3 Year Old Birthday Party!

This past Saturday we went to Georgina's best friend's birthday. Leo turned 3!!! There was a bouncy castle, a pinata, pin the tail on the donkey, cake, candy and lots of tears. Miriam fell asleep just before it was time to go so Dave stayed home with her while G and I went.

She was soooooo excited. It was the first birthday party she went to where she understood the general concept and was looking forward to it all week.

The Birthday Boy!! Anne, Leo's mom, swears he's been in his terrible twos this past year but I have seen all evidence to the contrary. Leo's a sweet, quiet and thoughtful little guy. With some very serious eyebrow powers.

This is Jackson. He's Georgina's personality twin in male format. They were born one day apart. That must have something to do with it. They will hold hands and give hugs and be pretty sweet to each other until one of them wants what the other has and then it's like the Hunger Games.

All day, Leo was very helpful giving G a boost. Little scamp.

 Oh, another boost. Thanks Leo.

This is Isabella, Leo's cousin. That hair is all natural.

The slide was a huge hit. And the bouncy castle in general was a fantastic idea. Even with all the sugar pumped into these kids all afternoon they were still wiped out by bed time.

All fun and games until someone gets hurt, which apparently is once every 5 minutes in the bouncy castle. By the end, each kid had a bandaid on a finger.
Time to move the party inside.

 The pinata.

Sweet Leo and Margaret minding Georgina with a stick.

 Georgina, Isabella and Margaret playing quietly in a circle. GIRLS!!

This is Oliver, Jackson's baby brother. He was born two days after Miriam and is one of my favourite babies of all time. SO much chub!!!

Jackson playing nicely with mommy. Oliver eating his glasses.

Time for the birthday cake! Jackson was way more excited about it than Leo and was pretty devastated when Leo blew out the candles instead of him. So Anne kindly lit the cake again for everyone to get a turn blowing out the candles.

G's head running into the shot because she was equally super excited. It almost looked like a zombie march, all the kids following the candle-lit cake.

The best part's the icing. Georgina would say it's the only part.

And finally presents!! Leo got lots of cool toys. Funny story about this shot: Leo is unwrapping his gift from Jackson, a set of toy cars. When Arinn, Jackson's mom, brought them home from the store, Jackson sat with them on his lap for two hours just looking at them in their box. Here you see him fist pumping and shouting "YA!"

It was a great birthday party. You set the bar pretty high Anne. Thank you!!

Aldor Acres

Today, Dave and I took the girlies to Aldor Acres, a pumpkin patch/petting zoo/dairy farm/Christmas tree farm East of Fort Langley. It wasn't too busy, super sunny and warm, and lots to see. A great day! Georgina loved it all but her favourite was the singing robot pig - of course.

Right off the start she was crouched down, saying hi to the chickens. This coup is before you pass through the front gates. She would have been more than happy to have just stayed here I'm sure.

These goats make me laugh. They remind me so much of dogs. You'd think there wasn't a daily line-up of people feeding them constantly. They act starved and desperate!

 The goats loved G. She was pretty popular. They saw an easy target. Onto the bunnies!

We enter this large barn where there's half a dozen baby bunnies just running around free. Or at least they're supposed to be. The children had them all caught and were busy squeezing the living hope out of them. I tried putting this one away in a pen after G was done with it but someone scooped it up before I could put it down. Poor little guys. RUN!!

Here we have some baby pigs. Look at those bums!!! They must be chilly, trying to cuddle in as close as possible. If they stopped growing here I could see myself adopting one. But I saw Big Momma lying beside them. Whoa, big pig. I wonder when their tails start to curl?

Look at the ONE DAY OLD baby pigs! They are so teeny tiny. It was pretty funny, this was the one animal pen that really got Miriam excited. I was wearing her on my chest and she grabbed onto the railing of this pen and started to almost squeal with excitement and she wouldn't let go.

Here's the creepy singing robot pig that Georgina fell in love with and wouldn't leave. Whoever's in charge is pretty clever because the pig would stop singing for about five minutes or so? Giving parents enough time to convince the children that the pig is finished singing and it's time to move on.

More bunnies in a different pen. Georgina really wanted to climb in and hold them, which it seemed she was aloud to do but I decided to give this little fluffs a break. She was fairly gentle with the first bunny but maybe too firm when it wanted to move on.

She was fearless with the horse and donkey. The donkey started to bray(?) and was very loud. Georgina thought it was hilarious.

Then we took a hay ride to the pumpkin patch to pick out our own pumpkins. How quaint! Georgina was pretty stoked to ride the "choo-choo". Miriam was less impressed as it was starting to cut into her nap time.

Georgina picked out her Georgina-sized pumpkin and I found ours. We'll carve the big one later this week.

You can see Miriam's starting to fade.
Miriam's out of her harness finally stretching her legs. Much better.

G sitting with the prized pumpkins. This was sadly the best shot I could get. Her consistent reaction to "smile for the camera" is to jump up and turn away.

Miriam's done. Time to go home!