happy birthday, dear millie!

Though it's hard to believe, our little Millie really is two years old! (Just ask her - she'll hold up five fingers and say, "TWO!") Her birthday was wonderful. She was able to spend it with a lot of her family, including her Grandma and Grandpa Vaughn, who were here from Florida.

She'd been talking about her birthday for weeks (okay, okay, maybe that was because WE had been talking about her birthday for weeks). On my birthday, which is the day before hers, she started saying, "Mommy birthday today, and Mimi birthday tomorrow!" She was really excited; we'd celebrated several family birthdays recently, so she knew that meant singing Happy Birthday, eating cake, and opening presents.

When we actually started to sing to her, though, she wasn't at all sure what to think! She just looked around at us all, trying to figure out what was going on.



Once we finished singing and prompted her to blow out the candles, she did so with gusto! She was so excited and quick about it, though, that Mommy missed the picture. There was no way I wanted to not have a picture of her blowing out her two candles all by herself for the first time, so... we lit them again. Yeah. We really did. :) She was confused, so we sang to her again, which made her even more confused! I think she was convinced we were all crazy, and she was probably right. She thought it was cool to blow out the candles again, though.



As soon as we got around to opening presents, she got really excited. In the past, she's been so excited about simply opening the beautiful boxes that the gifts inside have gotten second billing. This time, though, she really understood what was going on and got excited about each present. She wanted to touch the clothes and read the books and play with the toys - it was adorable! (Of course, all this translated into a little bit of "princess syndrome" in the week following, but now she's decided again that normal not-getting-presents-everyday life is okay too.) Somewhere in the present-opening process, she decided she wanted to use her new spoon to tear open all the wrapping paper. I have NO clue how she got that idea, but she was determined, and it was hilarious!



Her favorite gift by far was her new trike, and her favorite part of the trike was the bell. She thought it was pretty much the neatest thing ever that she could ride around and ring the bell over.. and over... and over. It's been so much fun, though! She wants to ride it every day, and it's great for walking to the park. She hasn't quite figured out the pedals, but she still feels much more like a big girl when she gets to go for "bike rides" instead of "stroller rides"!



We still just shake our heads in disbelief at the fact that she is two years old already. While she'll always be OUR baby, she's left the "baby thing" way behind in the dust. She's not even a toddler anymore! Every day, as she plays and sings and learns and grows, she's becoming more and more a little girl. Everyone who warned us how fast the years fly by was so right - but I suppose that's part of what makes them so very precious.

These last two years with you have been the happiest of our lives, Millie, all because of you. You have brought us immeasurable joy and we love you more than we will ever be able to say. Happy Birthday, sweet daughter!



p.s. - lots more birthday pics at flickr soon!