Guess Who's Two

That's right Ella turned 2 on Saturday and is now officially in her terrible two's! Actually, I think she hit those at about 18months, although she isn't very bad at all. Her birthday celebrations actually started while we were in MN where we had a birthday party for her on September 17th. We wanted to have a birthday party for her in MN so that her cousins would be able to come and celebrate with her. She is definitely starting to understand the whole birthday thing. She kept asking for a "happy itday cake". For her birthday party I made her an Elmo cake.

Pretty good, huh?!

This was actually her first birthday party she's had. For her first birthday we never had an actual party, so it was fun to have something for her. She enjoyed playing with her cousins and having balloons in the house. We let the kids play outside for awhile and then brought everyone in to eat. After everyone was done eating we opened presents to keep the kids roped in for awhile longer before cake. Ella was so cute opening the presents. She would open one and then just want to play with it, she didn't understand that she had more than one to open.

Pushing her new mega blocks wagon

She received great presents from my family and our friends. She got some new clothes, books, dress up clothes, mega blocks and weebles. I think her favorite present was the My first leapfrog book reader from my brother. He got her that and a Dora book to go with it, she plays with it at least once a day. After presents we had the Elmo cake. Since I used a lot of food coloring in decorating the cake I recommended that all the kids take off their shirts to have cake. I didn't want to risk any stains on behalf of Elmo! Here are pictures from cake eating.

Cheese! Good cake, it doesn't even need a plate

Who needs hands?!?

All the kids had a great time and I'm so glad that we were able to celebrate with family and friends. I don't know how people throw big parties for kids though. It was stressful enough with only about 10 people, I can't imagine a bigger party.

Then Saturday was her real birthday so we had a little celebration again for her. John, my brother-in-law, Katie and Johnathon came out for the day. Marc, Ella and I started out the day with a birthday breakfast of pancakes.

Birthday Pancakes for breakfast

Ella and Johnathon played all day together (except for when she had to nap). I got her a couple of balloons while at the grocery store so we had a couple of decorations. We grilled out for dinner and our neighbors, Jamie and April came up for dinner. We all had a good dinner and then had cupcakes for Ella's birthday cake this time. I made cupcakes and decorated them with chocolate frosting and M&M's. Ella even blew out her own candle this time! She got to open presents again, this time from Uncle John and Katie and from Jamie and April. She got another new Dora book and a princess book as well as more blocks (which she loves). It was a very fun day and Ella wasn't ready for it to end, she fought to the end to go to bed! Here are pictures from that day:

Birthday Princess

Opening presents

Blowing out the candle

Playing with Johnathon, making silly faces

This lucky girl actually gets one more birthday celebration, I know, crazy. We are going to Ohio next weekend for my sister-in-laws baby shower and we will celebrate Ella's birthday again with Marc's mom and stepdad.

I can't believe my little girl is two already. I love her so much and I am really loving the girl she is turning into. She is very sweet and loving, but independent at the same time. She is growing so fast and learning new things everyday.

What a big girl!