Birthday Princess!

3 going on 13! This little firecracker definitely seems older than she is-her language continues to be quite advanced and she is as busy as can be trying to keep up with her brothers. Heidi gets quite offended if the word little is ever used to refer to her such as "little princess" or "little miss" and she constantly insists that she is big. We have been looking forward to her birthday for quite awhile now and mom may have overcompensated a bit in an attempt to make up for last year's super lame birthday when we had to get our Canadian drivers licenses and I ended up lying on the living room floor with a mild case of mastitis. This birthday was much better!

As is our tradition, we started the day with chocolate waffles, whipped cream, and strawberries.

Heidi got lots of presents from her brothers, parents, grandparents, and cousins. My mom made her a gorgeous, colorful quilt with woodland animals pieced together, and Austin went as far as getting her a big interactive pony that sings and talks to her, but of all the presents, she later told me that he favorite was two tiny hatchimals (little plastic animals that come in an egg) that her cousins gave her :)

Here she is with most of her presents, although some are missing because Austin let her open one a day in the days leading up to her birthday, just to prolong the magic and let her enjoy them more than if everything had been opened all at once. From the presents that she opened early, she got a little puppy in a carrier with vet supplies to pretend she is a "pet doctor" from my dad, a sleeping bag from Austin's parents (very useful for our planned camping trips this summer!), and some my little pony gifts from my sister.

The cake is a little lopsided, but I am super proud of it! It is definitely the most complicated cake I've made (I'm not a big cake person), but it was so good and turned out really pretty too. Heidi and I have been planning this cake for months since we saw a white version on Pinterest. Of course she had to have pink though, which was an easy switch. Her favorite part was licking the cake batter off the beaters. Unfortunately she was napping when I made the frosting, and Asher got both beaters before anyone else could get to them.

Here she is just before we opened presents. Austin didn't get any good pictures of her opening them, but it was better just to enjoy the fun than be too worried about capturing the moment.

We went out to dinner on her birthday, partly because all the chocolate waffle and cake making wore me out, and partly because it was one of the last evenings my mom would be with us. The staff were very accommodating with our balloons and cake, and Heidi got to help a lot when a magician did some tricks and let her keep the fork he had bent all up with magic.

What Heidi really wanted for her birthday was to have cake at a park with all her friends, but most of the day was rainy so I didn't invite anyone. It cleared up after dinner so we wanted to take a walk, but decided to drop off half of the giant cake to a family we go to church with that lives close to us. They decided to go on a walk with us and we ended up at the little park near our house and Heidi got her wish to play at a park with her friends, although the only picture I took was of Trevor going down the slide over and over again (this picture makes it look like Leif was helping, but Trevor was really doing it all on his own).

Happy Birthday little Heidi! We love you so much!

Here is Heidi's birthday interview, which she was so excited to do, but ended up just trying to get away to go play something else :)

Who is your favorite person? Leif (This is a strange answer since of all her brothers, she and Leif have the hardest time getting along)

What is your favorite color? Pink

 What is your favorite thing to watch on TV? Big Hero 6 or Beauty and the Beast 

What is your favorite outfit? anything pink 

What song do you like the best? I Am a Child of God 

What is your favorite cereal? Chocolate Waffles (not a cereal, but at least its a breakfast food) 

Who is your best friend? Mom 

What do you want to do when your grow up? Be a doctor for people and pets 

What is your favorite book? The Wild Swans (she just got this book from my Grandma for her birthday and we haven't even read it yet) 

What are you really good at? Reading books 

Where do you wish you could go on vacation? McDonalds 

What would you buy is you had a lot of money? a pony, a butterfly, toy cars . . . and a bunch of gibberish 

What is your favorite dinner? Pot pie 

If you could have a wish, what would it be? A purple car 

What is your favorite flavor of ice cream? Purple and pink ice cream 

Who do you want to be like? The Garcias (This is the family that went to the park with us and they have three daughters all older than Heidi)

What do you like to do with your friends? Play at the park 

What do you hope you'll get to do before your next birthday? Take care of a baby bunny 

What is your favorite thing to do? Play tag with my brothers 

What are you proud of? Being a big girl 

What are you afraid of? spiders 

What is Mom's favorite thing to do? Eat cereal 

How strong is Dad? Really strong 

What does Dad do best? Play with me 

What does Mom do best? Just jump, jump, jump (I have no idea what she is referring to-maybe when I exercise inside on my yoga mat?) 

What do you like best about Dad? Snuggling with him 

What do you like best about Mom? When she sings to me at night

Adventures

Winter was so long and confining and now that it's spring and finally warm, we have been out a lot! This last week has been so busy- I'm exhausted, but it has been so great to be out in the sunshine (sometimes its cloudy, but at least there's fresh air!) We started with a little hike on the weekend; went on an adventure by taking a long walk to the park and library while my car was getting serviced; visited a nearby daffodil field; went to a park in Toronto where the cherry trees where in bloom; and visited a honeybee farm.We ended the week with the older boys going on a church campout/hike with Austin and the little ones staying at home with me.

Here is our hike. Its just a little woodlot on the edge of our neighborhood. The boys were hoping that we would go to the other one, but that one requires just a little driving (unless you want exhausted children), so we opted for the one that was super close instead. Heidi walked a good deal of the way, but I ended up carrying her on my back a lot toward the end.

 When I had to leave my car to get the oil changed, tires rotated, and a recall issue fixed, they said it would take at least 3 hours, so I decided instead of waiting around, we would walk up the library. It was a perfect day and we took the path that took us through a great park, so the kids loved it. They especially loved that I packed lots of snacks to keep them walking (it was 5 or 6 miles round trip). Of course Trevor rode in the stroller, and Heidi stood on the back of the stroller most of the way, but Asher and Leif walked the entire way with no complaint, even though I could tell they were getting tired toward the end and started dragging behind me rather than running in front of me. I didn't take many pictures, but the kids insisted on having pictures on this chair carved out of a stump.

 I also got a picture of poor Trevor being "helped" down the slide by his well-meaning sister.

 Trevor, Heidi, and I stopped by a daffodil field while the boys were in a technology class I have them signed up for on Wednesday mornings. I love daffodils, so I really wanted some pictures of the kids with them. (Even though Trevor was more interested in throwing gravel from the path into the stroller and I had to keep redirecting him back to the flowers)

 

Our next adventure took us to a park in downtown Toronto to meet up with some friends and see the cherry blossoms. Its a good thing my friend didn't tell me about the traffic, because I can't stand it! It probably wasn't nearly as bad as Toronto traffic and parking can be, but it was annoying. All the same, the park was worth it. It was huge and we ended up walking all over the place. First to find our friends, then to get to a "zoo" and park. There were some pretty steep hills that I had to push the stroller (with Trevor and Heidi and everyone's junk) up. And toward the end, I had to carry Leif on my back because his flip flops were giving him a blister, but by that time, we had met up with my friends and they helped me push the stroller.

 The kids were excited to see a swan (we recently finished reading The Trumpet of the Swan)

 And Leif spotted a frog in the grass. In another part of the park there was a "zoo" with a bunch of the less exciting animals (like buffalo, yak, caribou, cattle, emu) that we saw. Although, the first thing Leif told Austin about at dinner that night was that there was a sign for a raccoon, but we didn't see it. (That's so Leif!)

 All of the kids were most excited about getting to the playground, and they were not disappointed when we finally got there and this is what they saw:
By this time, Leif was sick of all my picture taking and the only way I could get him to pose for me was by asking him to stick out his tongue :)
You might notice that there aren't any pictures of Heidi at the park. That's because within a few minutes of getting there, she peed her pants and since I didn't have any extra pants or underwear in my bag (and the car was at least a mile away) she ended up in one of Trevor's diapers. It was totally my fault- she told me she had to got potty while I was trying to find a parking spot, but I was so distracted by that and then trying to find my friends, that I forgot about it. This was about 2 hours later, so she made a good effort to hold it in. Poor girl-she was pretty easy going about it though.

 For a homeschool field trip, we visited a honey bee farm and the kids learned about bees and honey. Here they are making honey bee hat at the end. Heidi went a little crazy with the flower stick-ons :)

 And to end the week, the boys went camping and I stayed home with the little ones. I convinced Heidi that we were making the boys leave so we could have a girls' night. I didn't want her to feel left out of the fun, so I tried to make it seem like it was our idea for them to go away. To keep her busy, I took her to Baskin Robbins to get some pink and purple ice cream, but made her save it until after dinner. We ate dinner while we watched Beauty and the Beast, then she ate her ice cream while I painted her toes pink. (All this time Trevor was happily bouncing/spinning in his doorway jumper or romping around getting into things). Here is Heidi enjoying her ice cream and a girl movie. She was happy to send the boys and dad off, but as soon as the fun was over and it was time for bed, she started asking when they were coming back.

17 months

My littlest one is now 17 months old! He's still my baby, but he's getting big so fast. He is all over the place no matter where we are. He loves to run around and get into mischief wherever he can find it. I used to think he made a terrible mess by dumping things out or throwing everything around before he ran off to look for something else to play with, but its gotten even worse in the last few weeks. He is really like a tornado! I don't remember the other kids being quite so bad, but that may be due to the fact that I had more time and energy to keep them on track or make sure they weren't destroying everything. Sometimes, I feel like its worth it to just let him go crazy while I try to finish dinner or get some dishes done.
Trevor still loves to pretend to cook and is constantly getting into my pots and pans and pushing things around in them with a spatula. I've also discovered that he thinks he's supposed to be in the laundry basket when I take it upstairs. Since he was born, I've always just laid him on top of the clean clothes in the basket to take it upstairs and fold laundry- its the only way I could carry him and the basket with me. In the last few months, he has shown a keen interest in helping me throw the dirty clothes into the washer, but he has also started making a beeline for the basket as soon as I set it down by the dryer. He tries to help me get the clothes out of the dryer, then tries to climb in. At some point in the last few months I stopped putting him in the basket because I figured he could follow me up the stairs if he wanted to, or he could go play with his siblings, but that doesn't appear to be enough for him- he thinks the basket is where he belongs, and he makes sure to get there as fast as he can.
Trevor has also become very interested in books in the past few weeks. I find him all over the house- in all kinds of positions- flipping through books. We try to keep him to the board books, but he'll take anything he can get his hands on. I guess he sees me reading to the other kids all the time (I usually only read a quick book to him at naptime and bedtime-maybe I should start reading to him more).
When I suddenly remembered that I needed to take photos of Trevor, I sat him down in the family room and the first thing he did was grab some library books. So, I though that would be a perfect way to remember him at this stage:
(Don't mind his dirty face, his nose has been runny this week and I just can't keep up with wiping it ;)