Ellie is 9!

I'm not sure how this happened, but my first baby is 9. Mercy.

That's almost a decade. Almost double digits. Half way to adulthood...ok, I gotta stop! Breathe...just breathe...

For Ellie's birthday this year we took a little trip to Kansas City! She really wanted to visit the American Girl store for her birthday, and we decided to make a fun family trip out of it! We even brought two Grandma's with us to share in the fun!

We did a lot of fun stuff in 2 days! We visited Kalaidescope at Crown Center, where the girls had a blast making crafts! Austin wasn't as thrilled with this place, although he did like one little nook where there were pillows, and he decided to lay down. Silly boy! He also liked this cool room where you could push a button and your picture appeared on the wall. Very cool! I thought it was a great place, especially for free!



We also ate a Fritz's! You place your order via a red phone at your booth, and then wait for the train to deliver your food! Everyone loved this place! We had to order a couple of times so all the kids could get the food off the platform. So fun!



We also did the Crayola Store and ice skating (future post!) at Crown Center, along with some fun shopping! The next day we visited Oak Park Mall, which is where the cool double decker carousel was!



Our last stop in KC was the T-Rex cafe. This place was super cool! Great food, fun times, and life sized animatronic dinosaurs!



We had a great trip to Kansas City and I'm so glad that we decided to go!

The next day was Valentine's Day/Ellie's birthday! First she got to celebrate with her class at school...

Then we stopped by Nana and Papa's house for awhile after school, and later celebrated that evening at Grandma Ellie's house with family. We had heart shaped pizza and a chocolate fountain! It was a great night!



AND...(we like to celebrate big in this family!) we had one more fun thing to do to finish celebrating our Ellie girl! A few days after her birthday we celebrated with manicures for Ellie and Annie, and cousins Olivia and Elaina! They were so cute sitting so still and being so grown up. Adorable!






So our Ellie is 9! 8 was a good year for her, and I'm excited to see what great things this year holds for our sweet girl! We love you Ellie!