This is the longest post, but it was a big day!
We ate at Corona Village, where Hazel had taquitos as an appetizer once, and has since regularly requested them. It's a nice place to go with the little ones, especially early in the evening.
When we got back, Grammy and Nellie were waiting for us. Grammy brought birthday surprises for Hazel, including the most spectacular tiny bicycle ever. It has no pedals. It is a balance bicycle, and the idea is that little itzers get used to balancing when they are tiny, so that they can skip the whole training wheels stage later on. It's going to take a little while for Hazel to really get good at it, but she already has a lot of fun with it and asks to go out side and use it whenever she gets a chance.
Grete: Here she comes!
Hazel: [shaking head] Bulldozers not moving.
....
[someone says something about how the guys in the bulldozers are maybe eating dinner]
Hazel: Eating dinner...
....Bunny! Bunny.
Hazel had fun with Nellie, who helped her with the new bike and then read some books with her. Here they are reading Flora and the Flamingo, a new library discovery which we highly recommend.
Flora and the flamingo dance, and this is Hazel's best arabesque, with her new ballet shoes from us.
We rounded out the festivities with an ice cream birthday cake.
Grammy generously shared her portion with Vivian.
After Grammy and Nellie left, Hazel was a little bit wound up, so we settled in on the couch to watch her new Anuna DVD for a while before getting ready for bed. It's the same concert that we had discovered on YouTube, and now Hazel also has it on CD so we can listen on the iPod in the house and also in the car. Hazel has about 4 or 5 favorites, and Vivian will bounce along to a few of them, especially Fionnghuala. We have listened to a lot of "Gotay" (how Hazel says Gaudete) in the past week!
All in all, a great birthday. We can't believe she's TWO!
She is talking so much, she "reads" many of her stories out loud now, and she is putting together more and more sentences. She helps out around the house with feeding the dog, putting away groceries and laundry, putting the soap in the dishwasher, and picking up her toys. She helps her sister when she can't reach a toy. She puts on her own shoes, and if she puts them on the wrong feet she'll swap them so that they are correct. She likes Christmas lights (some people still have them up!) and calls them "pretty" (as a noun). She is starting to pretend play, and it's so much fun to watch her have a tea party with her bear, monkey, and kangaroo or put her baby doll to sleep in the cradle and sing her a goodnight song. She also makes sure to tell me "shhh! baby sleeping" so that I don't wake her up! The way her face lights up when she first comes out of her room in the morning and sees the rest of her family is just the sweetest, and we are just as excited to see her. She is a wonderful, sweet little girl, and we are so blessed to see her every day!
We spent some time going through old pictures, and I thought I'd put a couple here.
This is Hazel on her 1st birthday:
She had been walking for a couple of months, and she could say about 5 words.
This is the day she was born:
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