The Banana: Five At Last

She has been waiting forever for preschool to start and for her birthday arrive, and both happened this week, which means I have a very happy little girl at my house.  She has literally been counting down the days to her birthday for weeks now, and so when it rolled around yesterday, it was met with immediate excitement.  I was up many hours before dawn getting the dining room decorated with our tried and true birthday decorations and baking banana chocolate chip muffins. her choice for breakfast in the bathtub.  When I woke her up, she jumped right out of bed.  With a little poking and prodding we got Mr. SP (always game for a muffin) out of his comfy bed.  It was a bit more difficult to arouse the biggest, extra tired sister, but she made it too.  Mr. Trouble on Feet was still sleeping and we decided not to wake him up, which worked out great since he munched on muffins later in the dining room while The Banana opened her presents.

The Banana really, really appreciates a present.  She gets so excited about each and every one, and she loves knowing who it came from, and she loves toting all of her presents around with her for days after the celebration.  She was thrilled with the books, the special doll (named Sophie)  that happens to look a lot like her, the jewelry, the music box, two sets of wonderful pink shoes (so exciting!) pink play doh made by the big brother, a fancy letter “H” decorated by the big sister, a tasty lollipop purchased by Dad, and a wonderful polka dottie broom that makes sweeping the floor oh so much more fun.  She can’t wait for the big kidlets to come back from school to play walkie talkie with them.

We read all the new birthday books, and then  it was off to preschool, where she wore her special paper crown and brought stickers to share with her friends.  At school it was also Esther’s birthday, one of our friends from Mops and music classes.  Ironically, The Banana and Esther were born on the exact same day in the exact same hospital in Wisconsin.  We didn’t get to know her until we both moved to Duluth a few months later, though.  Crazy!  Esther was also quite excited about her birthday.

While The Banana was at school, Mr. Trouble on Feet and I went to the grocery store to get a few items we needed to bake the birthday cake, and we picked out some helium balloons before coming home to bake and frost.

Unfortunately, The Banana’s birthday fell on my teaching day, which is always difficult, because things are rushed and crazy and I don’t get to spend the afternoon being a Mom (instead I’m off having a wonderful time being a teacher).  Our new babysitter, Amy, kindly stayed to have a piece of cake after lessons though.  There aren’t actually a lot of pictures of the day because it was super duper busy and chaotic, but The Banana had a terrific day just the same.  Today she woke up and said brightly, “Today is my FIRST day of being five that isn’t actually my birthday!”