A BIRTHDAY in the Life of a Two Year Old!

With Claire's second birthday on Monday, August 1st, I thought I'd have a little fun as a photojournalist. I wanted this day to be special for her especially because it's probably the first birthday she realized it was HER birthday! We'd been asking her for two weeks "Who has a birthday in two weeks...one week...three days...etc.?" and I'd also been singing "Alles Gute zum Geburtstag" to her many times in conjunction with this question. I'd pause at the "liebe" and let her say her own name, which she thoroughly enjoyed! A song with your own name...how fun is that?!? So, without further ado, here's a glimpse into a two year old's birthDAY!

First Request: What better way start to the day than "Loeffel Erdbutter!"

(Loeffel Erdnussbutter = Spoon (of) Peanut Butter)

Second Request: A walk and playing at the park! We even explored a new kind of pine cone (long and skinny) on our walk, and Claire spotted right away the tall prairie grass with the fuzzy tops, to which she requested "haben" (have). Now we're "arbeiten" (working) with the flowers - watering them and picking off the dead ones. She is actually pretty good at deciphering the dead flowers from the new blooms. Here, Claire is examining how HER flower is doing!

Trying out our new finger paints from Tante! She really liked this (and even requested to paint the next day as well).

We invited Sage over for finger painting, and after that and a bath to clean up, we turned on some music. The girls really liked "1,2,3 im Sauseschritt" (song) and grabbed each others hands without prompting to start dancing together! It was so cute. Then, when Sage wanted a turn dancing with Amber (you're welcome, Amber, for not posting the 'embarrassing' pictures) Claire stood there with her hands out insisting that she have her dance partner back.

(I realized for the sake of anonymity, I should take the picture with the license plate number off the blog. Let me tell you - it was a cute one with Daddy and Claire scrubbing the car!)

When Daddy got home, we put on a suit and washed all three cars (our two and her car) together! Now THAT made for a fun in the sun evening! To top it off, Claire invited the neighbor boys, Jeff and Cory, over to draw with sidewalk chalk.

If that's not a FUN birthday, I don't know what is! :)

If anyone knows how to upload more than five photos to blogger, let me know. I had a lot more, but had to pick and choose because of this darn website! Thanks!