Traditions

Well, here's the last bit on Sophia's birthday. As you may have already noticed with the last post, we haven't worried too much about sticking with the traditional birthday stuff. However, we kept with some traditions and gave her some presents. She got a puzzle and a book (from her Oma and Opa technically, who gave us some cash for Sophia). We wrapped the book the book for her to have something to unwrap. However, she didn't really dig the whole unwrapping thing. She thought it was funny when I did it, but didn't care to do it herself. But, both the puzzle and book were well received. We also lit a candle for her to blow out. I simply held it in my hand (since we didn't do the cake). After some wax burning my hand, we ended that part of her birthday, and ended the day we always do - singing her lots of songs and then putting her down for the night. The other things we did with her to make her day special was going outside, swinging in the swing, playing with her friends, going to the pet store to look at all the pets, a ride on the magic carpet (Henry spreads out a blanket onto which Sophia crawls and then he pulls her through the house - she LOVES it), singing and dancing, and best of all, we ate out at our favorite Indian restaurant. One may think that this wasn't really for Sophia, but quite honestly, she doesn't eat as much at home as she eats at that place. She really loves Indian food! So, we had a great day.

But speaking of traditions, Henry and I are starting a family tradition that is partially derived from what my parents did. My mom tried to keep journals for us kids when we were little. And my dad would read our 'birth story' to us at every birth day. While I thought those ideas were nice, the journals eventually stopped, and the birth story was the same every year. So, we've decided to start a book for each of our kids, and each year on their birthday we will write into it. In there, each year, we'll try and capture our love and feelings about them, their progress , changes, developments and anything else that may have been going on. We figured if we have a book for each child, and make an effort at least once a year to write about them, we should get a decent record together. Also, we thought these may be wonderful things to give to our kids when they leave home. When they are far away from us, they can read it and remember who they are, learn about their past, remember our love for them, and all the sweet memories we have of them etc. I'm really excited about this idea, and excited that we got to write our first entry for Sophia. We love you Sophia!

P.S. The pictures are of us eating at the Indian place, and then Sophia with her presents. Henry took tons of pictures of that. However, all of them sported only Sophia and my chest. I guess, Henry figured my head wasn't photogenic enough. So, I posted only one of the cleavage shots, and the only picture that has parts of my face in it.