Birthday girl

Grace turned 7 last week! She was very excited for her party. She had a few things she definitely wanted for her party (piñata, pin-the-tail game, and a horse cake) but was pretty flexible besides those  things. It was way less prep work than our last party, phew! 5 six or seven year olds have a lot of energy though, so it was maybe crazier than our last one.

Seven years!

We also played "don't eat pete!", which was a little nerve-racking for a couple of the kids, but lots of fun and laughter. The anticipation of being surprised was almost overwhelming sometimes for them. And then other kids didn't even pause to eat the marshmallows off the squares before moving on, doing a chubby bunny!

The piñata was, as usual, stressful for us trying to make sure no one got a concussion, but no one got hurt and everyone managed to get pretty equal bags of loot, so it went well. We filled it with Grace's favorites: Lindt truffles, smarties, suckers, marshmallows, 3 musketeers, and laffy taffy. Yep, we filled them up with sugar, hopefully the kids are still allowed over here.

We ended with soccer, it was a gorgeous sunny day in the sixties. This winter has been so mild! The kids have played on bikes and soccer more than sleds or making snow people.
We also went out to eat to Golden Corral for her birthday: they went to one last summer, their first buffet experience, and were enthralled with the all-you-can-eat cotton candy. Grace was SO excited to go, but they we're all moaning as we left, having eaten too many sweets, so hopefully we don't have to repeat that experience again.
Grace is a wonderful girl, we are so lucky to have her in our family. She was the VIP in her class last week, and answered questions about herself, and picked photos to display.

 I love her creativity, her desire to help, her love for all of us and God, her sweet notes and drawings she leaves in my nightstand, her energy and enthusiasm. The other morning Aubree got out of bed around 5 am, and RD was trying to get her back to sleep, and had just left the room, when she started crying again. She was really loud, enough to wake  Grace up, and. Grace started to sleepily sing "I am a child of God" to Aubree, who calmed down and went to sleep. What a sweetheart!