The morning of the big day arrived, and Aurelle requested "what Jovi had for her birthday" for her very own birthday breakfast. Small cereal boxes it is! Sometimes, children can be so easy to please!
And I have no idea why Kyle is making that face, but Happy Birthday Aurelle:
After breakfast was over, Aurelle opened her birthday cards...
and presents:
Aurelle originally wanted her birthday party to be a barbecue with hot dogs and hamburgers in the basement (one of the apartment buildings in our quad has a basement that is open for resident use), but we ended up doing it upstairs instead (I don't even remember why), but she was still super happy. Maybe next year, hun? We made the best of it with pink lights and a birthday pinata:
We headed out to the porch when it was pinata time:
And Aurelle didn't even want a turn hitting her own pinata! Minnette had a good try and Uncle Sam saved the day:
Gathering the goods:
Then we headed back inside for some cupcake and singing action (While Aurelle tried hiding under the table... she is seriously so funny sometimes!):
Enjoying their cupcakes:
Four Year Well Check Stats:
Weight: 30.86 lbs. (16.22 %)
Height: 40.5 in. (68.54 %)
BMI: 13.23 (.99 % )
Yes... you read that right! Her BMI is less than the FIRST percentile! Which is actually the highest it has been since she was two.
Birthday pictures and Birthday Lunch date with Mommy:
Aurelle likes to glean ideas from her sisters, I think. She wanted what Jovi had for her birthday breakfast back in May, and after hearing about Minnette's birthday date with Mommy back in August, she decided she wanted to do the same for her birthday date, as well! She had her sweet little hart set on a corn dog and chocolate shake AND soda from JCW's (a burger place), and I was very happy to accommodate (especially considering their double bacon cheeseburger with Swiss, sauteed mushrooms, caramelized onions and avocado is out of this world!) Anything for you, kid!
It is always such a sweet and wonderful experience getting to take my children out for a one-on-one date for their birthdays, and a tradition I hope continues... ummm, forever? Hoping they still want to hang out with their mom on their birthday when they are all grown up that is!
Birthday pictures with Aurelle is always a fun and interesting experience. I have learned by now that I have to prep the photographers before they start a session with one of my kids, and Aurelle is no exception! For my kids, it's very important to just go with the flow. You won't be getting them to enthusiastically pose in front of a camera yet. I'm happy to get pictures of them ding just about anything. I love personality shots!
Here, Aurelle is protesting even being in front of a camera and not on my lap after I set her down and is chasing after me as I jumped off-camera:
Holding Mommy's hand off camera. I'm good with compromise :)
I seriously love looking back at pictures like these, and almost always regret not picking them for our picture wall:
Within a few minutes of the tea set making it's appearance, we had a much happier and more willing subject on our hands:
And even managed some beautiful smiles out of our sweet girl:
To help the experience go smoother, I encourage Aurelle to pick and choose whatever she wants to do for pictures as far as props and. Whatever makes them happy and comfortable. Well, it ended up being this pink curtain, blue chair and cake prop that did the trick... hey, she was happy!
Such a beautiful girl!
This is the one I picked for our picture wall. Traditional? Nope. But I love it!
A little about Aurelle at 4 years old:
-Aurelle is the most giving child that I know. And I mean that literally. It is one of her strongest gifts. She is always, and I mean always, willing to share. She will give you half f whatever she has. Even if it is something that she loves. She will give half of her fruit snacks to Jovi because Jovi ate all of her own. She loves getting out toys for Waits. She brings Jovi books to read while she's sitting on the potty. She actually gave her teddy bear to Minnette because Minnette lost hers. She is always so willing to help. If I ask the kids generally for someone to help with something, Aurelle is almost always the first (and sometimes only) to volunteer, and she does it happily. It comes so easily for her. One of the things I absolutely love most about her!
-She is a talker. Anyone outside our family may never know it, as she is pretty quiet outside of our home, but she loves the phrase, "Hey Mom/Dad, guess what?" and always has something to follow it. Get this girl in the car or lay down with her at night, and she will just open up to you with seemingly unending thoughts, ideas and feelings to share with you. About anything and everything you could possibly imagine. And she can not stand having to talk over others who are making a lot of noise, or thinking you are distracted and not listening to her for any reason. She will get very frustrated until you are 1) making unbroken eye contact and 2) validating that you can hear her and that you are listening and please continue. She likes to be heard! We try very hard to make sure that she feels listened to, understood and validated whenever she is talking to us even now, so she won't lose that desire to confide in us as she gets older (when it will be so critical to our relationship with her). It is something that can (at times, depending on the environment) be stressful for me and/or Kyle, but is always something that is so precious to us that we treasure having with her.
-Out of the three older girls, Aurelle really goes out of her way to communicate with, and love on, Waits. She is always trying to give him toys, give him hugs, talk to him while he's in his highchair, etc. Unfortunately, most of her communicating is a little "more" than he would usually like, so many of their interactions end in him crying, or as Mommy says, "saying no thank you" (usually due to sheer volume or just too-close-proximity), and Mommy reminding her that "he needs a little space". I always feel bad because she is just trying so hard to love him!
-This one was a big shocker to me: at the tender age of four years old, Aurelle is already very interested in her wardrobe. Up until now, I have gotten away with not only buying their entire wardrobes in matching outfits, but picking out their outfits for them on a daily basis, without even a thought about it from any of them. Until now. Aurelle has a few favorite outfits that she wants to wear all the time. She will plan weeks ahead of time for special events which outfit she would like to wear, even planning which pair of panties she wants to wear with it! She has several outfits that she flat-out refuses to wear (never has, and probably never will) for absolutely unknown reasons to me, and she tries to wear the same mint green dress with pink tights to church every week (it may sound a little funny, but it does look adorable, I swear), and I can occasionally talk her into wearing something else instead. Being into clothing myself, I am excited to see how this aspect of her personality develops as she becomes a young adult- she already has impeccable taste- as I am quite excited and anxious for a clothes-thrifting buddy!
-She is very mature for her age. We sometimes joke that she is our thirty-year-old four year old. If you know her, then you understand. It is hard to describe, but she just often talks, plays, and acts very differently than other children her age, and much more like a little adult. We basically never have to worry about her getting into trouble, or even being influenced by other kids to do something she shouldn't.
-She is incredibly in tune with her own emotions and is quite gifted at expressing them verbally to us. She will talk to me about having a hard time falling asleep the night before because she was feeling very distracted and stressed, and that she doesn't like going to church because so many people look at her and it scares her and she feels uncomfortable. I don't know very many four year-olds that use words and express their emotions like that!
-If she is upset she likes to say things that she knows she shouldn't. If she is upset about something that I either asked her to do, or told her she couldn't do, she will tell me, "Mom, I'm just going to go outside and go downstairs without asking and I'm going to run in the street all by myself! With out anyone holding my hand! While the cars are driving!" or something else like that. It's really hard not to laugh. We have occasionally sent her to take a rest on her bed when she needed a few minutes to cool down and relax, and sometimes when she's not very happy about we'll hear her shouting in her room things like "You dang mom! The dang laundry! I don't want to be in my dang room! What. the. heck!" because we ask them not to use the words 'dang' or 'heck', so she really likes to use them. I am always grateful that they are not exposed to any worse language than that because that wouldn't be nearly as funny.
Aurelle is such a special spirit that we have been beyond blessed to have as a part of our family for the last four years. We are so grateful for all of her gifts and talents, for the joy and wonderful example of charity that she brings into our home, her spunk and persistance and even for the patience she helps us to develop daily!
Aurelle, we love you so so much!
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