 months older than Olivia and is very mature for her age.  I've seriously seen Olivia age about 15 years over the last few weeks.  Makes me kind of sad that I'm not cool enough to hang out with anymore...it's all, "I wanna go over to Broooooke's house!!!"  They are cute though and now I sorta know what it would be like to have 3 girls.

➼ And not that having three girls wouldn't be great, but I'm perfectly content with my precious blondies.  

➹ Ahhhh!  Does it get any cuter than this? {It does, but I mean, seriously?!} ➹

➼ And, to sum up this completely random post...let me tell you a couple things about my little stinkpot of a baby girl {who I just love beyond measure...}

➹ She likes to go into our messy pantry and empty out all of the tea bags.  The other morning, I said, "SYDNEY! What are you doing?" When she finished dumping them all out, she came out of the pantry and fist bumped me.  Fist bumped. ➹

➹ She also went into my messy refrigerator and pulled out the celery and then started snacking on it.  Two minutes later, she found David's stash of jalapeños.  Thank goodness for milk. ➹

Annnnnndddd, we're done.

Night, friends.