Josephine is Three and Genevieve is One!

I'm feeling very overwhelmed at the prospect of writing a one-year post for Genevieve and a three-year post for Josephine. There's so much to say and no time to organize my thoughts. I especially feel guilty about my lack of recording details about Genevieve's life (here and otherwise). I swear I will get on track soon. After I finish the birthday thank you notes. How I get slower and slower about those every year is a mystery. 

Anyway, what I CAN do is offer you a birthday photo dump. If you're new here or someone managed to tune me out whenever I worried about it, the girls share a birthday. That means we had a giant 1st/3rd birthday party a few weeks ago. At the same time, we were trying to squeeze about three years worth of DIY home improvements into a 6-week time frame so everyone could see our house on our one year house-a-versary. It was intense. But it was also great. We got a lot done and then had a great party. The girls had a ball, and we had leftovers for a week. Win, win, win.

So, enough rambling. Here's the birthday and birthday party.

Jeremy decorated their doors so they would see it first thing in the morning. When I opened Josephine's door, she said, "Ohhhhh! I'm THREE!!" (she also calls decorations "graduations," which I LOVE).

Next up was birthday pancakes on a silver platter with candles. It's something I'm making a tradition. We missed last year (ahem) because I was in the hospital and in labor and all, but hopefully we don't have to miss another year for something dramatic like that (fingers crossed).

Here's Josephine two years ago with her first birthday pancake. 

After breakfast, we headed to the park, a favorite for both the girls. For Josie, it's because of the play structures; for GiGi, it's because of the abundance of dirt, sand, and wood chips she can try to eat.

 

Next up, we gave Josephine a few options for lunch, and she chose Big Boy, probably because the other two times we went, she got Jeremy to draw Big Boy over and over until her food came. Today was no exception.

We came here for that? Sheesh.

After nap I attempted a photo shoot ... with varied success.

 

Then, finally, it was present time. 

Then cake time! The night before I had spent FOUR HOURS making this damn dairy-free cake from scratch so poor Genevieve could have some, and ... it wouldn't come out of the pans. Whatever. They still tasted pretty good. Not as fancy as I would have liked, but it worked.

 (Yes, we scooped some out so we could try it.)

Then we headed to Dairy Boy for ... dessert? ... after cake. There wasn't anything there that Genevieve and I could have, but Josephine enjoyed it enough for all of us. 

Genevieve settled for eating a napkin.

Whew. Then the next day was a party at our house.

This is Josephine and my niece watching ... the BOUNCE HOUSE go up! (Apparently my sister owns one. It's good to know the right people)

When my cousin's daughter arrived, Josie ran right to her, then her good friend ran over to join them, and they were immediately all best friends. I love little girls.

Kids love the stoop.

We used the front, side, and back yards so we had room for everyone to spread out.

And, presents.

 

 

These next two gems are when Josie pulled up her skirt in front of everyone and got angry when I tried to pull it down. Classic.

Then we made up.

 

Then cake. 

You should have heard the gasps when I handed Josephine a spoon and told her to dig in (she only ended up taking about three bites).

I tried a whole new dairy-free cake recipe for the party after the failure of the original, and this one was MUCH better.

Then everyone gave Josephine the rings that came on top of the cupcakes and she cleaned them off in her mouth and put them all on at the same time. As you do.

THE END

(biggest. photo dump. ever.)