Aubrey Turns Four!

Aubrey's actual birthday was on a Friday, so we went about our usual Friday morning activities. She went to her Broadway Princess class, where she's learning a singing and dancing routine to Let It Go and Under the Sea. Unfortunately, I haven't gotten any photos of her doing it! They don't let the parents in, and the glass we watch through is frosted--not good for taking photos.

Anyway, after that we went to my chiropractor appointment and then to Walmart to buy last-minute birthday party items. We had to hurry home because it started to snow! Wasn't expecting that.

A friend from church has his birthday on the same day as Aubrey, and he had his party on Friday afternoon. So Aubrey and I went to that for a couple hours before meeting Nana and Papa at Red Robin. Daniel took the night off Home Depot, so we all got to spend the whole evening together!

We went home and opened presents, and then it was bedtime! And as I'm doing this post, I'm realizing I took only one photo of this girl on her birthday (see above). :( I can't believe I didn't take pictures of her opening presents!

The next day, Saturday, we had Aubrey's party. Grandma and Grandpa were able to come for it, along with a few of Aubrey's friends from church and one from preschool. We couldn't invite everyone because our house is so small, and lot of people couldn't come. Then two kids cancelled the morning of due to sickness! So it was a small group, but that may have been for the best, haha. Four-year-olds are crazy.

The party was High School Musical themed (and it wasn't even my idea!). We started off with some mingling and snacking while people filtered in, and then we went on to some structured fun. First we had a basketball competition to see who could make the most baskets in 30 seconds (with their friends cheering them on with pom-poms). Aubrey and a friend tied with six baskets each!

Then we played musical chairs with the High School Musical soundtrack playing. That's always an entertaining game with little kids.

Aubrey was in the final round with another girl, and I turned off the music at just the right time to make Aubrey lose. Yep, I'm a good mom. (In my defense, it was Daniel's idea.)

After musical chairs, we had a dance party while waiting for the pizza to arrive. Those kids have some great moves!

Pizza came and was eaten (kind of), and then it was cake time. Aunt Kara was super nice and offered to make Aubrey's HSM cake for her! And Grandma and Grandpa were kind enough to take it on the plane with them from Texas! And let me tell you, that thing was surprisingly heavy.

Here is Aubrey seeing her cake for the first time...

... and then posing with it.

And now here's the cake in all its awesomeness! I would never have made anything even remotely this cool.

And, because I'm awesome and just assumed we already had four candles lying around somewhere (we didn't), we had to improvise. Luckily, we celebrated my Dad's 62nd birthday here earlier this year, so we had what we needed for a little mathy candle fun. 6-2=4!

Yep, we're classy.

 I love this picture of Aubrey. She looks so sweetly excited.

And then we sang!

As soon as we were done, she had to try the completely edible microphone, of course.

I'd say we made a pretty good dent in it! And then the family finished it off over the next few days. Yum. Cake for breakfast! It was totally a thing.

Anyway, happy birthday to my smart, sassy, funny, silly, imaginative, sweet, and energetic girl! We sure do love you, girly.

"I'm not going to do that. I'm just going to do what I want."

Live and Learn

• She's been learning the basics of telling time. She can tell us what hour it is, which is something!
• She also likes to do math at bedtime. She does basic addition counting on her fingers. It's cute to see her get so excited about learning.
• She kept saying she wanted a violin and Anna doll for Christmas, and my parents got her a cheap (but real!) violin to keep the magic alive. She loves making sounds with it, and I've taught her how to hold it and how to change the note by pressing down on the string. She obviously can't really play, but she looks cute trying!

• She's gotten a lot better at drawing and can even draw recognizable things sometimes! She draws our family a lot (awwww), as well as rainbows. I didn't teach her how to draw people; she came up with it on her own!

Fun and Games

• She loves playing games (yay!), especially Go Fish, Old Maid, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Spot It, Memory, and The Disney Princess Enchanted Cupcake Party Game (or, as she calls it, The Cupcake Game). She got it for Christmas from Mommy and Daddy, and it was the best $10 we ever spent! She loves playing the game as intended, but she also likes building her own cupcakes as well as giving each of her Little People princesses her own designated cupcake.
• She loves playing make-believe with her dolls and figures. She'll play for a long time by herself. I love her imagination!

• She used to always play in the bathroom after using it. One time Daniel went to tell her to wash her hands and come out, and he found her standing in the shower--completely naked--playing with her bath soap. When he asked what she was doing, she said, "Um... washing my hands." 
• Her current favorite shows/movies are anything Tinkerbell, Coco, Luna Petunia, Brave, and especially My Little Pony. Oh man, the My Little Pony obsession.
• She still loves playing dress-up, and one time she dressed as Merida and pretended her chair was a horse she was riding. So cute!

• She always wants to play these specific games when I put her to bed. There's tickle spider, her personal favorite, in which I pretend like my hand has been posessed by a tickle spider that descends from above and wants to eat her ribs. It ends with her grabbing my hand on its second descent and flushing it down her pretend toilet (complete with sound effects). She also likes to reenact scenes from Frozen (the beginning when young Anna and Elsa play and then the scene at the end when Anna gets frozen). She also likes me to reenact the book Love You Forever by crawling across the floor, picking her up, rocking her, and singing the song. There's also pretending the other one is a stuffed animal (to great protest), and holding my arm so I can't leave the bed.

Sour...

• One day she said, "Someone drew a J on the table!" I walked over to find a (admittedly pretty good) J carved in the coffee table, as she said. She used a rock that I let her take home earlier that day. And then she lied when I told her she was in trouble. "I didn't do it! It must have been the people who lived here before." When I pointed out that the table is ours and wasn't here when the other people lived here, she said, "Carter did it!" We had a long conversation about lying after that.
• For awhile there, she would refuse to let me tuck her in at bedtime. Then she would come out of her room--just after I'd gone downstairs--and ask me to come back to her room and tuck her in. If I refused, she'd throw an epic tantrum and refuse to go to bed. If I put her in her room and held the door so she couldn't get out, she'd throw things at her door. Man, I'm so glad she doesn't do that anymore.

... and Sweet!

• Lately she's been eager to help me. I love it! She's still too young to be actually helpful, but I love that she wants to help. She especially loves to help me paint! I think she looks like Cinderella in this photo:

• One day while eating dinner she asked us, "Who is that chair for?" (referring to our fourth chair). Before we could answer, she said, "Oh, I know! It's for our new baby!" And ever since, she's been obsessed with the idea of a new baby. She talks about it regularly and has decided it will be a girl. She says she'll help change diapers and give her all of her old clothes. It's so sweet!
• She loves sweeping! If only she did more than just move the dirt/crumbs around...

• When Carter needs help eating, he often wants Aubrey to help him instead of me or Daniel. She's always so happy to help! It makes me happy.
• Because he's working two jobs, Daniel is of course very tired. As a result, he often falls asleep on the couch. When he does, Aubrey likes to tuck him in with her blankets and stuffed animals.

Notable Quotables

• She has gotten in the movie Cars lately, and instead of calling the main character Lightning McQueen, she calls him "Lightning the Queen." It's amazing. Daniel made a nice "drag racing" joke in response. Haha.
• For awhile there, she would randomly (and constantly) say, "Hey Cool Whip, check it out!" She said she got it from a kid at preschool. I have NO idea...
• "I'm not going to do that. I'm just going to do what I want."
• Aubrey: "Mommy, why did Heavenly Father name me Aubrey?"
  Me: "He didn't name you that; Mommy and Daddy did."
  Aubrey: "Aw, well I wanted you to name me something else."
  Me: "Like what?"
  Aubrey: "Castle Princess!"
• "Mommy, listen to this beautiful song I'm going to play. It's called 'Count on Me... to Destroy Things.' "
• She came in while I was making lunch and said with a big grin, "I put a stocking on Daddy!"

• If I ever say Carter is a buttface (said in jest with love, I promise, haha), Aubrey says, "No, he's a wonderful baby!"
• Daniel: "What did you learn about in class?"
  Aubrey: "Jesus." *pause* "That's it."
• Me: "Carter's saying your name because he loves you."
  Aubrey: "Of course I love him too."
  Me: "And I love you both so so so so much!"
  Aubrey: "And I love you... not so much."
• Aubrey: "I'm talking! I'm in charge! "
  Me: "Okay, if you're in charge, then you need to get lunch ready for everyone and take care of everything."
  Aubrey: "No! That's hard work, and I don't do that!"
• When we went out to eat with my parents recently, Carter threw his food. Then Aubrey followed suit. When we scolded her, she turned to Daniel and said, "I'm proud of what I did." PUNK.

"What starts with red?"

• She's very interested in what letter different words start with. But instead of saying, "What letter does 'red' start with," for example, she'll say, "What starts with red?" It's pretty cute. She always knows the answer; she's getting very good with her letters and phonemes. And she has the spelling of her own name memorized!
• She loves eating bleu cheese. By itself. Won't eat potatoes or chicken or anything basically but sloves bleu cheese... Weirdo.
• One of her favorite things to do is reenact the opening scene from Frozen (not the part in which they break all the ice, but the part in which Anna wakes up Elsa and they play). She has the whole thing memorized, and she gets really into the acting. 
• Speaking of reenactments from that movie, she also likes to perform all of "Let It Go." She dresses in her Elsa costume and has me braid her hair over one shoulder and put the song on. Then she walks around the living room/kitchen doing all the same movements Elsa does and singing along to the song.

• With her, everything is a race. She always says, "I won!" when no one even had an idea there was a race. Who finishes their food first? It's a race. Who closed their car door first? It's a race. I've told her over and over that not everything is a race, but she firmly disagrees--unless she's losing. If we want her to eat dinner better and we say, "Aubrey, Carter's winning!", she always says matter-of-factly, "It's not a race." Punk.
• One time, less than five minutes after Daniel put Aubrey to bed, I heard the knob on her door turn once. And then again. And then again. Finally, I heard the door open all the way. I said, "Aubrey, what are you doing?" She replied, "Sleeping." Hmm, nice try, kid.
• Ever since visiting her cousin Emma and hearing her talk about dance class, she likes to pretend she's doing ballet. She stands with one leg stretched out behind her and also tries to do pirouettes. She didn't actually know what a pirouette was at first, so I showed her a video. Then she tried to copy it.

• She started asking us who the fourth chair at our kitchen table is for. When we said Carter would sit there when he got older, she said something like, "Then we'll have a new baby to sit in Carter's chair" (referring to his high chair). She hasn't let go of the idea and is now convinced she'll have a baby sister named Raspberry. 
• I'm trying not to be worried that she sometimes kills off her dolls when she plays. Sometimes she says, "Nora died." And recently, Nana said she had Cinderella kill Belle because she was going to marry Jaxon (our only boy Barbie-type doll). Ummm... what?! We had a conversation about that one...
• She really likes the song "Phantom of the Opera." She told me once that Christine is her favorite character in the musical because she has the same name as her and Grandma. Awww! She also does a great impression of her... haha.

• She has started to go into her room and play by herself, usually after meals. It's really nice, haha.
• She often calls things "lovely," which is adorable. She sets up pretend picnics and says, "I made a lovely picnic for you!"
•  Awesome Aubrey quotes:
• "Do you know what 'cabiffable' means? It means you're drinking scissors!"
• Shouted as she bid goodbye to someone who had just given her candy on Halloween: "Bye! See you next time!"
• After barfing in the car on a road trip: "I'm never going to eat M&Ms ever again. I'm only going to have lollipops and chocolate chips!"
• Spoken after climbing in bed with me one morning: "Mommy, I can smell your voice."
• "When people get mad, they freak out and have a tantrum. But when people get happy, they just eat!"

"I'll hold my own hand."

"

Man, this girl has too much personality to fit into such a small package. It's not possible to write down all the things that make this stubborn, crazy girl so wonderful. I feel like I could write twice as much as I have, but that would be ridiculous. So here's what you get.


Live and Learn

• Since we moved to Colorado, we've started hiking a lot. Aubrey's such a trooper! She sometimes gets tired and asks us to carry her, but when we tell her no she pushes on. She's done some pretty difficult hikes for such a young kid, and she's rocked them! We hiked to Castle Rock, which was a very uphill hike, and she did it all herself! She's done several 2-mile hikes already. And she loves it.

• Our new neighborhood has a pool for residents only. We got Aubrey a set of water wings, and she's gotten very confident! She is working on blowing bubbles in the water and can swim well with the wings on. She asks to go swimming pretty much every day.

• With Aubrey starting preschool, we had to finally bite the bullet and for-real potty train her. We had tried a few times before--using charts, bribes, etc.--but she decided she didn't want to do it. She was completely capable but completely unwilling. So we told her she had to be potty trained to go to preschool, and then we talked up preschool in a major way. And it worked! We had very few accidents (and just in the first couple of days), and she proved she was able to hold it for long periods of time. We had trouble with pooping (she held it in for a couple days, refusing to try, and got really bad stomachaches) and with using public toilets, but it worked itself out within a couple of weeks. Yay!
• And now she's in preschool! And it's been great. She was apprehensive about me leaving the first few times, but she's gotten over it. But she does always say, "Kiss and a hug!" before I leave. And then she asks to give Carter a kiss and a hug. It's pretty dang cute. We did have a bit of a problem with preschool at first in that Aubrey refused to say "May I please be excused?" after snack time. She apparently said to the teacher, "I don't say that at home." But not for lack of trying on our part! Punk. Anyway, we've worked on it. And on the second day of school, the teacher said to me, "She was less stubborn today!" So yeah.

Sour...

• When she's mad, she threatens to throw things in the trash or just generally throw things. One time she threatened to take Carter away from me.
• When she gets mad at me, she sometimes calls me "a bad mommy." It feels great.
• She often knocks Carter down when he's walking. She just walks by and hip checks him. It drives me crazy.
• When she wants something she hasn't gotten, she says, "I told you [insert demand here]." (Example: "I told you to get me chocolate milk!") And it's never something she's actually told me she wanted. Oof.

... and Sweet

• When I put Carter down for a nap (or down for bedtime when Daniel isn't home), she always asks if she can read him books and sing to him. It's pretty dang cute when she does it.
• She loves texting Daniel emoji messages during the day. She gets really excited when he responds back. She also does the speech-to-text thing sometimes. Once she sent him the following: "Dr do to Deedee which prime up the times for fines. Prime mind when mine run crying and dozers of four, three, two, one goes away. Come away when you apologize." It totally sounds like an angsty poem!
• When Carter gets hurt (not by her, haha), she says, "Oh, I'll go get him a toy to make him feel better!" And she does. And it's super cute.
• At school, when they were making one of their craft things, she said to the teacher, "I need to make a second one." When the teacher asked why, she said she wanted to make one for Daddy "because he does so much." Heart melted.

Fun and Games

• She likes to make up silly words to songs she likes. She also LOVES dancing. I wonder if musical theater is in her future... haha.

• She likes to super dramatically pretend she's falling down stairs. When she gets to the bottom, she lets out a dramatic "Oh!" and then lies there motionless for awhile.
• One of her favorite games involves bringing me fake food and describing what's in it and giving it a funny name. She often includes the made-up word "durlik" in her food names.

Funny Girl

• In sacrament meeting back in Massachusetts, someone said from the pulpit, "I struggle; we all struggle." Aubrey was apparently listening and responded very matter-of-factly and kind of loudly, "I don't struggle."
• From Daniel's Facebook post: "I explained the concept of liberty to Aubrey today by telling her that it means that we could live the way we wanted as long as we didn't hurt other people and that it is important to fight for our freedom. She replied by saying, "Ok, if I ever see a bad policeman, I will fight him."
• One night she said, "Mommy, can you sing "sha la la la"? I sang, "Sha la la la la la don't be scared, you've got the mood prepared. Go on and kiss the girl," and she responded, "Mom, it's dinner time; it's not time to sing." Well then.
• She really likes the movie Enchanted and is getting into Wicked songs, but she can't get the characters' names right. "Giselle" is "Gazelle," and "Elphaba" is "Elphabet."
• She still hasn't mastered asking politely for things she wants. One day she demanded I turn on High School Musical songs. When I said, "You need to ask nicely," she yelled, "Ask yourself!" 
• When we try to hold her hand to cross the street, she says, "No, I'll hold my own hand." And she actually does.

• When we met with the lawyer to close on our house, the lawyer mentioned something about our bank. Aubrey was apparently listening and said excitedly, "I have one of those! It's a piggy bank!" AH. DOOR. AH. BULL.
• The other day I went into my room to have a solitary break, and Aubrey followed me. She informed me, "If you want to be alone, you need a friend!" Of course.
• When we're out doing errands or hiking or whatever, she almost always says, "You know, it's pretty hot today. Maybe we should go get some ice cream!"
• She changes her outfit at least once a day. She'll go into her room wearing one thing and come out wearing something else. And she's very concerned about matching. Of course, her idea of matching and my idea are somewhat different... haha.

"You are the music in yourself."

Oh man. We already have a threenager on our hands, guys. This girl is SAS-SY. She knows what she wants and usually how to get it.


Live and Learn

• She got a Lego Duplo set for Christmas, and it comes with a little boy and a little girl. I recently discovered that she named the girl Mercutio. Thanks to the Baby Lit version of Romeo and Juliet for the inspiration!
• She's learning the stories and characters from the Book of Mormon. We have a kid-friendly version, and it's really been good for her. It's fun to see how much she learns, even when it seems like she's not listening. She's really into the Tree of Life story right now, which she can tell to us now.
• She's very interested in how things work. A few nights ago she asked me, "Mommy, where does my food go?" So we talked about digestion. Her mispronunciation of "intestines" was downright adorable. She also has learned from Daddy about how trees provide oxygen. (I discovered this when she said in the car one day, "Mommy, the trees help me breathe.")
• She loves doing puzzles. And she's pretty good! She does iPad puzzles as well as actual physical jigsaw puzzles.
• She's also finally learning how to ride her little kiddie bike. She has trouble peddling and turning at the same time...

Fun and Games

• She LOVES High School Musical (and both of its sequels). Those are the songs she wants to hear every day in the car and at bedtime. She particularly likes "Get'cha Head in the Game," "Stick to the Status Quo," "All For One," "We're All in This Together" (she loves it when the say, "Wildcats"), "Now or Never," and "The Boys Are Back." She has seen all three movies more than once. When we listen to the songs, she talks about what is happening during different parts. She used to ask who is singing (or playing, when referring to the background music), but now she pretty much knows all the answers. She refers to the characters by name and has actually pretended to be playing with Gabriella. And, my personal favorite, she tries to copy the dance moves. She especially likes Troy and Chad's moves in "The Boys are Back." Guys, this is seriously a dream-come-true for me. I have a kid to share HSM with! Okay, done geeking out. Moving on.

• She has also gotten into the movie Moana and the show PJ Masks. 
• She likes to play the game SpotIt! She actually does pretty well. There are even some times she legitimately finds a match before I do. 
• She's gotten really into taking pictures on my phone and my camera. They're so artistic! Haha.
• Like many kids her age, she loves playing pretend. And, I think like many kids her age, her pretend play is often influenced by the shows, books, and movies she likes. But in a uniquely Aubrey way (at least I think it's unique), she starts talking so fast and getting so excited that her brain can't keep up with her mouth. This is the point at which she descends into total gibberish. Here she is calling the Paw Patrol to help her fight some evil woman from Elena of Avalor.

Funny Girl

• As previously mentioned, she loves High School Musical. One of the songs is called "You are the Music in Me." I overheard her one day saying/singing to Carter, "You are the music in... yourself!" I laughed, and now it's a thing she says to be silly and funny.
• Similarly, she says, "I just want to be with Troy!" instead of "I just want to be with you." Again, she said it once and realized it was funny when I laughed. Now she always says it.
• She often says, "I'm starving for [insert food, such as cake]!"
• She also says, "Oh, all this [insert activity, such as playing a game] is making me tired!"
• When Daniel puts her to bed, she always makes him sing the Sofia the First theme song, interchanging the same Sofia with every member of the family. It then becomes "Daddy the first" and "Carter the first" and sometimes "everybody the first." Tonight she actually had him sing "no one the first." 
• She's begun speaking in complete gibberish to be silly.
• I often call Carter "Carter Barter," and she has misheard it to be "Carter Barber," so she calls him that now.
• Out of nowhere, she became terrified of bugs. She freaks out any time she sees one, running away and asking me to "shoo" it. When we had a picnic recently, she said, "Mommy, keep your feet closed so the bugs don't get in here!" So I took a picture.

• The other day, when we told her she had to come to the table and eat dinner, she talked some gibberish about not doing that and then said, "I'm not a little girl anymore." Well, that's good to know.
• When she coughs or sneezes, I always tell her to cover her mouth. She often ignores me until she's done, and then she covers her mouth and does a fake, super-exaggerated cough/sneeze. Then she often makes weird gagging noises. 
• She got very into The Very Hungry Caterpillar a bit ago, and then she started being obsessed with stomachaches. She would say she had one or her baby doll had one or that she didn't want to eat too much of something and get a stomachache.
• She once turned to me at dinner and said, "Mommy, did you ever kill anyone?" She was quoting Lilo & Stitch, which she had just watched a couple of times that week, but it was still so random.
• She LOVES eating "cheese balls," which is just grated parmesan cheese I've squished together into a little ball. She could eat them all day.
• Everything happened "last night." No matter how long ago something happened--and no matter if it ever even happened at all--she says it happened "last night."
• She loves the story I told about how my dad threw me in the pool with my clothes on one year during my birthday party. She always asks me to tell her the story, and then she tells me the same story but says that Grandpa through her in the pool at her birthday party.
• After a failed nap time/quiet playtime for the kids, I said, "Mommy needs some alone time. I want to be by myself. Alone. Just me." Aubrey, with sweet sincerity and apparent confusion said, "But you can't."

Sour...

• She takes toys away from other kids and waits to see their reaction. She's hoping they'll chase her, because she loves to be chased. Ah, my little manipulator. 
• She actually got kicked out of nursery a few weeks ago for kicking another kid. She full-on wrestles Carter, which he doesn't like, and does other very not-so-gentle things to him.
• I actually had to tell her, "Don't break off the blinds and put them in the heating vent." Because she did. She's pretty destructive, regrettably. She likes to pull things apart. She also likes digging holes in her wall. When Daniel asked her about it, she said, "Oh, yeah! See, when I do this," referring to digging a toy into the wall--"it turns white!" Oy.
• We tried potty training for real. It didn't work. She's capable of doing it (she can even realize on her own that she needs to go and make it to the bathroom in time), but she's unwilling. After a successful first day, she started refusing to use the bathroom and then freaked out if she peed her pants and I tried to change her clothes. So we gave up for now. When she wants to do it, she will.
• She never wants to do something that wasn't her idea. Even when you give her a good reason for her to do something, she'll contradict you just to be, well, contradictory. Example: I tell her to put on her coat. She refuses. I tell her, "But it's cold outside!" She responds, "I like it cold." So she goes out without a coat, and no matter what--even if she's shivering--she doesn't say anything. I've even offered the coat at this point, and she's still refused. 

... and Sweet

• She has become much more affectionate. She will randomly say so sweetly, "Mommy, I love you." She also says "I love you too" now when I say it first. Heart melted.
• She has epic tantrums, of course, but she has gotten really good about saying sorry afterwards. Once she has calmed down and we've moved on, she'll randomly say, "Mommy, I'm sorry I yelled/threw [item]/whatever." It makes me happy when she does that.
• She loves being helpful--giving Carter more snacks, setting the table for dinner, clearing the table after dinner, cooking, doing laundry with me, etc. She always wants to be with me, even if what I'm doing is, to me, boring and mundane. It's so sweet!
• One time, when she was holding fake flowers I just bought, she said, "I've got pretty flowers for getting married. Let's go get married to each other!" I explained that mommies and daughters can't get married because they're already in the same family, etc., and she responded, "But we belong together!"
• When I was putting her to bed the night we returned home from Peru, she said, "Mommy, I don't want you to ever leave ever again." OH MAN, I just melted into a giant puddle of guilt and love.

Aubrey Turns Three!

Aubrey's actual birthday was on a weekday, so we didn't do too much on the day itself. In traditional fashion, we started with Swedish pancakes. Ignore my lack of artistry.

Then Pam drove down from Boston, and we hit up the local fro-yo place. It was raining, which sucked, but Aubrey got lots of chocolate fro-yo topped with sprinkles, cookie dough, and M&Ms, which was awesome. She's totally my kid.

Once Daddy got home (she was NOT excited about waiting), we opened presents. She got a doll house from Nana and Papa...

... spelling puzzles and an American-Girl-knockoff (named Nora), along with a bathtub to go with her, from Mommy and Daddy...

... and a doll bed for Nora, an Owlette costume, and PJ Masks toy figures from Grandma and Grandpa.

These last two gifts lead me to her actual birthday party, which took place the following Saturday. When it came time to plan the party, I decided to ask Aubrey what kind of party theme she wanted. She immediately said, "I want a PJ Masks party!" She had just started to get into the show, so it was really on her mind. You know how kids go through phases...

Anyway, this phase lasted all the way through her birthday party, so there were no requests for a last-minute theme change (thank goodness). I did the whole Pinterest research thing and tried to get creative (not my thing), and this is what we came up with.

I stayed up the night before making masks and bracelets (which turn them into PJ Masks superheroes) for all of the kids, but no one actually wore them. Those who tried often ended up breaking their masks. (Did I mention the crafty Pinterest party is not really my thing?) But oh well. Aubrey still has a couple of the masks and plays with them sometimes, so that's a win, right?

In her typical fashion, Aubrey refused to wear her Owlette costume that Grandma and Grandpa gave her... just because she was "supposed" to. She did put it on before the party though...

I also went heavy into the red, blue, and green thing for decorations, and I tried to have every food item be related to the theme. Weirdly, no one wanted to eat the "Catboy's hairballs" (AKA popcorn chicken bites). ;) Oh, and the things that look like Jello shots are just plain old Jello. I promise. Actually, they were Romeo's experiments!

Because Aubrey and her friends are three-ish, we opted not to structure their fun. We just let them run amok. I'm really sad I didn't get any photos of that. I was busy shoving my face with pizza and then cake and enjoying adult conversation...

Speaking of cake, I decided to carry on the Mangum family tradition of serving Texas Sheet Cake for birthdays. And I kept it simple by decorating it with the PJ Masks figures my parents gave Aubrey.

This year, Aubrey didn't get all weird when we sang to her! And she was actually able to blow out (most of) her candles by herself.

Perhaps I shouldn't have bothered with a theme for a 3-year-old's birthday party (Eh, live and learn, right?), but in the end she had fun. And that's what matters.

After all the birthday shenanigans were over, it was nice to see that Aubrey was putting her presents to good use.

So anyway, happy (at this point very late) birthday to Miss Aubrey, my sassy, smart, independent, helpful, willful, sweet, sometimes very difficult but always wonderfully entertaining girl. I can't wait to see what you make of your life!

Gymnastics

Back in September, we decided to enroll Aubrey in a gymnastics class at the YMCA. At first, she was super shy and pretty much refused to participate. She was nervous about the teacher, Miss Alyssa, and wanted me to be the one to help her with everything. It was a really rough start, and we almost decided to pull her out of it. But finally, after a few weeks, she warmed up to the teacher and started getting into it.

She started out being a little scared of heights on the regular-height balance beam. She was too scared to do "airplane arms" and instead held on to the teacher for dear life.

She also needed help with the shorter beams and didn't feel super confident, for obvious reasons.

She did love the trampoline right away though, 'cause jumping...

Over time, she got more and more confident and excited about gymnastics. It was really good to see after those first few rocky classes.

 Still, she had a tendency to be a little reluctant at times...

And she often ran a little wild...

But she's gotten stronger!

She's mastered airplane arms!

She's gotten better about following instructions!

And she's even at the point where she can do the medium-height beam all by herself!

Each week they mix it up and try to add new skills, like backwards somersaults...

... kicks on the beam...

... and the vault!

Long story short, she's loving it! And there are still a few months left for her to improve more, have more fun, and learn more things. Just today, in fact, she did some flips on the bar. I'll have to record it next time so I can add it here! But for now, here's a funny vault outtake.