Brooke's 3rd Birthday Party

This past weekend we celebrated Brookie turning 3! How the heck did she jump from baby to official toddler/little kid? Although her attitude and personality is more like a 12 year old ;) 

When I asked Brooke what she wanted for her birthday this was her response: A Doc McStuffins and Daniel Tiger birthday with LOTS of pictures of the characters all over and on the cake. Well ok then, ask and you shall receive!! We decided to have her party at our house (we will do the big class party next year) but I did want to invite a few friends to come play. It was a HUGE success, all the kids had fun and all the adults had fun. Win Win.

Family picture with the 3 year old!

 Can't go wrong with pizza and sitting next to Adelyn

She LOVED her cake

McKenna turned it into a naked party!!

Party Favors

Decorations

She shocked us when she wanted to wear her princess dress before the party started

The kids trying to keep the balloons in the air

Getting kids to look and smile is NEAR impossible

Sometimes you get tired partying

Ruthie and Adelyn are cause for excitement

Could be the BEST picture of the entire night. Got to love being cousins

The love each other

Thanks to everyone for coming to celebrate our Brookie Bean. She had a great time and is already planning her 4th birthday!!!

Brooke is Three!!

It does not seem possible that it has been three years since Brooke was born.

She went from this little 8 lb 8 oz baby

to this wide eyed one year old

to this feisty two year old

to this strong and opinionated three year old

Here are some facts about our newly three year old!!

1. She is almost fully potty trained. She has been potty trained during the day for awhile (she had a whole didn't want to poop on the potty thing for awhile but is over that!). She insists on wearing underwear to bed and we are 50/50 at night for being accident free

2. She has STRONG opinions about what she wears. She only wants to wear t-shirts and sweatpants or her PJ's 99.9% of the time. Recently we got her in a dress....so maybe we are hitting a new chapter

3. This girl would eat her weight in sugar if we let her. She LOVES marshmallows and chocolate and gum/mints. 

4. She is Blake's shadow. Whatever he is playing, she wants to play. Brooke has no interest in princesses (until this past week when she asked to wear a princess dress!) she would rather play ninja or tag around the house with Blake. 

5. She is doing great at swim class and has recently started gymnastics and seems to enjoy that as well. She still loves going to the park and the swings are her favorite

6. She can be dramatic. I am talking she has tears rolling down her cheeks on almost a daily basis. If something isn't exactly what she wants and she is tired or hungry, you best believe there will be tears

7. She doesn't want to nap on the weekends unless we are driving in the car, then she passes out

8. Her blankie is her security. She sleeps with the blankie and when she is tired or upset she needs blankie to help calm her down

9. She is into watching movies and shows. She loves Daniel Tiger, Doc McStuffins, Minions, Minnie/Mickey, Elsa and Anna....the list goes on and on. Basically if it is a movie or show for kids she will pretty much watch it

10. Acts like she is much older than she is. She definitely has always wanted to keep up with Blake and her vocabulary and thinking make me think she is almost his age at times

11. She can identify that her name begins with B, count to 12 (she knows the #'s up to 20 but mixes them up)

12. She loves to sing. She sings songs all the time randomly

13. Her favorite song "Go Cubs Go"

We love you Brookie Beans

February Recap

Holy cow, how did I let a month fly by without posting? Here is how we spent our February!

Having fun at school...

Rocking their new swim caps at swim lessons

 The kids are in gymnastics for the first time and Brooke actually let Daddy come out and play with her

 We had an all day play date with our bestie Brady!

 We celebrated Valentine's Day

Brooke went to her first Daddy Daughter Dance and we convinced her to wear a dress for the first time in six months!!!!!!!

The weather was insanely awesome and in the high 60's so we took full advantage

We had a family fun day bowling!! (and p.s. look Brooke wear her dress again....:) )

January Recap

Our January was spent pretty much just going to birthday celebrations!! 

My little brother turned 30!! (how the heck did that happen?) and he really wanted me to come with him to soul cycle in the city. Challenge accepted. It was a lot of fun (but dang it was hard) my body was sore for days!!!

 The actual birthday celebration....

In the fall we took the kids to the high school football game so this winter we wanted to try and take them to a basketball game. Safe to say these kids were entertained! Although, I must say, kids nowdays have no school spirit, it wasn't as lively and fun as I remember. 

Paging Dr. Brooke.... 

 And then somehow because it is Chicago land, we got a freak 55 degree day in January. So naturally my kids took that as shorts and tshirt weather outside.

Then somehow this little cutie pie turned 1. What the heck McKenna, stop growing!!

 In keeping the birthday theme rolling, we then celebrated my Mom's birthday. These kids are eating cake on the regular!!

Then as part of the kids Christmas present we got tickets to Disney on Ice. This was the first big show we took Brooke to and she loved it. She was definitely in awe of seeing all the action. Meanwhile, Blake was more curious to know how the workers were doing everything and inner workings of the show (oh and watching the Zamboni)

 When you have an older brother it doesn't matter how many princesses you see, you want a sword too!

Can't believe how much celebrating we did in January!!