one year older

it's that unfortunate time of year when my oldest child decides to grow a year older. maria is now seven. i can't believe my first little baby is already seven! my only consolation is that she is always such a delightful girl on her birthday.

each birthday kid gets to pick what to have for dinner and what kind of cake i'll make. maria wanted hotdogs for dinner and for her cake she said, "chocolate. every year chocolate."

i think she looks more like ethan every year.

lincoln seemed to enjoy the hotdogs as well.

hudson and libby gave maria the "how to train your dragon" book. she's already read the whole thing and started over.

libby was very interested in the presents. she did pretty well considering. she only said, "no, MY presents" a couple times.

more books. she loves the magic treehouse series. over the last couple years we've managed to find most of the first twenty at used book stores. she really wanted the few she was missing. she was also really excited to get another magic treehouse research guide. a research guide is a non-fiction companion to a book in the series. for example, she got book #17 "tonight on the titanic" along with it's research guide which tells all about the titanic.

she was very excited to get a playmobil toy from grandpa and grandma hawkins. it was exactly the one she wanted! how did that happen? she also got a couple extra dresses for her cinderella doll she got for christmas and a snow white/prince/horse set that is polly pocket size.