We See Three

Overall, LB's birthday was a resounding success. I think she will definitely remember this one, if not in 20 years, then certainly for at least 2 months.

As previously mentioned, we spent most of Friday (the day before her birthday) frantically shopping and baking a cake. Then we drove to my MIL's house to stay there, since we were planning to spend LB's birthday at the Monterey Aquarium, and my MIL's house is halfway there from San Francisco. I brought my schoolwork to study over the weekend, but that was a waste of energy and luggage space. I barely had time to pee all weekend. After we put LB to sleep at my MIL's, DB and I headed off to Walmart, the only place I could think of that was still open, and shopped until 11pm. By the way, have you all see the People of Walmart blog? It is crude and insulting, and I was terrified all night that someone was going to take a picture of me and send it in. Not that I was wearing shorts that said "Cocks" or anything:

But I was wearing pink flannel pajamas shorts, an orange tank top, and hairy legs.

After buying out Walmart's kids clothes section, we wrapped presents until 12:30 am. We went to bed exhausted, then remembered that we do not sleep well in my MIL's guest bed. Why do we always forget this? It's a full size bed, and we just don't fit. DB finally left to sleep on the floor in the living room, but even then we only got 2, maybe 3, hours of sleep.

The next morning, LB was happy and excited about the aquarium and her birthday. She was really sweet. She bugged out when she saw all her presents, and we told her we only had time to open one gift before the aquarium. In retrospect, this was such a cruel maneuver on our part. Show her a mountain of presents and let her open only one? But she took it in stride. We specifically had her open the Magna Doodle, so she could play with it on the long ride to Monterey. Here she is drawing what she claims is a "camera":


After she opened the one present, I pulled out an outfit for her to wear. This one:


But thankfully I caught myself, because that photo is actually taken from the last time she went to the aquarium, with her godparents. Talk about a fashion faux pas, wearing the same outfit to 2 aquariums. So we changed her right before we left. And bonus, while we were at the aquarium, what did we see there but:

So it looks like it's somebody else's go-to aquarium outfit as well.

The aquarium was amazing, and everything LB hoped for. She said her favorite part was the Touch Pools where she got to touch the starfish and seaweed. You can also touch a bat ray there, but her arms were too short. Here we are arguing about what the best way might be to get a 3 year old to touch a bat ray:

I believe this is the part where DB suggested I get her to reach deeper, and I said, "She's reaching as far as she can! What the hell do you want me to do? Dip her in head first?!"

She also loved the sharks, the fish, the seahorses, the everything. There was nothing she was not impressed by. So the aquarium was great, but geez, I was totally exhausted. Just the long drive, and the late night, and lack of sleep. I was dead on my feet halfway through the aquarium. I'm sad to say there was definitely at least one section we skipped because we were all tired. But LB didn't seem to mind.

Then we drove back to my MIL's, where we opened the rest of the presents. Of all her wrapped presents, do you know which one she was most intrigued by?

You see that brown one in the bottom left corner? Yeah, that one. It came in the mail from my dad, and that is the one she was most excited about. Weirdo.

She was also doing this weird thing, through all the present opening, where before she opened a gift, she would say, "I can't remember what it is!" We think she was trying to express, "I can't wait to find out what it is!" We tried to explain to her that she's not supposed to remember because she doesn't know what it is, but that didn't stop her from saying it before every single present.

She loved everything. Well, almost everything. DB and I chose some toy food and toy pots and pans for her (NOT just because she's a girl! I have really resisted buying her kitchen toys, but all she does at home is take our tupperware and fill them with random shit to serve as meals for us), but she was pretty confused when she unwrapped them. Especially the pots and pans. She stared at them very seriously, like she was thinking, "Uh oh, now that I'm 3 they expect me to start cooking."

She was also SO PARTICULAR about which gifts to open. Like there was a specific order she needed to follow in her head. Every gift choice took such careful calculation. Sometimes she would sit and contemplate her options:


Sometimes she would move them around:

I couldn't figure out her thought process, but it was pretty intense.

And of course, there was cake:


It's supposed to be Normal Duck. You got that, right? I think it is a vast improvement over last year's Squid Cake, but only because it has sprinkles on it:


If you recall, there was an argument between me and DB at last year's birthday over the correct spelling of "Squidy," an unfortunate nickname that DB has for our daughter. Let me be clear: I do not call her this. Anyway, I said it has one D, and he says it has two Ds. Well, the Monterey Aquarium, which I consider the expert on all things squid, settled it for us:

Yeah, yeah, you told me so.

And cake was consumed by all:


After all the festivities, we put our tired, overstimulated girl to bed. Meanwhile, DB and I switched beds with my MIL, and we all finally got some rest.

The next day, I realized I hadn't taken my annual Daddy Growth Chart photo, so we took it the day after her birthday. Here they were last year:


And this year:


OH MY GOD, WHERE DID MY BABY GO?!