Princess Lily

So, it's that time of year that the month of December becomes "Lily month" as she is blessed with many wonderful friends and family who like to celebrate her birthday. Just recently we had a Prince and Princess party for Lily with 20 of her closest friends, yes, we really had 20 kids (and some of their parents) all in our house - it was too cold to be outside.

I decided to try my hand at decorating a cake . . . to look like a castle, at the Princess' request. And this is how it turned out:

Everyone should have seen Lily's face when she first caught a glimpse of her cake . . . she put her hands to her mouth and with a big smile she whispered, "Oh my goodness!" I'm so glad she liked it :-)

When the kids first arrived, they created their own crowns:

And the presents came rolling in!

We had a pinata, that Scott and I worked diligently to paper mache together the whole week (I never knew that a birthday party was so much work).

All the kids waiting for their chance to beat the pinata.

Opening presents . . . if you are claustrophobic, I would not recommend helping the birthday child open her presents because the kids will crowd you :-)

Time to blow out the candle!!! Then the cake was devoured, including the ice cream cone towers . . . then when we weren't looking and the party was over Tito decided to finish off the cake, silly dog.

Lily's birthday party was a huge success and I'm horrible that I have never got thank you cards out to those who gave Lily presents. So, thank you to everyone (in behalf of Lily) for the presents, she plays with them all every day!

This past weekend, we had our church Christmas party . . . we helped make 108 dinner rolls, and 2 boxes of instant mashed potatoes (have you ever tried stirring 2 boxes of mashed potatoes? Scott was such a trooper to help me out) - See picture below of the results of the potato craziness:

Lily got to visit Santa, no fear this time. When he walked into the cultural hall (the gym), she was so excited and was telling everyone that Santa was there. Then she was the first person to visit him. We got a great picture, and make sure to check out the video of her talking with Santa, it's truly the cutest thing ever.

Later, the Primary kids got up to sing and they let the nursery kids up too . . . Lily is so ready to be a Sunbeam in Primary. She went straight up there and sang the best she could (see video).

We have had an exciting month of December already, and it's not over yet . . . next week we are so excited to visit family and see Scott's brother get sealed for all eternity in the Temple. What a wonderful time of the year, Merry Christmas everyone!! Hope all of you are filled with peace and joy.