We have a FIVE year old!

Yesterday was sweet Ella's fifth birthday!  Five seems to be a big milestone.  So many things have happened in her sweet innocent life.  She's grown from a tiny 8 pound bundle of wrinkles to a beautiful, smart, sweet, social, helpful, caring, sister, funny, talkative, friendly, meticulous, and so many other positive things that make me so proud to say I'm her mother.  I can't wait to see what this next year has in store for us.  What a good role model she is to her brother.

We started off the morning with breakfast of her choice: eggs, sausage and cinnamon rolls.

For lunch I took pizza for her and her classmates.

Chris and I surprised her last night.  We met at the Galleria to take to her to the American Girl store so she could pick out her very first doll!  Dallas is one of nine cities to have a store.  Aren't we lucky? ;)  

After walking around for about 30 minutes and playing with everything she could possibly touch she had narrowed it down to Julie and Lanie.  She's been talking about Julie for months so I was surprised there was another doll even considered.  She finally decided on Julie.  She also had a gift certificate from BB so she wanted to get Julie some clothes.  Julie ended up with "Julie's Birthday Dress" and some pj's because the doll needs appropriate attire to sleep in, too.  Here she is ready to make her purchase with her daddy!

 And here is her brother who was so excited to be there as well!  He was running around like a crazy person pushing the "Itty Bitty" strollers around and playing with EVERYTHING.  Not a store for two year old boys!!!

Ella & Julie!!

After we left the store we went to dinner.  Can you guess where Ella wanted to eat?  If you guessed Mi Cocina then you are correct.  The girl loves that place.  I'm not sure why but she does.  All she gets is a side of beans to make a taco and queso to start with.  Nothing special but she loves it!

After dinner we came home to open presents from Grandma VeVe & Papa Jim, Papa Mo, Grammy JoJo, Titi & Uncle Dave and Aunt Lauren along with a couple from Bennett.

We interrupt this present unwrapping for a phone call....Happy Birthday from "Uncle" Scott!  This was at least her 10th call of the day and she was loving every minute of every call!  Her morning started with a Skype video call from Bryce & Layne at 7am and that couldn't have started her day any better!

Puppet theatre from Papa Mo

How one can get so excited over a movie is beyond me!  I picked up the new Tinkerbelle movie at Costco yesterday that was released on Tuesday.  She was overjoyed!  She now has all three.

Here is Julie this morning at breakfast.  When Ella went to bed last night Julie had to be her in pjs first and slept next to Ella.  This morning when I went to get Bennett out of bed I saw her light on so she was up playing.  She didn't come down for one hour.  This is so out of character for her.  She usually comes right down and asks for the TV to be turned on.  When I called her to come down to eat she had Julie in her new "birthday" dress.  She told me last night that today was going to be Julie's official birthday and she would need to wear her special birthday dress.  Julie rode in the car with us this morning and she's sitting on Ella's chair with her now while she's watching the new Tinkerbelle movie.  I wonder how long this will last?!?

I asked her if she could pick five old toys to give to under privileged children and she picked out six things.  I hope that she will learn the value in giving to others as she grows up.

I think it's safe to say that Ella had a great birthday!   We thank each and every one of you that are a part of her life and make her feel special!

XOXO