Starting the birthdays early!

This year the girls celebrated their "friend" birthday party with their buddy Annie, who is just a few weeks older than them. We have a lot of joint friends, and this ended up being a weekend that Nana Rose and G-Daddy could come out, so it was a perfect time for a big birthday party.

We were lucky to have many fun friends who could make it, including some of our neighbors and many of our good friends. In lieu of gifts, we asked people to bring something everyone could play with at the party- people brought stickers, bubbles, etc. but the favorite thing brought was chalk and a set of spray bottles. The bottles probably never got used on the chalk, but were used all over everyone at the party!

The theme of the party was balloons - because last year that was all the girls cared about. It turned out to be a good theme this year, too - everyone likes balloons! Christina made up various balloon animals/flowers for all the little (and some of the big) guests.

Remember last year, when we got the big "2" balloon and it got loose of it's balloon weight and brought the girls to tears as it flew away? That was the big story of the year. Of course we got a big balloon "3" this year, and instead of trusting the weight we tethered it straight to the fence. Within minutes of the party starting, Caryn shouted: "Oh no, the three!!"

Yep, that's the three -off in the air yet again, sailing into the wild blue yonder. The girls were still distressed, but not nearly so much as last year. What kind of wacky tradition is this that we've got going???

The cupcakes this year also had their own little mishap. Turns out that MnMs melt not only in your mouth, but also on cupcake frosting. These were supposed to be so pretty...and instead were pretty disappointing. Luckily, they still were delicious to eat.

Our three sweeties, blowing out the candles Nana Rose and G-Daddy brought them for their cupcakes.

This sideways glance Annie is giving is just hilarious!

Have you ever seen three girls happier to be sharing a birthday?

Christina made the girls these shirt/skirt combos with their initials and a different dot pattern for each girl. If you think of "ace" as meaning "pretty great" then we think they are definitely aces!

Rachel, the girls' first babysitter and steadfast friend, came to the party and the girls tricked her into doing anything we said they couldn't - like looting these lollipops out of the goody bags, and blowing up the water balloons they were supposed to save for later. Somebody's got to spoil them, right?

A scene of some of the party fun:

Christina and her girls -there had never been a mom more proud of her daughters than Christina is of these smart little beauties...we are so lucky to have had three years together.

Silly, silly years together!

Daddy was the photographer today, but he is no less proud or lucky...we are all thrilled to be celebrating Clara and Elena's birthday, and are excited to celebrate all week long.

Here's the other birthday girl, Annie, and her doting mom.

...and Dad, too. Aren't they a sweet little family? We are so blessed to have them as friends, birthday buddies, and everyday supporters.

Stay tuned for posts on the fair, on big girl beds, and on birthday party number two when Grammie Ellen gets here on Saturday!