And Then She Was Four

Lane's fourth birthday started the way our family's birthdays usually start: with birthday pancakes. My brother traveled down from Norfolk to spend part of the week with us, so he was here that morning, too. Lane opened a few presents from her Alabama grandparents, and we took her to the movies to see Frozen for her main birthday present from us. (She also got a new jean jacket and a book, to which she replied, "I wanted a toy." Grateful child, this one.) It was the first time either of our girls have been to the movie theater, and I think they both liked it for the most part. They at least liked the experience of it, even if the snow monster in Frozen was a little scary for them. Later that evening my mom brought a small ice cream cake and we sang "Happy Birthday" to Lane and all had a small piece of cake before bed.


A birthday "4" for our oldest girlie!


Enjoying some popcorn and…the previews, I think. Noel sat in Shannon's lap during most of the actual movie…the seats were a little strange to her since they kept wanting to fold up on her.


Birthday cake #1 on her actual birthday, courtesy of Food Lion's frozen food section.

Lane's birthday fell on a Wednesday this year, and my niece Denali's birthday is three days after Lane's, so we had a joint birthday party for them on the Saturday following Lane's birthday. We just had pizza and cake, and everyone opened presents and played. It was very low-key, but I think the kids had a lot of fun. The girl cousins all dressed up and we called it a "princess party," even though the only thing that made it one was the fact that the girls were all wearing fancy dresses. Lane requested a butterfly cake, so I was more than happy to oblige: this cake only took me about two hours of labor to frost and decorate…I've spent much more time on her previous cakes!


Butterfly cake with sticker butterflies and sparkler candles!


Princess birthday girl!


Opening gifts…you can see Denali in her "princess' tutu on the right!


My oldest (younger) brother with all his nieces and nephews (nephew?…there's only one boy…).

Lane's big gifts were a couple of new princess dresses with matching shoes and jewelry from my sister and brother-in-law, and my dad and step-mom took her shopping for new shoes the day after the party. And my mom gave her a box of art supplies and tickets to the…circus! So, while Shannon was in Ohio my mom and I took the girls to the circus, and my brother-in-law and nephew came along, too. It was fun, although the girls cared way more about the animals than about any of the other cool stuff at the circus. In hindsight, the rinky-dink circus we took them to last summer was probably about as "fancy" a circus as we need to take them to until they're older. We were too far away for them to really get into it, but they did like the elephants and lions and kangaroos.


All dolled up and ready for the circus!


The one thing they still mention about the circus: the elephants "standing" on each other.


My mom and the birthday girl!

And finally, I actually conducted this birthday interview with Lane on her fourth birthday, so it was relevant two months ago. I'm not sure how much it is now, but then…it was current!

1. Your favorite color is purple.
2. Your favorite toy is dollies.
3. Your favorite fruit is strawberries.
4. Your favorite TV show is Care Bears.
5. Your favorite movie is Winnie the Pooh.
6. Your favorite thing to wear is dresses.
7. Your favorite animal is cats and dogs.
8. Your favorite song is "Bless the Lord."
9. Your favorite book is Green Eggs and Ham.
10. Your best friend is Mommy.
11. Your favorite snack is cheese and crackers.
12. Your favorite drink is lemonade.
13. Your favorite breakfast is yogurt.
14. Your favorite lunch is peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
15. Your favorite dinner is spaghetti.
16. Your favorite game is Hiss.
17. Your favorite thing to play outside is kicking a ball.
18. Your favorite holiday is Valentine's Day.
19. At night you sleep with: blankie.
20. You want to be a mommy/chef when you grow up.

I love seeing how these answers have changed since last year! And I also love how about half of them are totally not her favorite things…she just can't think of what her real favorite things are at the time I'm asking the questions.

And Then She Was Two

Noel turned two two months ago today. Eek. And while part of me feels extremely guilty about not writing about her birthday before now, the bottom line is that the celebrations took awhile.


Family photo at Noel's party the week after her birthday.

Noel's actual second birthday began with us getting up early to eat breakfast, take showers, and finish packing. We left around 9:30 a.m. to head to the airport to catch our first flight headed towards America. There was no birthday pancake, no birthday presents, no nothing. I'm not even sure if we sang to her on her actual birthday…it was such a crazy day that I honestly don't even remember, nor do I have a single picture of December the 12th. Our flight was delayed and then it seemed that some of our bags were missing, so we ended up not getting to our hotel until 6 or 7 that evening…we ordered up room service for dinner and all went to bed promptly. Poor Noel didn't even get a good night's sleep since she slept in the bed with me and Shannon (which she doesn't usually do), so in turn Shannon and I didn't sleep well. The only benefit to the overnight in the hotel was that Lane started our really long travel day with 8-9 hours of good sleep in her.

So Noel's actual birthday was a bust.


She loved this ride. It had animals that moved and made noises when you pushed their button. She sat in my lap and waited about five minutes (an extremely long time for a 2-year old!) for another child to finish their marathon riding session so she could ride some more before we left.

A week after we had arrived in America we took her to Chuck E. Cheese's for her "real" birthday celebrations. We purchased a Dora ice-cream cake from Dairy Queen, invited her grandparents, uncles, and cousin who live in the Birmingham area, and let that girl ride the same ride about 30 times to appease her poor, birthday-deprived soul. She had cheese pizza and apple juice for lunch and was happy as a lark until Chuck E. himself came by, when she looked down at the table and refused to look up until he was gone. She opened a few presents and fell asleep in the car on the way home.


Getting ready to be sung to and blow out the candle!


This is exactly what she did the whole time Chuck E. was near her. She looked at her plate, continued to eat, and would occasionally look up with her eyes (while keeping her head down) to see if he was still there.

It was a fun birthday bash and even though it was about 99.9% not what I ever wanted to do for any of my kids for their birthdays, the bottom line is that she had a blast. She didn't care that I didn't make her cake or plan anything beyond the day and time of the party and pick up some birthday plates and napkins. And while I still feel a little guilty about her "poor excuse for a birthday party," sometimes you just have to let things go. And when you fly across the world on someone's actual birthday, live with two different sets of grandparents/parents/in-laws the two weeks afterwards, and have jet-lag to deal with…fancy birthday parties just don't make the cut of important things in life. Maybe next year will be better, more up to my expectations. Although I don't think she'll give a rat's behind next year, either.


I mean, does this look like a kid who cares that her party wasn't color-coordinated and that her mom didn't make her cake? I think not.

And Then She Was Three

    The birthday girl with her Minnie Mouse cake. It wasn't as big as it looks here, I promise. =)

This year, Lane's birthday "celebrations" began at around 9:30 the night before her birthday, when she woke up complaining that her tummy hurt. An hour later, the puking began. At 3:30 a.m., after a few hours of dozing in our bed and waking every 30-45 minutes gagging in her sleep, subsequently dry-heaving and puking up any spit that accumulated in her tummy while she slept, she finally fell asleep for the night. Around 7:30 the girls woke up, so I got up with them, leaving Shannon to sleep for awhile longer since he also had been up a lot of the night puking. (Lest anyone think I escaped the plague, rest assured that I had it the night before.)


    "Hey, dat's my NAME!" said the birthday girl.

So, we woke up and I let Lane have a big glass of water since she had been puke-free for 4-5 hours. Big mistake, as she immediately threw up all over the kitchen floor. Lesson learned. Until noon she only got a couple of tablespoons of water at a time, and no food. Some great birthday breakfast, huh? That morning she opened her gifts while on Skype with my mom, and spent the rest of the morning playing with her new toys, other than the hour and a half that she napped, which she desperately needed since only getting six or so hours of sleep the night before.


    Birthday pancakes. For lunch.

We ate our birthday pancakes for lunch, played some more (and watched new Mickey Mouse shows), and had the birthday girl's request, spaghetti and broccoli, for an early dinner. Lane was in bed by 6:00. Her actual birthday was, I'm afraid, quite the let-down, at least in my eyes. But I think she had fun, despite being exhausted and not feeling too well.


    Playing with her new Minnie Mouse Birthday Boutique.


    Watching Mickey Mouse shows.

I had wanted to give Lane an actual party this year, since she's finally old enough to know what's going on. But I knew it would have to be Mickey Mouse, and the more I looked at ideas for party decorations and party favors, the more stressed out I became. I don't live where I can just drive to Target or Walmart or the nearest party store and come home with a tablecloth and birthday banner and color-coordinated balloons. So we decided to forego an actual party (and save my sanity) and instead to celebrate with the people we fellowship with on Sundays.


    Birthday dinner, complete with candles. Hey, when the sick birthday girl wants candles in everything and for you to sing to her, most people oblige, right?


    The Minnie Mouse cake I made. A big shout-out to my sister who sent me the candy melts and to our friends who loaned me 1/4 cup of corn syrup! And to Pinterest, which makes coming up with cake ideas so much easier!

I made a beautiful (if I do say so myself) cake for her, found some birthday paper plates and Minnie Mouse napkins, and called it good. A few friends brought her gifts which she opened on Sunday, but honestly she was quite overwhelmed just with everyone singing to her, and what started as a huge grin at the onset of "Happy Birthday" turned into a shy little girl looking at her lap until it was time to blow out her candles. She could barely handle opening gifts (and the children who were so excited to give them to her), so I think in hindsight, it's a good thing we skipped the actual party this year. Maybe the big "4" will be a winner in the party department.


    Our birthday gift: a mini trampoline. I love the fact that now when she's being crazy I can tell her to go jump on the trampoline if she wants to jump around, and most of the time, she does!


    One of her favorite gifts: a BrainQuest dry-erase tracing book. The tracing lines gradually get lighter until they're not there. I think that's a pretty good solo H for a just-turned-3-year-old, don't you?

Anyhow, it was more or less a birthday week, stretching over five days with gifts and cake, and even today she got to finish her piece of cake from yesterday (of which she only ate the frosting). I can't believe my baby girl is already three years old. I about threw up when I realized she'll leave home in 15 years, that my time of day-to-day influence in her life is 1/6th of the way over. Here's to hoping that three is better than two was (in the temper tantrum, I'm-in-control-and-want-it-my-way, learning-to-be-obedient areas of life), although from what I've heard...I'm gearing up for another long year. I love my girlie to death, but her stubborn side might just do me in before we reach next January!


    I let her lick the beater when I was making her birthday cake. I'm an awesome mom. =)

And Then She Was One

   Noel at her party on Sunday, wearing the same dress that Lane wore to her first birthday party.

My baby girl turned one a week ago today. We kept it low-key on her actual birthday, since it was a weekday. Noel woke up before Lane, so we got her up, I nursed her and then let her eat a banana while I started making pancakes. We woke Lane up so she could take part in the singing. We helped Noel open a few gifts and then it was onto a weekday as usual.


    Birthday pancake. It was in the shape of a "1". (Forgive the bad lighting...it's rather dark around here until about 8:30.)


    Helping daddy open a present from Mimi and Papa.


    Lane helping Noel open the present from her.


    Daddy bought roses, one for each of his girls, on Noel's birthday.

This past Sunday we had Noel's birthday party. I spent last week baking cakes and freezing them (one per day for four days), and then Saturday night it took me three hours to put the cake together. I'm rather pleased with how it turned out. Here's the recipe I used for the white-cake-from-scratch. If you need a white cake recipe, this is a pretty good one. It's a bit more dense than a cake-mix-cake, but it was good nonetheless.


    N, O, E, and L on the sides, 1 on the top.


    And different colored layers!

Sunday morning we put up a few balloons and streamers and after lunch with friends, we all sang Happy Birthday and ate cake and ice cream.




    What is with my girls not liking their first birthday cakes? She actually cried when we put some in her mouth.


    But yesterday she was all over it. 

While I'm in just as much unbelief over Noel turning one as I was when Lane turned one, I do have to say that I didn't cry this year, and not because it's not a little bit sad to me that my baby is already growing up. But as I think of three good friends who have lost newborns in the past year or so and then about Sandy Hook and twenty children dead, I have nothing to cry over (in my own life). One whole year with another beautiful daughter. It went by quickly, yes. But I'm grateful for every single day. 373 of them so far.


    So grateful for my family!

Five Years

Last Friday (the third) we celebrated five years of marriage. It was a very fun and special day. While I didn't get many photos, I wanted to write about it so I don't forget.

I woke up at around 7:00 to a quiet house. I had asked Shannon to wake me at 6:00, and he obviously didn't. He was gone and his breakfast preparations were still sitting on the counter, and I wondered where he had gone, thinking possibly he'd decided to go for a run. About 15 minutes later he showed up with chocolate croissants, a venti frappucino from Starbucks, and a travel mug for me (identical to the one I'd gotten him for Father's Day). Lane and I had croissants, Shannon and I shared the frappucino, and we got started with our day.

I checked my phone for messages and realized I'd gotten one the previous night saying that my friend Diana's water had broken and that they were going to the hospital. After a few texts and a phone call, we learned that she had given birth to their newest edition at around 6:45 that morning. So we all got showered and cleaned up, let Noel nap, and packed a snack bag for them. We headed to Burger King to pick up food for them (neither of them had eaten since dinner the night before) and went by the hospital for a visit. It was so fun to see them...we missed the first days of their first daughter's birth because we were here (visiting...not living here yet), so it was so special for us to be the first ones to see them, and to bless them with snacks for the day. Then we headed home, ate lunch, got the girls in bed, and I headed off to class.

After class I came home to a still-sleeping Lane. We woke her (I mean, it was almost 5:00 pm!) and started on prep for the babysitter: notes, meals, picking up, laying out jammies and diapers and such. Our babysitter showed up at 5:30 and we were out the door by 5:45 to enjoy dinner and a movie for the first time since having children.

Biber. Almost empty since it was before sunrise and we're still in the month of Ramadan.

We walked to a cute little restaurant called Biber (which means "pepper" [as in the bell kind]) that we actually went to for our third anniversary right after we'd arrived in Istanbul. We enjoyed dinner without having to chop up anyone else's food, tell them to sit on their bottoms, share our drinks or food, and so on. Then we caught a bus and headed to a mall where we got another frappucino (Shannon is ADDICTED to those things) for desert and then watched the newest Batman movie. We watched the credits all the way to the end because Shannon thought maybe there was a sneak peak trailer at the end, and didn't like my reasoning that if there had been one, surely we would have heard about it on Facebook. Needless to say, there was no sneak peak.

Dinner! Steak with a mushroom sauce and rice, and a beef curry. We each ate half and then swapped plates.

Anyhow, we took a taxi home, Shannon walked our babysitter home, and we were in bed by midnight. It wasn't a super special anniversary, but it was fun, and it was nice to celebrate. As Shannon said, we might not do anything really fancy for our anniversaries, but we always do something. We don't let the occasion pass without celebrating. What about you? Do you do "big and fancy" for things like anniversaries, or do they almost pass by unnoticed? Wondering where we fall of the scale of celebrators...

Father's Day 2012

Unfortunately, this year for Father's Day we really weren't able to do a whole lot. Shannon has been taking this class that is torture...I've pretty much been a single mom for the last three weeks. He has loads of homework every weekend, and this weekend was no exception. So we did what we could to make his day special.

First thing in the morning I had Lane run to Shannon with a small gift: a new Starbucks travel mug, a card decorated by Lane, and a card that I bought for him while in the States. Lane was so proud of the card she made, shouted "Happy Fodder's Day!," and enjoyed unwrapping his present for him. Shannon then played with the girls while I got a shower.

Daddy and his girlies.

When I put Noel down for her morning nap, I took Lane out for a "key-sont" (croissant) and chai in order to give Shannon some time alone to do his homework. It was our first mommy-daughter date. I let her walk down to the restaurant where we sat outside and leisurely enjoyed our chocolate croissants, chai, and fresh-squeezed orange juice. Lane had a blast.

Enjoying our croissants and tea in the gorgeous weather!

Then it was home again to console a crying Noel (she had a rough week of it, nap-wise), play with Lane, fix lunch, and so on. After lunch, Shannon finished up his homework and asked if he could go to the movies. Of course, I let him, so he went off to enjoy Prometheus while I took care of the girls. He arrived home with lilies for me, and then he played with the girls while I cooked his Father's Day request: breakfast for dinner.

Quite possibly Shannon's favorite meal, other than spaghetti. And he could do without the fruit, but I make him eat it so that there's something on his plate that doesn't include butter or oil!

We all ate and did bath time/bedtime routines and actually got in the bed early for a change. Overall I think Shannon felt special and loved, even if we didn't do anything extraordinary.

20 Weeks and a Birthday Boy

Friday was a fun, albeit exhausting, day.

Shannon turned 37. The day started with birthday pancakes and a skype call with his dad.

My first attempt at number pancakes. Not too bad!

Then we walked Lane down to some friends' house where the dad babysat Lane and our friends' kid while we all went to IKEA. Thank you, Tim, for giving us a relaxing day shopping instead of a stressful one!

Lane loves to ride on daddy's shoulders.

No photos of IKEA. I mean, it's IKEA. We did eat lunch there and spent a long time there. Our friends needed to pick out big things like a couch, so they wanted to be sure to get what they liked. Our list was much shorter and was mostly things for Lane's room. When her room is all put together you'll see photos.

After IKEA, we rushed home in order to spend a few minutes with Lane before heading out again. Our friend Kristina came and babysat so that we could go out for dinner. Thankfully Lane loves Kristina, so it wasn't any skin off of her back that we only saw her for about two hours all day long!

Technically this was our anniversary dinner, but we went on Shannon's birthday since Fridays are less hectic than Wednesdays, generally speaking.

My chargrilled chicken sandwich. It was yummy!

So, on Shannon's birthday, on a Friday, we went to TGIFriday's! We hadn't been before, and quite honestly probably won't return. The food was good, but by the time you take into consideration the hour it took us to get there, the hour it took us to get home, the fact that they didn't have their air conditioning on and it was about 87° outside (and inside too), and that our dinner was about $40 (a burger, a chicken sandwich, and two small waters)...it was good, but not that good. Shannon's still on the quest for the best hamburger in Istanbul, as Friday's burger was not, in his opinion, worth the extra cost over and above NumNum's burger.

Shannon with his birthday/anniversary burger, complete with fake (not pork) bacon!

We were so hot after traveling an hour in the heat and eating our meal in the heat that we were honestly not up for being out in heat anymore. So, despite the fact that Kristina was spending the night at our house and we could stay out as late as we wanted, we headed home and were home by about 8:30. Shannon bought ice cream and we all made banana splits/sundaes and watched You've Got Mail, which Shannon had never seen. I assembled the step stool we bought for Lane, and we stayed up way too late. It was a good birthday/anniversary celebration!

20 weeks + one day.

And lastly, Friday marked 20 weeks, or halfway through this pregnancy. Only 4.5 months to go!

Father's Day

Shannon is the kind of guy who never will tell me what he wants for his birthday, Christmas, our anniversary, or any other holiday. I always feel bad because there's always something I want, and his list is always super puny. Actually, he just always says the same thing: "I want to spend time with you." Blah. We usually go to dinner and a movie for his birthday and maybe for his Christmas present, but you can't really ditch the kiddo on Father's Day to see a movie, you know?

So this year I didn't get Shannon anything for Father's Day. I'd asked him what he wanted. He had no answers. So I made him a big breakfast and his favorite dinner (spaghetti). And I decided to treat him for lunch: we went to a place called Numnum Cafe and Restaurant. We'd heard they had good burgers, and Shannon's been on a quest for a good burger ever since we got here. We'd also heard they were a tad on the expensive side, so we'd need a good reason to visit. Father's Day seemed like as good a reason as any!

Our table. Love the fatty bird.

The waitresses gave Lane some balloons to play with while we waited for our food.

We didn't know when we went to Numnum that it was Father's Day in Turkey, too! Good thing that Turks don't seem to have the American tradition of taking their fathers out for lunch after church! We had the restaurant practically to ourselves, they had menus in English (thank goodness), and the food was yummy. Well, the fries left something to be desired, but the main dishes were good.

Shannon's burger. The best one he's had in Turkey so far.

My club sandwich. Yes, I know that pregnant women aren't supposed to eat cold lunch meat. But 1) I don't like burgers, 2) they didn't have any chicken sandwiches, 3) I figured that one serving of cold lunch meat in 9 months probably won't kill me or the baby, and 4) their meat is probably sliced on site anyways since it's not a fast-food place, and that kind of lunch meat you ARE allowed to have.

I felt like a slacker of a wife, getting my hubby nothing for Father's Day except a day full of food. But he thanked me over and over for a great Father's Day. I guess it just goes to show that the way to a man's heart really is through his stomach.

Lane and daddy on Father's Day.

Family photo op at Numnum. Shannon's last Father's Day as a daddy of one (outside of the womb).