Julia's 2! Extravaganza!

Well, she's officially 2 now. Can't you see how much she's grown?!

We spent the day of her actual birth at America the Beautiful park in downtown Colorado Springs. Unfortunately, I left my camera at home (I know, I suck) so I have no pictures of her frolicking in the fountain. She quite enjoyed herself, though!

When we got home, she opened her presents. Unlike last year, she was adamant about opening them without the assistance of her older sister. So, she asked Evan for help. :)


She declared every gift "cute" and would ooh and ahh over them all.


After a dinner and a bath (and a trip to King Soopers for brownies after mine were too disgusting to eat....I have no idea what went wrong, they were from a box for goodness sakes!), we called Nina & Papa on our computer (thank you Skype) and we sang Happy Birthday to her.
She tried so hard to blow out the candles by herself. Evan eventually helped her out.
She found the store bought peanut butter brownies delicious (as did we all).

We had her birthday party this past Saturday. Of course, it was Mickey Mouse themed. I made her cake. It was cherry chip with vanilla icing. Oh my goodness, was that cherry chip cake delicious!
Do you like her party skirt? It was an Old Navy find and I adore it on her.
We invited only a few people (Rachel and her family, Kim and her family, Baby Noah and his family). After she opened this Mickey Mouse coloring book from Kim, she had absolutely no interest in opening any other gift. She'd just pass them to me and say, "Here go, Mom."
That was, until she got a surprise gift from her Aunt Kyle....a helium tank with balloons.

Why is Kyle so mean to me? you ask. Well, you see, when Ethan turned 2, he loved balloons more than anything else. And when looking for a gift for him, I was strolling down the party aisle at Wal-Mart and stumbled upon a small helium tank with balloons. Knowing how much he would love me, I purchased said helium tank, wrapped it up and didn't tell a soul what I'd done. At Ethan's party, he opened the gift, and as I predicted, was ecstatic about it and demanded it be opened so he could blow up all the balloons. Kyle, on the other hand, was not as happy. She may or may not have made an inappropriate hand gesture at me. I can not recall.

So, Kyle emailed Rachel and asked her to buy Julia a helium tank for her party and to surprise me and Evan with it. Yeah...the kids loved it. I'm trying to figure out where to store it. Sigh.
My ceiling. Which are 16ft. high. The babies kept letting go of their balloons. Yeah.

This is Noah. I love him. It goes--Ethan, Owen and then Noah who have my heart. Evan's somewhere at the bottom after the little boys. Julia also loves Noah.


Julia was a bit embarrassed to have to blow out her candles in front of everyone.
Thankfully, her daddy was there to help her out.

We had root beer floats. Rachel drank hers from a stein. :)

Do you want to see her skirt again? Ok!


The older boys played the Wii.
Noah showed his patriotism.

The older girls played pool party with their Barbies.
And Julia wanted bubbles! Thankfully, she received lots of bubble toys!

Noah was in complete awe of the bubbles.
Julia kept eating them.
Thank you, Buzz Lightyear, for supplying them with endless bubbles. Julia loves you.
Overall, Julia had a fantastic birthday.


She's ready to enjoy being 2!!!