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On Sunday, Bill and I hosted a birthday party for Gwendolyn in our back garden. At first, when we started talking about a party, we thought we were crazy to try to do this — the time to plan, the risk of germs, would it be too much for her…but, in the scheme of Gwendolyn's life, we knew we would regret not creating a special day to celebrate our sweet baby and this milestone we are so fortunate to reach. So, to planning we went. We had so much fun immersing ourselves in something so positive — a celebration of Gwendolyn. We decorated with butterflies hanging in the trees, had pink, lime green, and orange balloons all over and big butterfly balloons, too. “Aunt Kristen” (Bill's sister) made the most gorgeous medley of butterfly cakes — each one decorated uniquely. Thanks to the help of our fabulous family it all looked magical and was a wonderful day!
We loved giving Gwendolyn the opportunity for new experiences. We had a fantastic music teacher named Sabra from Kindermusik with Kathy come to sing. Gwendolyn loves music and we have always wanted to take her to Kathy's classes, but the risk of germs is too great in the indoor setting. However, being outdoors and with Sabra's special personalization of things for Gwendolyn, it was perfect. Gwendolyn was absolutely mesmerized by Sabra. She watched her closely, studied each instrument she played, and was keen to participate in everything. She had a hard time relinquishing the maracas and bells. And, as usual, she loved watching the other children. It was heart-melting to see her so very happy.
Gwendolyn had an absolutely fantastic day. She loved all of the attention and quickly showed us that any thoughts of her being overwhelmed were foolhardy because she relished all the 'oohs' and 'ahhs' over her. We thought she would just crash afterwards, but she was just too excited and smiled brightly as she told us all about her fun day through nap time. She finally zonked out just before 6pm after a big, big wonderful day and didn't wake up until after 9am the next morning — the life of a true party girl!!!
Video coming soon…