and they keep growing up.

ashley turned 7 today.

I know.

I thought I had made a deal with these kids.

a deal that entailed their not growing up anymore, and I would keep up on the laundry, cleaning, feeding them and whatnot.

they totally aren’t living up to their end.

ashley is in a current phase.

a phase which includes these questions, daily.

1) what is your favorite color?

2) what is your favorite dinosaur?

3) what is your favorite princess?

I can tell you all of her favorites today.

1) brown

2) mammoth or allosauarus (it’s a tie)

and

3) mulan

so at first this birthday was going to revolve all around our extinct friends until, while rummaging around for the jurassic park dvd, she came across mulan, and, well, the rest is history.

let me tell you how hard it is to find anything mulan.

nevermind.  I am still tired from finding the few mulan things I did to tell you how tiring it is.

I have never been more thankful for amazon prime (free 2 day shipping!!), or rather the fact that I forgot to cancel it after my trial period (ordering easter goodies that I couldn’t find locally).

her birthday presents (well, at least the bulk) arrived today.

(see, SO thankful for 2 day shipping.)

but look at how happy she is:

think she might be even happier when she gets her dress-up.. 

(shh!!!  don’t tell her!!!)

she also asked for a mulan cake.

I will say that I did my best, but this weather, and a time crunch today left me less than pleased with how she turned out.

(my dad would reassure me that it looks fine, and that it will just turn into poop anyway..)

I think she turned out looking more hispanic, maybe even polynesian.

I will blame it on:

a) the time issue

and b) the weather.  my hands are killing me with this new cold air and all the rain.

and now that I have read through this post a couple of times, I sound not so chipper.

I guess that is why I usually compose happy birthday posts (heavy on the happy) a day or so in advance and plug in pictures the day of?

not so tired then, are we?

so here goes 7 happy things about my 7 year old girl:

1) you have quick wit.  I mean seriously, where do you get that from?  one thing can be said, and there’s ashley, following through with a zinger to tack on the end.

2) you can’t seem to go to the bathroom with the shower curtain open.  you also can’t seem to spend less than 15 minutes in there either.  I think that is hysterical!

3) you cannot go to sleep unless I have tucked you in.  sometimes you need to take one of your famous (aforementioned) trips to the bathroom, after the initial tucking-in, and you cannot settle down unless I re-tuck.

4) you make up songs in the shower.  then you sing them repeatedly and get them stuck in my head.

5) you eat anything and everything!!  well, except for school lunch, and well, I can’t blame you there.

6) you read like it is the easiest thing in the world.  homework this year is a breeze!  and you love to read.

7) everyone (including the random kids we meet at random places like mcdonald’s in page) are your new “best friends” and everyone in our neighborhood/ward/grade/school, are also on that “best friends” list.

happy birthday sweet ashley. xox