Isabel's 7th birthday

Isabel turned 7 on October 11, and ended up with no less than three days of celebrating, lucky girl!

On her actual birthday (a Thursday), she asked for fried eggs and toast for breakfast, easy enough. We gave her a couple of small gifts, a kitty necklace and a Lego Friends set (best things ever! love them!), because her main gift was yet to come (ear piercing!). Brian and I surprised her at the school cafeteria at lunch time with a pizza and a balloon, and ate lunch with her, then after recess we went to her classroom to hand out treats. She was SO surprised to see us at lunch (I had packed her a trick boring lunch that day), and said it was one of her birthday highlights, and that the surprise "touched her heart." It was awesome.

Being sung to in class and handing out treats-

Our 7 year old, and her necklace-

That evening was pretty quiet, as Brian had to be at the CU football game. She chose tuna hotdish for dinner (for reals!!!) and we had a movie party.

Her party was the next day, Friday, a no-school day. She had chosen a luau theme some time ago, as she is very into Hawaii. As I was preparing her party, she did say it would have been better to actually have the party in Hawaii. Um, sorry.

We hung a few decorations (I asked the kids to make some pineapples to display, they did a cute job)-

I made some "beachy" cupcakes-

When all the girls were arriving, Isabel placed a lei on them greeted them with "Aloha! E Komo Mai!" which means hello, welcome, enter. The girls were so amazed with her language abilities, it was darling.

Then I had them each color a tropical picture until everyone arrived.

I had cut out some felt hibiscus flower pieces; the girls selected color combinations and we glued them onto hair clips. They turned out very cute, and the girls felt pretty with their hair flowers.

For games/activities, we learned a bunch of Hawaiian words phrases; listened to hula/luau music and learned a bunch of hula moves with the girls taking turns wearing the grass skirt and modeling each move (I had grass skirts for each girl, given to me by my friend, but they shed some a ridiculous amount that I had to come up with plan B); did the limbo; and played hot potato but with shell, passing the shell around the circle to luau music and when the music stopped the girl holding the shell was out). They loved the games/activities; there was much giggling and happy screaming, especially when Brian did the hula. :)

Learning some hula moves-

She opened presents-

And we had cake and ice cream and Hawaiian punch-

And each girl got to bring home a luau bag filled with flip flop crazy straws, tropical tattoos, those little paper umbrellas (the biggest hit every, I can't believe how excited they got about them), and some tropical Starburst (and of course their hibiscus hair flowers).

All in all a very easy, cost-effective party with maximum fun and results. My kinda party.

The 3rd day of celebrating was Saturday, when Brian's mom and I took Isabel out for a girls night out and to GET HER EARS PIERCED! Isabel has never ever wanted to get her ears pierced until she saw her cousin Grace (same age) get hers this summer, and Isabel has been asking about it ever since. Brian and I didn't have a definite age limit set, so we agreed since she had been asking for months and that she's a responsible girl, we were fine with it. I didn't think she'd actually go through with it. But she did!

She brought her new lamb Lenny for comfort, and was brave as can be. She said it hurt way more than she expected, but she did not cry.

Before-

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During-

After (eyes slightly red, but tear-free)-

We spent some time shopping for earrings, and I was pleased with how many little-girl appropriate sets they had that were sweet and cute. She chose a forest creatures set, a sea creatures set, and a winter/Christmas set-

 Then her Nanna gave us a ride on the train-

She took Isabel to the Lego store to pick out another Lego Friends set (seriously, such fun and cuteness), and then took us to Johnny Rockets for dinner-

 Here's her Lego Friends treehouse completed. She has been pretty much playing with it nonstop-

Whew! What a way to celebrate 7! We love Isabel so much and are so grateful that she is a part of our family. She is a really fun, chatty, bright, imaginative, entertaining, social, full-of-life girl.