Eliana is 5!!

Eliana turned 5 today and I have to admit - I was a bit sad and I almost cried when we brought the cupcakes to her school this afternoon. Just to see her with her crown and the look on her face when she saw Fadi and I in the doorway was just priceless! Her friends liked the cupcakes and Eliana had 2 of them!! After the cupcakes, we stayed for a few minutes and danced with the kids in her class and we left.
After her party - we went home and she got ready for her 5 year old pictures. Can you tell that she loves to be in front of the camera.

This is her "I'm 5 years old now" pose :)

My two favorite people in this world!

I love how daring she has become - She is not afraid of much anymore!!

Eliana chose to go to Buffalo Wild Wings for her birthday dinner! It was nice to get together with Fadi's family on the night of her birthday, even though we are having her party on Sunday!

It makes me miss my family even more :(

Ahlam brought this cake - Eliana was excited that we were able to sing to her!

This is the chunky monkey eating her special birthday dessert and birthday cake!

My sweet little family!!

I had to give my girl some birthday love!!

My last 4 Year Old HUG :(

So Eliana just went to bed a little bit ago....She gave her last 4 year old Hug and Kiss :( I told her that I was so sad today that she is growing up so fast and she said to me...
E : well ang, if you cry - you are not allowed to come to my party
A: oh really?!?!
E: yes but I know that you won't cry because you really want to come to my party :)

preperations....

If you haven't noticed...I LOVE planning parties and of course our wedding. But parties do not take nearly as much planning and they can happen alot quicker than a wedding can. Eliana's 5th burthday party is on Sunday - and we are very excited!! I probably do more than I should but I remember having great birthday parties growing up and I will do nothing less for my kids! Eliana has been very involved in the planning, she picked her cake, the bouce house, and balloons so she has some sort of ownership over her party! Eliana is very excited to turn 5. Fadi and I on the other hand are not :( She is losing her baby face and is too smart for her own good!! Stay tuned for 5 year old and party pictures!!!!!!!!!!

My Patriotic Girl

Eliana has been signing these songs for the past couple of weeks and I wanted to share:)

Happy St Patricks Day

We had a great St. Patrick's Day today! The Leprechaun visited Eliana's class today and caused quite a stir! He apparently danced all over the desks and left his footprints everywhere, took all the books off of the bookshelf, took the puppets out of the puppet box, and hid pieces of gold all around the playground! She was sooo excited to tell me all about it after school and she could not wait to see the mess he had left at home!!! After a little improvising, we came home to find out the he had all of the chair upside down in the kitchen and dining room, all of the drawers and cabinets opened in the kitchen, ALL of the dvd's were all over the floor, and the Leprechaun had toilet papered Eliana's entire room!! She could not believe it. She was very determined to find the gold he was supposed to leave for her. Just one thing, we could not find the note that had the riddle! Lucky left the note on her marker board...it said, "Thank you for letting me make a huge mess and cause some mischief. You can find the GOLD where you lay your head". She immediately said - its under my pillow!!!! Upstairs we ran but could not find it!! It was not until baba came home that he was able to help her find it tucked into her pillow pal!! Eliana said, "this gold is going right into my piggy bank"!!

New Patio

Lord help me if we ever need to do a BIG project for the house because I will probably lose my mind!! While my parents were down visiting, Fadi and my dad poured a new patio in the back of the house. Fadi was able to frame the area before they arrived which made it alot easier. I ordered the cement to be here at 7:30am on the day we had a bizzilion things to do for the wedding, but it was the only day that Fadi had off while they were here and I didn't want my dad to pour it by himself. Needless to say that the cement truck didn't arrive until 8:40 so we got a late start. The cement turned out great and we were able to make the rest of our appointments. Check out how my men work :)

The First Pour He brought most of the equipment from pittsburgh, but forgot his boots - That didn't stop him! I wanted just a small circle pan of cement for Eliana to put a single handprint in.

This is what I get:) Both FeetBoth Hands Name and Year

1st Day of Gymnastics

Eliana had her first gymnastics class at the YMCA. She was up at 7:20 and could NOT wait to put on her leotard! She did great - a few tears at the beginning but I think it helped that I was outside of the room. She went to the instructor and not me. She stopped crying and did SUPER! They did alot of stretching and warming up and then moved onto the vault. The kids were hilarious - and Eliana seems to be the only one to have to coordination to land on her feet after jumping. But I was very proud of how well she did in such a big enviroment with so much going on. I can't wait to see how well she does as the classes go on. She gets so excited when it is her turn on the event. All I heard about on the way home is how she can't wait to be on the balance beam and the bars.