Saturday was the big day. She turned 3 years old! I can't believe it's been 3 years since I had a baby. She is so big. Lyla has been excited about her birthday for a while now. We had my family and Eric's family over for a birthday party for her. We grilled hamburgers and had cake and ice cream. Lyla is obsessed with Scooby Doo right now, so her party of all Scooby Doo. We had a table cloth, plates and kid cups that were Scooby Doo. The cake was even Scooby Doo. You'll see that further down. The three little girls ate their lunch squeezed at the top of our slide. Here is Lyla's tattoo. It is 3, of course for her birthday. The other cheek had something blue on it because blue is her favorite color.Here is Grace's rainbow tattoo. She loves rainbows. Her birthday had a rainbow cake in January.Here is the wonderful Scooby Doo cake. My friend, Brooke O'Dell, makes cakes for people and designed this herself. She did a great job. It was ashame I messed it up. I tried to photograph Scooby's good side but you can still see the mess up on his right cheek. I sat the cake on a cabinet in my dining room Friday night so it wouldn't get messed up by someone if it was sitting on the table. Well, the next morning I came downstairs and the morning sun was shining directly on poor Scooby. Half his cheek had melted off. It was just a puddle in the box. We tried to make him look a little better by putting some chocolate icing on his boo-boo but it still looked pretty sad. Lyla never even noticed. Sorry Brooke!Lyla was so proud of her Scooby cake.Now, on to the presents....She was given a few Scooby Doo dvds, which she loved. We have played all three of them already. I love them b/c they have an entire season's worth of episodes on each disc so they just keep on playing!
My sister, Julie, gave Lyla Moon Sand. She was nice enough to call me and ask for my permission before buying this for Lyla. I told her OK even though I've told Grace and Lyla no to moon sand several times in the store. I thought I'd give it a try. This was one of the gifts we gave Lyla. I searched everywhere for ScoobyDoo figures. They are sold out at every ToysRUs store in town! They have a Mystery Machine van to go with it but it is sold out too. Ebay has several of these but they are selling for more than twice what they sell for in the store. Crazy!!! So, I kept calling the store until I finally caught the Bellevue store when they had the figures. We never did get the van. Oh well.

Lyla is turning into quite a ball fanatic. She got a baseball bat and ball from my parents and a soccer goal for the backyard. I think you can tell from the picture she was pleased with this gift.

A tee-ball set!
My grandmother sent Lyla a pretty little Dora gown. I was afraid she wouldn't wear it because she won't wear any pj's right now. It's panties only for her! But, she did where the gown last night. She was so cute.
Another big ball from my parents. It has Scooby on it. She loves this one too.
This was the other gift we gave her. A stuffed Scooby. I got this from Ebay. She loves it.
So, after everyone left and it was later in the evening she was playing with her new toys. We got the moon sand out to see what it was like. Well, it's sand, with coloring. It is a little stickier than regular sand so you can mold it quite easily. My problem with it is the clean up, which is why I have always hesitated to get it in the past. It's not like play-doh. It's so fine that once it falls to the floor or the chair you might as well forget about it. If it's not in the pile by the time playtime is over, it's getting sweeped into the trash. The other problem is that it doesn't come with any storage containers. You have to buy those separately! I ended up putting the sand in sandwich baggies. Plus, it's impossible to not mix the 3 colors together. It's impossible to keep it in a small pile on the table too. So, I would not recommend Moon Sand simply for the mom's sake. The girls loved playing with it, but, I think it's going to go into the sandbox outside. Julie, I'm sorry to say this, but it's just too messy for inside. It should come with a little miniture sandbox to play with on the table and a container to store it in. Oh well, you live and you learn.

Goldfish! Eric's parents brought the girls about 7 goldfish on Friday night. Well, by Saturday evening two were left. By Sunday morning, one was left! "Goldie" is still hanging on and looking pretty strong but she's all alone now. The girls love it though.

This was Lyla by late on Saturday. She was wiped out. Did she fall asleep early? Of course not! That would be too nice on Eric and me! We put in one of her new Scooby movies and hoped she would fall asleep watching it. No such luck! That little stinker could keep herself awake all night long if she wanted too. I finally turned the movie off at 8pm and made them go to bed.It was a good birthday for little Lyla Belle!

Happy 3rd Birthday!