Its your birthday Ali...Happy birthday Ali!

I became a mom much sooner than I ever thought I would - just over a year after we were married and before I finished college.  Alexandra has been a sweet blessing to my life since the moment she came to this earth.  She is everything I wasn't (other than stubborn!) as a child, fancy, beautiful, sensitive, smart, kind, girly in every way imaginable and just plain wonderful. 

I know that Heavenly Father sends us the children we need, when we need them.  Alexandra has helped me to grow in every way possible.  She is loving and kind and I have found great joy in seeing her become the sweet girl that she is.  I know that she is capable of so much and I pray that I will be up to the challenge of being her mom.

I have been getting emotional about this fifth birthday for quite some time and decided to make it the best day I possible could for her.

My parents had a tradition of decorating our bedrooms while we were sleeping then they would wake up all of the kids and have them go into the birthday child's room and wake them up with a rousing version of Happy Birthday.  We decided to do that for the Boo Boo and she loved it.

We set up all of her presents down stairs and she was surprised when she came down and saw them.  I made cupcakes and had them out on the counter and she said that we had to sing happy birthday, eat cupcakes and then she could open presents...you know, the way you do it at a party.

Sophi loved her cupcakey breakfast!  We skyped with my parents while Alexandra opened her gifts.  Top on her list were a picnic table for her to eat lunch at outside after school and a talking 'Prinpress' Celestia.  She saw the Princess Celestia in Wal-Mart last summer when we were visiting my parents and she has been asking my mom for it since Christmas...as her birthday gift.  She also loved her big girl backpack, box full of pet shops (thanks to an amazing family who gave us what their girls have out grown) and pink Hawk's jersey.

After eating cupcakes and opening presents we all got ready to go.

Alexandra wanted to do two things on her birthday, first was to go out to breakfast and have pancakes without butter.  A sweet friend watched Sophi for us so we could enjoy our meal.

Long live Prinpress Ceslestia!

The second thing she wanted to do was to play at the Little Gym.  The owners there are amazing and made this happen.

We all had a blast and I went crazy with taking pics.

Anthony cracks me up but he has so much fun with the girls.

After playing at the gym we took a walk by the lake and enjoyed the sunny, windy day.

 

Alexandra loved all of her birthday phone calls.  The cutest was a message from her sweet friend Ashton who sang happy birthday to her on my voice mail.

 

We played around for a while, then cooked dinner.  Ali asked to have salad for her birthday dinner.  I asked if she wanted anything else and she said "well...how about grapes...and broccoli" so we honored her wishes and thew in some grilled chicken.  What a healthy girl she is!

We had an absolutely perfect day!  And I feel so blessed to have such an amazing family!