Kennedy Turns 4 ~ Part One

Before I launch full force into what was Kennedy's three day birthday celebration - let's focus on lil' sis for a moment, shall we? This little peanut has had an awful cough/cold. I'm so not used to dealing with sick babies. Kennedy didn't really get sick like Avery has been sick and she certainly didn't get sick at Avery's age. I suppose she was spared being sick so early because she didn't begin daycare until she was 18 months old. Poor little Avery though - she's let me just say - "building up her immunity". Thank heavens she and Kennedy are both troopers when they are sick so aside from not sleeping a ton in this household and dealing with some extra fussiness - it's not been terrible.  

Anyhow, other than being sick not much is new with Avery other than she's been trying out some cloth diapers. How cute is she sporting them? These are Bum Genius diapers that Chelsea gave me when I was pregnant (knowing that I really wanted to try it). It has been challenging at times but thankfully I've got friends like Billie who have been cloth diapering for a while to guide me through it. Once you get a system down it's not bad at all...I actually wish I'd known how easy it could be and I would have tried it with Kennedy. I've learned they are super expensive new, but there are cloth diaper consignment sales where you can get some really quality diapers for a much lesser price (again -knowledge I gleaned from Billie). She and I went to such a sale last week and I can now say my arsenal is full enough that I can cloth diaper for the majority of the time from this point forward. Yay! Happy planet...happy wallet...happy Mom and baby. Messy at times - yeah, but considering the positives I'm game.

Look at those little rolls....

Kennedy's actual 4th birthday was Thursday week before last and it was full of craziness. I had a MUMS meeting followed by a work meeting and it was just plain nutty but we did manage to squeeze in some fancy cupcakes that she picked out from Gigi's. Aunt Abby and Uncle Jonathan came over to celebrate with us and we sang and shared yummy cupcakes with mile high frosting. Yum!

They were super thoughtful and purchased a gift for Kennedy. She was very excited to see what it was.....

Cheesing with Team Burns and her new manicure set they gave her...Oh Lawd - I see lots of nail painting in our future!

Love watching men putting together pink plastic toys...what can I say? This is good practice for Jonathan - there's lots of this in his future!

Precious...and this is why she LOVES him so:

We practically had to peel her off of this thing to go to bed that night. I foresee hours of nail entertainment in our future.

On Friday I had made some special birthday plans with/for Kennedy since I had more free time than on her actual birthday. First up was a trip to Chick-fil-a to use our free breakfast pass. Well....little did we know my car had been broken into the night prior and rather than starting our morning with coffee and yummy chicken we started with an officer and a police report. Fun, fun. Thankfully, from what we could tell the only thing stolen was some cash I had in my car. Since Kennedy's sweet little heart was set on breakfast with Daddy, I am grateful that Chick-fil-a let use our passes despite being way past our assigned time slot that morning. After breakfast I ran to Walmart to get some cake preparation materials and don't you know my day needed more drama and my flippin' car battery died in the parking lot and there I sat with my two kids and lots of things to do! *sigh* Did I mention that Courtney and I had gone running that morning and due to rushing to get to breakfast I didn't shower before departing. Awesome!

Long story longer - after phoning a friend and trying to jump the car ourselves, I ended up needing Walmart automotive's assistance to get my car back to normal. While they worked on my car, I called the friend who I had plans with to let her know what my morning had been like. Luckily she was super understanding and completely went with the flow so we all loaded up into her car and our first stop was lunch at Jimmy Johns (one of my and Kennedy's favorites!).
She was more excited by the gift they brought her than the sandwich we had just ordered. Oh well - I couldn't really blame her.

Next up was Build-a-bear. My sister Catina had given Kennedy a gift certificate and little outfit for Christmas but we hadn't used it yet. I figured it a perfect birthday activity. It was so cute and so fun to watch. After Kennedy picked out her animal (kitty - shocking, I know!) - next up was picking out a sound to go inside the kitty (appropriately she chose the meow).

Then she stuffed the kitty.

After both girls animals were stuffed they then went through a whole little ritual of preparing the hearts to go inside their new babies. They made wishes...

Jumped up and down to make their animals playful, they hugged the hearts and on and on it went - it was precious.

The hearts were then ready to be put in their animals.

After they were sewed up they were told to hug them tight.

Testing the meower...

Bathing, combing, fluffing

All done - SO MUCH FUN!!! I present Daisy the Bunny and Kitters the Cat (in her box).

I don't know if Build-a-bear is always that amazing, but our experience sure was. They were so great with the girls and so upbeat and fun and Kennedy really enjoyed herself. It was the perfect special birthday event.

No Birthday celebration would be complete without some type of treat, right? Here are the girls with their frozen yogurt masterpieces at Menchies. Notice Kennedy wanted Kitters to join her. :)

For weeks I've been talking to Kennedy about the need to stop sleeping with a pacifier. It's been a LONG time coming (plan pacifier cessation) and I felt like her turning 4 was a good catalyst for making it happen. My sister had mentioned that Build-a-bear would allow us to stuff her animal of choice with her pacifiers and I thought that was an awesome idea but in all my crazy morning drama I forgot the pacifiers at home (double bummer!). The BAB employee that worked with us told me that we could bring them back the following day and they could open Kitters back up in order to place the pacifiers inside (which Kennedy really wanted to do). So..in preparation for that coming the following day I asked Kennedy to try to sleep without her pacifier that night. It wasn't easy and there were tears shed (by she and I both), but she made it ALL NIGHT long and awoke VERY proud of herself. I just had to snap a picture to commemorate this monumentous occasion. BIG GIRL! We are now pacifier free....whoopee.

To be continued....