Shae's burfday!

Why dillydally -- let's just get right to the presents! On the morning of Shae's birthday, we opened a couple presents from Mama and Daddy (since the party wasn't for a couple more days). Shae is an expert at wrapping paper nowadays.

Posing in her pretty dress. Quite unfortunately (for mama) the boots that we wanted to wear with the dress couldn't get on her little feet. Bummer.

Best present of the morning: a tricycle!

A noteable photo: Shae... well... is not particularly fond of her Uncle Terry (to phrase it nicely). After several days of his diligent attempts, Shae allowed him to pick her up and give her a hug! Only lasted a fleeting moment, though -- glad the camera was at the ready!

Party time! Oodles of presents for the kiddo -- we are continually blown away by the thoughtfulness and generosity of family and friends.

Bring on the cake, yo! Shae picked out the cake herself -- Mickey and Minnie were a big hit.

Cheese!

Playing with the art station she got for her birthday. Who knew that dry erase pens would lend to hours and hours of pure joy?

Shae has been a super-good dinner eater lately. Sometimes when she gets towards the end of a meal, we do play the "one more bite and you can have ____" game. Last night that blank was filled with "pudding." So we gave Shae her pudding, and then went to task with making our own dinner in the kitchen. After about 60 seconds of quiet, I turned to see the following adorable face. I don't even know how exactly it happened in such a short amount of time, but the kid does love her pudding!

Just a noteworthy outfit that's worth photographing. (Have I ever mentioned that I love having my very own life-sized Barbie doll? I know that the window of opportunity for dressing her is closing at an alarming rate, so I'm taking as much advantage of it now as I can.)