Happy Birthday....AGAIN!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We did, though I forgot to take a single picture! Do you believe that? I can't! I don't go anywhere without my camera. Everyone I know teases me about taking so many pictures and then I manage to completely forget to take a picture of Claire's first Thanksgiving!!! Oh well.

There is one thing I am not lacking though, and that is pictures of Claire's birthday parties. We had another one! This was Claire's third, 3rd birthday!!! Now, I think we have made up for the two birthdays that we missed with her and we are done! And, not a moment too soon, as Christmas is coming around the corner way too fast!

Here she is, blowing out more candles! She's a pro now. This cake was decorated with letters so she could "pell", because that is her new favorite thing to do! She is still working on learning her lower case letters but she did pretty well.

Cousins, Brooke and Megan, helped with the presents this time. Of course, by now, she knows exactly what to do!

Here she is with her first Trike...which she LOVES! I don't think it will be too long before she is going to be riding it by herself, but for now it works great with the handle on the back for us to push! And, she got everyone to push her!

Claire with cousins, Brooke and Brianna. Thank you for coming to my party....because I know most teenagers could think of 10 things they would rather do than go to a birthday party for a 3 year old!

Claire and Casey playing around. They are exact opposites. Claire is shy and reserved...Casey is wide open! But they both love chocolate....best friends in the making!

Casey is more interested in the dogs! Knowing her mother the way I do....this is no surprise to me! My dogs LOVE Miss Michelle and I'm sure they will feel the same about Casey if she keeps this up!

Recognize this pretty face....well, you do if you follow the blog, Significant Source. Claire is posing with her new friend, Darling Daughter from over there! Darling Daughter has been a big fan of Claire's from way back before we left for China and we were so happy to finally meet her! We can never thank her enough for all the prayers!

The twins.....with the twins! Parker and Noah had a great time today with SS's twin boys, Quatro and Pip Squeak, and hope to see them again when we visit up this way!

And, here I am with Significant Source herself! We went to school together....ummmm, 20 years ago (yikes), but only knew each other causally. Of course, we aren't really that old...we both graduated from high school when we were like 8! LOL!

Claire had another great birthday thanks to our family and dear friends, but the icing on the cake.....

Was watching Claire take her first independent steps! Just like a baby's first steps, they were wobbly, but she is definitely not letting that stop her. She practiced over and over again...with an audience, of course! She was so excited that she was finally doing it! Paul got a few of her attempts on video, though he missed the first and best because she just started going and he wasn't in the room at the time! She physically tires quickly, but she wants to keep trying even when she isn't able to any more. In the end she was just standing there and falling face forward because her legs were to tired for her pick up her feet anymore! But, she just laughed and said, "do again"! It was really hard to believe that we were seeing her do something we only dreamed about months ago! Seeing her just balance there for a few minutes and take off like any other baby taking first steps, just confirms for me that SHE WILL WALK and that day is going to come sooner rather than later! Amazing!