Maggie's Birthday Celebration

And so another Fowler Family Festivus draws to a close as Maggie's birthday winds down. Around here we start our holiday season at Halloween and don't stop eating sweets and opening gifts until mid-February after clearing Christmas, Kate's birthday, my birthday, Valentine's Day, and a couple of cakes for Mags. This year we already had about a third of the homemade carrot cake that I made for Mike for Valentine's Day (it's his favorite) still in the fridge when I started making Maggie's ultra-pink strawberry birthday cake. Cake-o-rama!


Nothing says love like carrot cake.

The first wave of celebration came when a box arrived in the mail from Nana and Papa. I went ahead and let Maggie open it even though it wasn't quite her birthday yet because, well, a present came in the mail!!


Happy, happy!! Joy, joy!!


She even let Kate open one of her presents for her in return for all the presents she opened for Kate last month.

Next, her brand new big girl bed was delivered from the furniture store on the day before her birthday. She got all new sheets and duvet cover from Grandma the Great (picked out by me though... if you don't like them, don't blame Grandma! For the record, Maggie loves her purple sheets, of course.) She and Kate played there all afternoon!


Two little monkeys cuddling in the bed...


That night, Mike took down the crib. Goodbye old friend!


And we moved the toddler bed into Kate's room! Here she is practicing sleeping in it.


And relaxing with a book. She actually really loves the "critter bed" (it's IKEA name is Kritter... it has a cat and a dog on the headboard), but she only loves it until it's time to go to sleep. Then one of us has to basically sit outside her door and keep putting her back in it until she gives up and falls asleep. This too shall pass.

On Maggie's birthday, we got up and let her open her presents from us first thing.


Kate helped again. Oh, and it's not Christmas. They just love wearing their matching Christmas pjs all year round.

Mike had taken the morning off, so we headed downtown to the Children's Museum, which Maggie chose as her favorite place to go on her birthday. We had tons of fun!





We had some lunch in the museum restaurant before Mike had to go into work for a few hours and Kate collapsed in the car for her afternoon nap. All the way from the museum to the parking garage and into the car seat, Kate kept repeating, "I no like, I no like!" Neither of the girls wanted to leave at all, but they both ended up asleep, so I think they were done.


Chocolate Milk!

Later, we had hot dogs and tater tots for dinner - another choice made by Mags - and then the neighbor kids came over for strawberry cake.


With pink, red, and white heart shaped sprinkles! That's pinkalicious.

AND THEN, the next day we headed up to Gram and Grandpa's for chocolate ice cream cake and more presents!


Mike and I both feel a little woozy about how grown up she looks in some of these pictures. We're already starting to worry that she's going to be much too pretty and we're hoping that she'll at least be mega-nerdy so Mike won't have to sit up nights on the front porch with a shot gun! Paternal and maternal (mostly the maternal) genetics guarantee that she'll be at least semi-nerdy. Fingers crossed!


This little Playmobil garden set from Gram and Grandpa was a huge hit. Both girls spent all weekend playing with it. Who doesn't love making a huge mess with water and modeling clay and tiny little plastic flowers?!

And so, a marvelous time was had by all. We ate cake, our little bitty baby turned four years old, we ate more cake, we played musical beds, we ate cake, we hit the museum and had lunch out with Dad, we ate cake, we made several big messes, and we ate cake. Birthday success! And may all your Festivuses be white... because it snowed again here today! Argh!