2 years: Happy Birthday Sophia!

Wow, I can't believe 2 years have passed already. It seems like it went so quickly and yet I feel like Sophia has always been in our lives. Our family is truly blessed. I am so thankful as well for having met such great mommy friends to spend this time watching our kids grow older together.
This month we have been getting ready for Sophia's birthday. She has been having her good and bad days, but she is mostly happy to be out and about playing with friends and going to her classes. She is acting more and more like a big girl - using the potty most days, counting, drinking from a cup without a top and communicating her needs much better, which means less tantrums :) She also has some new interests: Dora the Explorer (a.k.a. Dori), playing with her dollhouse, Barbie (yes, already), Rocky training scenes (Nick's influence) and you guessed it STAR WARS. She actually knows all the names of the characters including difficult ones to say, like Boba fett. Here are some highlights from this month leading up to her birthday...

Sophia enjoying the French story time at the bookstore. As you can see, I decided to cut her bangs myself. They got really short as I tried to straighten them for the 3rd time.

We took a demo gymnastics class, which was so exhausting because you have to run around after the kids. We had a lot of fun though. I think it will be better when she is 3 yrs. old.

Sophia learned lots of new tricks in the class and has been "practicing" at home.

Nick took Sophia on the carousel at the mall. When we first tried to take her, she would only sit in the chair and then finally she said yes to the horse that doesn't move, and now she loves the moving horse. Now every time we go to the mall, it involves a ride on the horsey.

We had a busy weekend with two birthday parties in one day. Sophia did great with only a quick nap in the car before Leyton's birthday.

And then it was off to see Noa, the first birthday girl from my original Mommy group.

Sophia had lots of fun with her friends and pretending she was a photographer.


Sophia and Layla being silly at open gym

I am such a wimp in the cold weather that this is only the 2nd time I took Sophia to play in the snow even though it has snowed all month long. She must be a wimp too because she did not want to even stand in it. We only lasted about 5 minutes before calling it a day. It may be that it was too close to nap time, but I think I will wait until the weather warms up to play outside again.

MOMS Club had a cute Valentine's Day party this month and Sophia danced, ate a lot of cake and then got into trouble with Layla. They ripped half the table cloth off. It was all in good fun though.

Happy Valentine's Day from Grandma! Sophia really enjoyed her Chewbacca card. She learned all the characters from Nick showing her his card collection. She is getting hooked... It is starting to happen..stay tuned.

Sophia went through a phase this month where she wants to clean. She will take a wipe and clean off all her toys. Unfortunately, I have heard this does not last long. Too bad, I thought I could get her to vacuum next.

My uncles were in town this month from Florida and China. It was fun to catch up and great that my grandmother felt well enough to come to the apartment from the medical center where she has been for the last few months.


I went to a baby shower one weekend, while Nick took Sophia to another party. Happy Birthday Maddie! We really have a celebration every weekend this month, which is fun. I do wonder if she will be surprised when April comes and there is no more pizza and cake on any given Saturday. When I returned Sophia had watched Star Wars with Nick. I thought we would wait another year but Sophia has definitely shown interest and is not scared of the fighting scenes. Is this really happening? Is she becoming a major fan of Star Wars?

Nick has also introduced Sophia to a few training scenes from the Rocky movies. She loves to watch them and even act them out.

Sophia is still very girly and really enjoys her new dress up clothes that she received for her birthday and even adds her own accessories to the mix with a tutu and snow hat.

Sophia also discovered Barbie this month. A neighbor had given her a book about Barbie being a maid of honor at a wedding and when we went into Toys R US with her Grandpa, she was very excited to see all the Barbies. We tried to get her to pick one of the "career" Barbies, but Sophia wanted this mermaid barbie with tatoos and pink hair.

Now she takes her Barbie everywhere and even gives her rides on toys.

Sophia has been practicing her counting skills. While she can get to like 14, she does still skip a few numbers. I find it very entertaining.

More Star Wars! She is definitely a fan. I just hope she doesn't want to start collecting action figures like her father.

Welcome baby Joey/ JJ/ JR! Ali had a surprise little boy on the 21st. Such a cutie!

Sophia's birthday was a lot of fun. It took her awhile to understand that it was her day, but then she loved all the attention...
At school, she dressed up like Snow White..

and got hugs from her prince, Tommy..

.. and then changed outfits before the class sang to her.

Sophia loved being a birthday princess for a day and eating her favorite foods - avocado, pizza and of course, cake. Happy 2nd birthday my sweet!

I can't believe I have been blogging for 2 years now. I am going to change the format again to a more sporadic blogging when there is something new and exciting to report, like her birthday party. Stay tuned!