On September 1st, Libby turned two, and then on September 8th, she went to her first day of pre-school. My little baby is now a little girl. Good thing too, since there is going to be another little baby soon 😉

Last year, we kept her birthday pretty low-key but this year, she ended up a little obsessed with birthdays – throwing pretend birthdays for her toy animals, singing the happy birthday song at random, making birthday cakes out of play-doh… so we figured we should go ahead & throw a little party for her second birthday.

We reserved the room at the back of the McCabe community center & put together a snack table, set up a coloring table with crayons, and I had bought a bunch of balls, scarves, balloons, and pinwheels to keep little hands busy. Luckily my parents and Brian’s father and his wife were there to help set all of this up because I should have reserved the room for an hour longer than I did so we were still putting it all together when people came. Unfortunately, there are precious few pictures from this little party because we were all so busy setting up and playing that we didn’t stop to grab very many pics. But while it was a pretty cute little party, it was hardly a Pinterest worthy set-up ha! Everyone seemed to have a fun time despite the lack of picturesque center pieces or distinct theme. When I asked Libby what she liked best at the party she said “The rainbows and the birthday cake!”

And it should also be noted that the birthday girl absolutely helped make her own birthday cupcakes.

The party was the Saturday before her actual birthday, so we essentially had a birthday week as I doled out the presents two each day until her actual birthday.

Then on her actual birthday, we had a family dinner & did cake one more time (that picture is at the beginning of the post).

The following week was Libby’s two-year doctor appointment and her first day of school. The doctor check up went fine, no worries. She weighed in at 32.5 lbs and measured at 37 inches. So still off the charts, surprise surprise.

For school, Tuesday September 6th was visitation day, where she & I got to meet her teachers and see the classroom. She was pretty excited about the play kitchen.

Then on Thursday September 8th, she went for her first day. Drop off was a little chaotic, I don’t think Libby really knew what to think. She was so distracted when I gave her a hug & kiss goodbye, there were no tears. And when I came to get her in the afternoon, she was immediately telling about the day: “I was sleeping in there, Mommy. I played with toys. The playground has two slides.” The teachers said during the day she was very quiet & observant. Yesterday was her second full day, and she was less enthusiastic. She clung to me with a death grip and cried like I was abandoning her. That was really hard to walk away from. When I came to pick her up she was very happy and just said “I missed you Mommy.” But then later when we talked about school some more I got a little more out of her about playing with play-doh. So we’ll see what happens tomorrow. Really hoping after a couple weeks she’ll love it and look forward to it.

I have yet to really take a lot of advantage of the extra time for much self-care or creative outletting because I’m so overwhelmed at the house with stuff to take care of. Our hall toilet has a broken seal again, which seems to be a yearly occurrence at this point, the dishes and laundry and toys are a constant battle to fight, and I have to purge some stuff to make room for baby girl #2. I have actually finished my two toddler-free days more tired than my other days so far. Tomorrow though, I have a kid-free lunch planned with a girlfriend, so that will be a thing I haven’t done in a really long time.

We’ve done a bunch of other fun stuff since I wrote here last, but I’m just going to let the picture gallery illustrate all that.

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