4 Years Old Princess Style

Emma is 4! She was so excited for this birthday and to turn 4. She had been planning for months to have a Nemo and aquarium-themed birthday but switched after the princess-induced-craze-of-Christmas (where almost every gift had a princess or 3 on it) to Cinderella and her "cottage" dress. We watched a how to make a doll cake video online together and that was that. She immediately began telling everyone we saw.


"I'm Emma. I'm going to be 4. I'm going to have a princess doll cake for my birthday!"
Complete stranger, "Oh, that sounds nice! When is your birthday?"
"It's ___ (nearly 2 months away). It's after Shelbe's. He's going to be 5! And I'm going to be 4!"


Despite having reservations about the princess craze, we embraced it, secretly hoping we could move on from these lovely ladies in years to come. We had pin the glass slipper on Cinderella, pass the glass slipper (which resulted in a bloody lip for the birthday girl - note: don't use actual glass slipper shoes), dance & freeze when the music stops, step on a balloon, and relay races (adults even got to do these). There was princess lemonade, Rapunzel's Rampion Salad, Prince Charming's Mac & Cheese, Aurora's Fruit Basket, Ariel's Fish Friends, Cinderella's Caprese Salad, and Tiana's PB & J. The Cinderella cake turned out well, complete with 7 pastel pink and purple layers. All in all, everyone had a great time, especially the birthday girl.

On the day of her birthday, we celebrated with a small gift and we went to some of our favorite spots - Alki and Pegasus. One of her grandpas came over and spent a couple hours reading and playing with Emma since he couldn't make it to the party. 

Happy birthday to our sweet little girl whose dreams of the moment are to become a princess and a mom and have a 100 children, each with their own unique names like Renton the Orangoutang, Joshua for a girl lamb, and Sally the Cow. We love you!

jack is ready for sleepy time