a second birthday party

I can remember life from before my daughter was born but I don't think I really started living it until after she came into it.  Life used to be full of travels and expensive meals.  Now it is full of imaginary birthday parties for Tonka and Nemo.  A meal in a restaurant is a luxury and is often over in less than forty minutes, which is generally the maximum amount of time that we can persuade Clio to stay put.  I can't even begin to count how many loads of laundry I do in a week or how many dishes we wash since we don't have a dishwasher.  Our house is never clean. Never.

But I would not have it any other way.  She is my joy.  She fills me with so much happiness, even when I am at the end of my rope and need a break.  Her smile lights up my world.

A couple of weeks ago she turned two.  Just like that, I blinked, and suddenly the tiny little baby I brought home from the hospital was a toddler.  We kind of missed her first birthday, as we were leaving the very next day to move to Portland, and so I made my best effort to throw her a second birthday party that, even if she wouldn't remember, would be a blast.  There were bubbles, and balls, and water and party hats.  Oh, yeah, and temporary tattoos too.

She was surrounded by many of the people who love her most in the world and I think that she had a pretty wonderful time.  I think everyone else did too.  I just wish my family could have been there too.

Because it was only her second birthday and she could not really care one way or another what "theme" it was I chose something that I thought would be fun to plan around.  I mean, what isn't fun about yellow submarines and newspaper sailor hats?

Happy birthday to my big girl.