Nate and Tanja: Lydia 1st Birthday

Between Father's Day on Sunday and Lydia's 1st birthday on Saturday, we had a very exciting weekend. Karina was much more enthused about Lydia's birthday than little Lydia was (obviously). Karina had been talking about it for days and was eagerly anticipating opening Lydia's birthday presents, eating the birthday cupcakes, and going to Chick-fil-a. Karina also managed a tantrum the day before the birthday when I told her the presents were not for Lydia AND Karina, they were just Lydia's, and it was a day to celebrate Lydia and not her and that Karina's birthday was another day. Life is tough when not everything is about you. But in the end, Karina will probably play with Lydia's presents at least as much as Lydia will, so it works out.

Here are the girls playing dress-up a few days before Lydia's birthday. Karina likes to dress up like Cinderella, and recently she has begun insisting that Lydia be the Fairy Godmother. Being a Fairy Godmother entails Lydia putting on fairy wings, and waving a wand while Karina pretends she is saying 'bibbidi bobbidi boo'. I can't say Lydia likes the fairy wings particularly much, but we go with it.

Lydia has been walking full-time for a few weeks now. She looks like a little duck waddling around the house; it is very cute.

Karina was excited for the kids table and chairs they got. I refinished the table and chairs and we decided on pastel colors for the chairs and white for the table. Karina has decided that she gets the pink chair, Dolly gets the green chair, and Lydia gets the yellow one. Fortunately for Karina, Lydia isn't old enough to mind leftovers. They'll have many tea parties here. I'm happy with how the set turned out:

One of Lydia's presents was a set of musical instruments that all pack nicely into the drum. Lydia has taken a fondness for the maracas and egg shakers. Karina likes trying out all the new toys, so here she is marching and playing the drum.

Lydia loves everything edible we put in front of her, so it was no surprise that she gobbled up her birthday cake/cupcake quickly and happily. She was enthralled by the candle on her cupcake. She kept wanting to touch the flame.

(Lydia scarfing down her birthday cake reminds me of the stark contrast between her and Karina's reaction to Karina's cake on her 1st and 2nd birthdays. Karina nibbled on her 1st birthday cake, but didn't eat much, and for her 2nd birthday, she refused to even try the cake, and ended up with birthday orange juice:-) I hope Lydia doesn't reverse course and turn into a picky eater too.)

Unsurprisingly, Karina refused to try the cake part of Lydia's birthday cupcakes, but picked off all the frosting, leaving a disgusting mess. Lydia eats considerably more than Karina does throughout a typical day. On the rare occasion Karina eats more at dinner than Lydia, we are surprised.

We had a nice and quiet celebration of Father's Day on Sunday. We also had a mini photo shoot in our backyard to get some pictures of the girls in their coordinated pretty dresses. Since Dolly is also wearing a pretty dress, Karina insisted she be included in the pictures:

It's always a nightmare trying to get pictures of them together because Karina won't pose and Lydia is too little to understand. At least they are cute.