Oceanside 2011

I came across this picture today from our trip to California. What a great time we had! Even if we drove 22 straight hours to get there and another 22 to get back...with 4 kids age 6 and under. Are we crazy? When it comes to getting us to the beach to stay on an ocean front property with Grandma and Grandpa in sunny California, we'd do just about anything. Next summer can't come soon enough...

Gwen Girl

The day before my littlest baby girl turned five I kept hugging her. I told her over and over again that it was the very last day I would ever be able to hug my four year old Gwen and I didn't want to forget how it felt. She ate it up. I loved every second of it. The first hug in the morning I told her I wasn't letting go. She tried to get away but I hugged tighter and shook my head no. She laughed. I told her she was going to have to stay in my arms all day long because tomorrow she'd be five. She laughed more. Then she told me she had to go potty. So I let go, sadly.

I told her about the day she was born. She loves to hear about how we waited and waited and waited. Until she finally decided to come the next day. And when she came out, she screamed. She likes to do her baby crying impression at this point in the story. She loves that part.

At 3:30 am on her birthday she came into our room to ask if it was her birthday yet. She grabbed her blanket from under our bed and took up her spot on the floor. I told her she was, in fact, now five. She said she knew she was five because her toes were now sticking out from the bottom of the blanket. She had obviously grown since yesterday.

When morning came we went into her room to get dressed. She informed me that the clothes in her dresser would no longer fit her. Now that she's five of course. So I got down her 5T clothes from the top shelf in her closet. That seemed to humor her.

She was so excited to see her friends. She mentioned that she didn't think that they would even recognize her. Because, of course, she was five and she had grown so much.

What a sweetheart she is. Kinda ironic that on this big, momentous day, we threw her a teeny tiny party complete with teeny tiny everything. In my mind, I'll always have my little Gwen. I love you baby girl!