She's two!

It's official -- we have a full-blown toddler on our hands. It's hard to believe that it was two years ago that we were just getting to know our little girl. Here she is celebrating her first birthday last year: We celebrated Emilia's second birthday all weekend long and even today. She had really been looking forward to her "music band" birthday. We just lucked out that Rocknoceros was planning to play a free show at the Reston Town Center on Saturday morning. So, we planned a small birthday celebration for family and friends around that. Emilia loves this band and she took no time getting down to the music. She was lucky to have her good buddies with her.After the band performed, we had a picnic lunch. Emilia loved her chicken and strawberries, but wanted nothing to do with the cupcakes or ice cream. Sure, they were a little melted, but she wouldn't even try them! The band even joined us for lunch! Here are Eric and Emilia with Coach Cotton from the band:It turned out to be a great morning and I think Emilia had a blast. Even Uncle Kyle got into entertaining the kids:
Check out some more photos from the party on the Simpsons' blog and the Vaughans' blog.

Sunday was Emilia's actual birthday. After church we went to Mon Ami Gabi for lunch with Grandma, Grandpa and Uncle Corey (Uncle Kyle left earlier in the morning). Emilia loved dancing to the jazz trio, but again, wanted no part of the special dessert they brought her. She turned her pout around long enough to show us how old she was. We went home and opened some presents. Emilia is so blessed to have such generous family and friends. Here she is stylin' in her new Vans from Corey and Gillian...and her new sunglasses from Kyle...

After another long nap, we took her over to Chuck E Cheese for a few rides.

I actually think her favorite part was collecting all of the tickets!

Her birthday celebration finally came to an end today with an ice cream cake for her friends at daycare. At least her friends enjoyed it... she again passed on the treat! Here she is with Miss Suman, who helped her blow out her candle.We had a great family weekend, although it's still surreal to think how fast the last two years flew by. Happy birthday, Mia! We love you!

33 years young

Eric turned 33 today! We celebrated with dinner and dessert at home. Emilia missed the opportunity to practice for her own upcoming birthday by refusing to help daddy blow out the candle on his frozen key lime pie.

Unfortunately, we have been talking up Emilia's birthday so much that she apparently was less than pleased that someone else was getting some attention. She would not participate in dessert or even sing one of her favorite songs, Happy Birthday. Hmmm... I can only imagine what she'll be like with the new baby. And yes, she's even shedding real tears.

King of the creek

Eric and Mike celebrated their birthdays over the weekend with a fishing outing to Goose Creek.

They hiked back deep into the woods...

Apparently, Eric was "on fire" (Mike's words), and their little fishing trip turned into a several hour ordeal.

Another summer Saturday

We had another jam-packed Saturday morning this weekend. Emilia couldn't wait for swimming lessons. She's been really into trying to dress herself lately, so here is her attempt at putting on her bathing suit:
Once in the pool, she focused on practicing her kicks:

Then, we stopped off at Reston Town Center to see the Unicycle Lady:

Finally, both Emilia and I got much-needed trims:

She crashed as soon as we got in the car, but she managed enough energy to use a tree near the salon as her personal trapeze!

Family weekend in Lancaster

Over the weekend, we spent part two of my dad's birthday celebration. We all met up in Lancaster County, Pa., for a fun time in the Dutch Country.

The reason for meeting up where we did was because my dad's Massey Harris Pacer was on display at the Fawn Grove Old Thyme Days tractor show. We went to the show on Friday afternoon and again on Saturday morning. Emilia got to ride on "Gampa's" tractor...Go on a pony ride...

And more! They had lots of food, arts and crafts, a flea market, music, face painting... it was a great country fair.

Since there was a large group of us and we wanted to be somewhere in between the tractor show and the tourist activities, we rented an 1800s farm house on a working farm, complete with sunflower patches and animals.

There were lots of pretty country roads for Emilia to enjoy a bike ride with Uncle "Coorie" and Gillian...

Lancaster has plenty of things for kids to do -- a lot of which I remember from when I was a kid. We spent the late afternoons on both Friday and Saturday at Dutch Wonderland, which is a perfect amusement park for Emilia's age. She was fearless and went on tons of rides...

She finally warmed up to meeting Duke the Dinosaur... But the real highlight came when she got to meet the Dutch Wonderland princess...On Saturday night, we ate family style at the Good n' Plenty Restaurant, another memory from my childhood. There was soooo much food...

Emilia was in heaven!

It was a great weekend and a lot of fun to all be together. Here we are after we stuffed our faces: Kyle, his girlfriend, Amanda, dad, mom, me, Eric, Emilia, Corey and his girlfriend, Gillian.

You know you've had a full and successful weekend when Emilia doesn't budge from this position the entire car ride home!