A cup of tea.: And she turns ten...

I can't believe it, my baby girl is ten years old! It's strange to think that I am the Mom to a ten year old (a tween). In some ways the time has flown by, I can remember the day she was born like it was yesterday. In other ways I can't imagine my life without her, feels like she's always been in my life. She's becoming the most amazing young lady, so beautiful, so caring, so full of life. There's never a dull moment when Juliana is around. I have many hopes and dreams for her in her life, most important that she is happy and healthy.

Her birthday was a on a Saturday this year, both her and Tyler had soccer games, but before leaving for the games she wanted to open her gifts. She got a pillow pet from Tyler, and Pajamas and a netbook (small laptop) from Steve and I. She was so excited with the computer, she keeps saying she can't believe we bought her one (feels so good to get her the perfect gift).

We went out to dinner that night, she got to pick the restaurant, she is always careful to pick a different restaurant every year (photos are a bit blurry as they were taken on a phone without the flash).

We had a little cake for her when we got home.

The next day we had her birthday party. She is not so good with making decisions, and I had to kind of push her into make a decision. She finally settled on a "Mystery" theme. I only had two days to throw it all together, but I think I did well, I saw many smiles and the girls all said they had fun.

We spent the morning decorating and getting the house ready.

The snack table was set and ready for the girls:

The first game we played was "who am I", they all had a person, place, or animal taped to their backs and could only ask YES and NO questions to figure it out. Once they did they got a little prize.

Next we played 20 QUESTIONS, the questions ranged from "how many toes does Juliana have" to "name the 7 continents". The person with the most correct answers got a prize. All the girls guessed the correct number of toes FYI.

Next was the girls favorite part. I put a lot of time and brain power into developing this game (with a little help from Steve). You see Juliana's Great Aunt Stephanie had left her a necklace, there was a video message explaining this. In order for the girls to find the necklace they had to find clues that were hidden through out the house. Each clue led to another clue. Some were difficult some not so hard, at the end they each got a small prize.

They thought Great Aunt Stephanie was hysterical:

While I was getting the cupcakes ready they played the pass it on party game. A player says, "when I go to a party I like to bring X, and then the next player says, when I go to a party I like to bring X and Y, and so on" it was really funny hearing the things they came up with, one person said a mustache trimmer, another said a dog, another said tweezers for spare hairs... very entertaining.

They also did a sketch artist game where they had to sketch someone I gave details about, they figured out that it was Great Aunt Stephanie. The best two pictures won prizes.

Finally it was time for cupcakes, Juliana had requested I make Key Lime Cupcakes. They are super tasty, but also a lot of work. But they all loved them, so it was worth the time and effort.

The girls had a little time left so we sent them outside to run off the sugar. Steve got out the leaf blower and ended up blowing air onto the girls, they LOVED it. Seriously it really sometimes just is the simple things.