Is the week over?

This has been a busy week and I've been meaning to post pictures of Brooklyn's birthday:

Here she is first thing in the morning. We hadn't really been telling her that her birthday was coming up so she was in awe when we started singing to her. Her usual morning routine is to grab her cup of juice and then cuddle on the couch with her blankie watching cartoons for a while. It takes some time before she wants any social interaction in the mornings. We generally let her be until she's been awake for 30 minutes or so; she was a little surprised when we both stopped our own morning routines and sat down beside her to start singing "Happy Birthday" before we even turned her cartoons on! This picture sort of captures that initial look - eyes wide, head cocked to the side, mouth open.

For her birthday, Brooklyn got a brand new shiny red bike. We haven't had time to get any pictures of her on it yet. We went to Puyo that evening after Sean finished up at the hangar, and spent over an hour searching the entire town for a bike . After only 5 or 6 stops at the many tiny bike shops, we finally found what we were looking for! I'm so glad we were able to find one and Brooklyn is starting to get the hang of riding it. I was a little frustrated that we didn't have a nice Wal-Mart or Target nearby - that would have been much simpler and probably cheaper for a better quality bike; they probably would have had nice wrapping paper for it too! Oh well.

Knowing that finding a bike might prove difficult, I had a back-up plan. A while ago I bought some used toys from some other missionaries here. I knew that if we couldn't find the bike, I could at least give Brooklyn something to open. Even if it wasn't brand new, I knew she wouldn't care at all as long as it was new to her. I wanted Brooklyn to have something to open in the morning of her birthday so we gave her the gently used stuff first thing... and she was thrilled! She played (and still plays) for hours with the Barbie horse and stable and the little child-sized shopping cart. She did mention that her friend had the same horse...ummm, not anymore! I really had a hard time knowing that I was giving my daughter used toys for her birthday (even though her real present from us was actually the new bike) but Brooklyn was so grateful and pleased with the older stuff. I love the innocence of a child - she was just tickled pink that she got "presents!"

Here she is blowing out the candle on her birthday cake!

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