A 'Beary' Happy Birthday

I can't believe my baby is 3 years old!  Her birthday was actually Tuesday the 27th, but we were in our pj's all day and did absolutely nothing but play with Christmas presents!

Audrey is such a character.  She has come out of her shell so much since Eliza started school this fall.  She is talking so much more!  She loves to go hiking with our friends, and to play at the park.  She can be very outgoing and friendly at times, and very shy at other times, only wanting Mommy or Daddy.  This goes for everyone - family, friends and strangers alike.  Audrey loves her ballet class, and is always "performing" for us at home.  She will be moving up to the same class as Eliza now that she's 3, and hopefully the extra 15 minutes each week will hold her attention.  Currently, her favorite TV show is Super Why, though she likes Team Umizoomi (Eliza's favorite) a lot too.  She knows her colors and some shapes, and we are working a lot on counting right now.  Hide and Seek is one of her favorite games to play, and she likes to play some board games as well - like Candy Land Castle, Cootie, and her new Fancy Nancy Parfait game.

Today we went to Build-a-Bear to celebrate her birthday.  The girls wanted to wear their new princess dresses to Audrey's "party," so Audrey wore her Rapunzel dress and Eliza wore her Ariel one.  They also got headbands/crowns to match.  Mommy wore a tiara as well, and Audrey brought a cowboy hat for Daddy to wear, since he was meeting us there from the office.  Audrey had been telling us for weeks that she was going to pick a dog, but I made sure she looked at all the bears and other animals just to make sure.  She picked the same dog we recently made for my niece Kyrie.

Audrey's turn came, and she got to step on the foot pedal to make the stuffing come out.  She picked a heart and did the "heart ceremony" before putting it into her puppy.  She rubbed it on her tummy, shook it in the air, spun around in a circle, and gave it a big kiss!

Then the puppy was all ready for a bath.  Eliza stood on the foot pedal while Audrey brushed her new puppy.  I helped her to turn it over and make sure she got everywhere.

After deciding it was to be a girl puppy, Audrey was excited to pick out an outfit.  Eliza tried to sway her towards a Rapunzel or Cinderella outfit, but she ended up picking a ruffly, pink shirt with sequins and I helped her find some white shorts that matched well.  We found some pink bows for her ears, and then we just had to give her a name.  I asked her what she wanted to name her puppy, and her first response was "dog."  I told her to think of a name, and gave her the example of Eliza's bear being named Andy.  So she said "Annie" (though I'm sure she was trying to say Andy).

Eliza picked out a new shirt for her bear, and we were ready to go have lunch and some birthday cake!

We decided to go to our favorite pizza place, but stopped at the fountain at the mall to take a few pictures first.  Audrey didn't want to take Annie out of the box.

We had pizza and salad at Woodstock Pizza, then I brought out the cute little cake.  I bought a little cake at the grocery store, and some candy decorations to make it princess-y.  We added the candles, and I called my niece Sage to help us sing (she had been upset that she didn't get to sing with Amanda, Izzy, and Lloyd when they called on Tuesday).

Eliza had to help blow out the candles after a few tries.

Ready for me to cut the cake.  It was red velvet cake - mmmm!

Annie and Andy (in his new shirt) hanging out at home.

Audrey opened a few presents, and we just stayed in to celebrate New Year's together.  The girls enjoyed some sparkling cider, and we did the countdown at 9:00 (midnight in Ohio).  We watched the ball drop live in Times Square, and called my parents and my sisters to wish everyone Happy New Year!