Celebrating Charlotte as a family

I love July 13th! I loved it in 2009 when this sweet little girl was welcomed into our family...
I loved it in 2010 when we celebrated our little lady turning 1.......
and I loved it this year as we celebrated Charlotte Grace's 2nd Birthday!

Here is how we celebrated....

Robby made Charlotte a stack of pink pancakes topped with a candle. We sang Happy Birthday to her & she blew out the candle before we were even finished with the first "Happy." We have been trying to desensitize her to the Happy Birthday song after she shouted "no" & began to cry when we sang it at Matilda's birthday party last month. What do you know, singing it at least 50 times in one week did the trick!

Baby sister woke up just in time for the yummy breakfast

We decorated the house & set her gifts out on the table after she went to bed the night before. She was SO excited when she saw the streamers, then she noticed the gifts and ran straight to the table. She is so sweet opening them moving very slowly & was completely content to just hold onto that gift while we convinced her to open the next : )

The tradition we started with her first birthday was Robby picking out a special book for her. This year, it was the Jesus Storybook Bible.

This backpack was the start of the entire owl themed birthday. I have had my eye on it for quite sometime & knew she would love it! We also got a matching lunch box that is as cute as can be. She has been carrying the backpack as much as possible & loves to put her birthday cards, books & anything else she can collect inside.

The next exciting part of the morning was this.....

Gaga & Paw Paw bought this for Charlotte when they were in town a few weeks ago. Robby set it up for them & we filled it with water & had it waiting for her on the back patio. Her eyes lit up when she looked outside & she could not stop tapping on the glass saying "I go!" & "pay?" which means "play." Bella enjoyed it too....it was like a giant water bowl. Charlotte must have been thirsty & was copying Bella lapping water up with her tongue. Haha!

We finished off the morning with praying for Charlotte before Robby went to work. The rest of the day included Charlotte getting to spend some time with her best buddy Matilda while I picked up the balloons & did some last minute preparations for the party. In the afternoon, Charlotte of course wanted to play outside with her new toy so I let her. I was halfway paying attention while taking care of Eloise inside & when I glanced up I saw this.....

This photo was taken after I got outside. Actually, the first thing I saw was Charlotte standing in the water pouring it over her head! I was not quick enough to capture that on camera. Plus I was trying to be quick to get her down before she fell & cracked her head open on her birthday an hour before her party : ) Since then, I have had MULTIPLE opportunities to photograph the feet going into the water as we cannot keep her out of it!

She had a blast all day long & slept in the following morning to make up for the lost sleep from the sugar overload. So far, the birthdays are getting better & better. It is fun to celebrate such a special girl!