Five!

Celebrating you is so dang easy to do, so we did it about 100 times for your fifth birthday, and you ate it up!

You've been waiting to celebrate your birthday at school since the beginning of the year. Your new best bud Samuel's birthday is in September, so waiting for your May celebration has been almost a whole school year in the making. Maaike made you feel so special, and I felt unbelievably lucky to be helping parent and get to share in your whole day of birthday joy. You decorated your crown, got to be the first at choosing all the things, and then at story time you finally got to sit in the special birthday chair as all your friends sang the dutch version of "Happy Birthday!" and Maaike and I hoisted you up in the bear chair for three hip-hip-hoorays! You were positively glowing. After school we invited all of your school friends to Ramsey for snacks, cupcakes, and play. We capped the day with a trip to Hat Creek because they've got chicken nuggets, a playground, and milkshakes. What more could you want?

You were dreaming so big for your birthday party this year, and since you're the kindest, smartest, funniest, most wonderful kid we know, your dad and I got sucked into your birthday imagination vortex. Ninja party? Sure. Sno-Cone food trailer? Why not? Waterslide that's taller than our house? All seems reasonable. I may have said way too many yeses before I added up all that you were dreaming of for your big day. Being your mom is real tricky. You don't ask for much, so when you do, it's really really really hard to say no. Your dad and I are pretty certain you know this and are just the most wonderfully manipulative little human on the planet, but you're just so dang kind about all of it; it's hard to know for sure. You ended up with no sno-cones, but our neighbors had a gigantic waterslide in their garage, so your ninja waterslide dreams came true. Pretty much it was a waterslide party with a little obstacle course and a blow-up, punching bag ninja. You declared it your "best party ev-er!" You'd been asking us for a wetsuit, so you threw that on as soon as possible on Saturday, and we waited and prepped for all your family, neighbors, and life-long friends to come over and then partied so hard celebrating you.

Five feels so good. You're smart, funny, adventurous, and kind. We'd replicate you, if we could. You're just perfectly ours.