2!

Brenna turns two in a few days, but we took care of that today with some birthday festivities. Strap in, this is going to be a long one.

We barely finished painting everything and cleaning the house up before people started coming over. Here's the kitchen as it looked before the party happened. The dark brown paint on the cabinets really improved their appearance, I think. Such a cheap, simple fix.

And here's the living room, painted and cleaned up. For my mom who was asking, the Shark steam cleaner/mop worked wonderfully on getting up splotches on the floor with minimal effort, but did nothing to clean our stained grout. Could be because it hasn't been cleaned in six years, though. It worked wonders for not leaving smears all over the floor, though, and was worth the money for that alone.

Here are some of the Dora decorations for the party.

Brenna spent the afternoon with Grandma so Emily and I could get things wrapped up at the house. After her nap, and seeing all of the decorations (including balloons!), she was ready to rawk! Let's get it on!

To get things started, she watched some of her favorite programs and ate some sugar toast, a personal favorite at the time. If you don't believe me, check out the Brenna-sized bite taken out of this defenseless piece of bread. Only the crusts were spared.



After playing with her sand table with cousin Rachel, she then engaged in a rousing game of peek-a-boo.

Finally, the hats! Here is mama, Brenna, and cousin Rachel.

And here are the rest of the party goers. From left to right, if you please, Grandpa, Grandma, Uncle John, cousin Tyler, Mama, cousin Rachel, Daddy, and the guest of honor.

Here's a shot of Brenna's grotesque cake, complete with a dismembered Dora, with Diego rushing to her rescue.

And then there were gifts, including a cool kitchen set from Grandma and Grandpa H. Brenna played with this for a loooong time tonight before heading to bed. Rachel is looking on in anxious anticipation while I'm filming the destruction of package opening.

Here Brenna is checking out a cool new Diego toy from Aunt Beth and Uncle John. You can never have enough Diego paraphernalia.

Another favorite, a princess carriage. In this shot, Brenna is putting Diego (of course) in charge of steering the carriage.

Man, can this party get any more lively? I can hardly contain my excitement. Probably looking forward to cleaning up afterwards.



Yet another favorite (of many), the princess castle. Diego is in the gunner's seat in the tower.

The cake was delicious. Diego and Dora look on.

Mama put together the kitchen, it's fabulous! Grandma Becky provided Brenna with all the trimmings (food, etc).

Finally, Brenna gets in on the action, assisting Emily with construction.