Birthday Girl

Our birthday girl had a great day today I think! :)

She unfortunately had to start the day with her three month doctor appt. It didn't go well, not due to anything wrong, but due to the fact that the appt had never been written down (unfortunately not the first time), we waited over 45 min to get in (which meant we could have slept another 45 min - we were all so tired getting up so early!), and then only had half the appt we were supposed to have today (she's in a research protocol which we were supposed to have today as well but since the appt wasn't technically scheduled it didn't happen). The upside to this was that Olivia and I had some extra time together since we got done early!

We then headed to Rainforest which was her choice for lunch today! We are "members" and had a $10 gift cert, plus a coupon for a 99 cent kids meal, so our lunch came to $5.77 with tip! :) We shopped around a huge mall for a while, mostly window shopping! Olivia outgrew her ballet shoes from last year and Braeden just had a huge growth spurt and only has one pair of shoes that fit (for church) and was in need. Since Pay*less has BOGO right now and they have ballet shoes, we were able to get Olivia's shoes, a pair of tennis shoes for her in her NEXT size, and TWO pair of great shoes for Braeden for school... all for $33! I was very excited! The ballet shoes alone would have been $20 anywhere else, so to get an addtl three pair for just over $10 more was great!

I am ITCHING to look at all the little girl clothes on the sale racks and buy buy buy... but since I have NO referral and NO idea of sizes/seasons yet... it is NOT working out and that is GOOD for my pocketbook! LOL :) There are so many CUTE things!!! :)

After we got home and got the boys, I began dinner. When the kids have a birthday they get to choose their dinner that day. Today Olivia picked pancakes, eggs, sausage, Sprite to drink, and brownies for dessert! Wooo!!! Can you say sugar high!? :) They ate it up and loved every bite! (I had some brownie batter and called it a dinner!) :)

While Olivia was in FL on her own, the boys and I went to Lowes for their Build and Grow. They made picture frames, and way back then Braeden had the idea to keep the one he built and give it to Olivia for her birthday. He used some paint from a recent project ( more on that later ) and then put a picture from our summer trip inside. Olivia LOVED it! (This green is her FAVE color!)

The kids get to have big friend parties when they turn 5, 10, and 16... so this was not a party year for Olivia. She did have a friend spend the night Friday and we had cake then. She loved it! There is also a "rhythm" to the gifts they get as well. They typically get an outfit, a book/room item, and a toy. Olivia got an outfit that she had fallen in love with at Gym*boree last winter. We had seen a velvet brown skirt with big polka dots that she loved, when the line was on clearance, BUT we couldn't find a top to go with it and I try so hard not to buy separates that are hard to put things with because I tend not to use those then. Another day I happened to go to a different store and found the skirt, a shirt, knee high socks, and a hair accessory... all for under $20! She was so excited to open it today! Her book/room item was a set of three hanging picture frames that rotate and are "Hanna*h Montan*a" - in a very small way. It was a MAJOR clearance item from Disne*y online - about $6. And her toy was a cake maker from the Ace of Cakes that I happened to find on Amazon for $5!!!! I then also found an accessory set for it on clearance at Tar*get one day for $5 as well! A GREAT set of items for less than $40 and she was in HEAVEN!

PRICELESS!!!!!