Last weekend our sweet girl turned four. FOUR! Weren’t we in London bringing her home to our tiny apartment in Holloway about four minutes ago?

I can see that it is probably easier to do all of your adventuring, meet someone, settle down, move to a good school district and THEN have kids but boy am I thankful that she has been on this adventure with us. Our little London/East coast/West coast girl who adores baseball cards, Chipotle and anything with wheels – we love you.

It was such a joy to take a day and make it all about this sweet one. I know she is mine and I am of course biased but she really is incredible. She is such an open-hearted, smart girl with an insatiable curiosity. She thinks so carefully and deeply about everything, asks 100 questions a day, has the memory of an elephant and energy in abundance. She thrives off the ridiculous and the hilarious. Seeing the way that she fiercely protects and loves her brothers is beautiful. This girl knows how to love and I am excited to see what God is going to call her to do with that huge heart of hers.

We had such a sweet morning opening her gifts and cards around the breakfast table with Granny (J’s Mum). Being four, I was totally expecting her to dive into the presents (which would have been totally fine – I think!?) but she sat and carefully opened each card first (without being told!) and asked Granny to be her ‘card reader’. I even offered her a gift to open and she said “no thank you, I am going to open my cards first!” – what a kid!

She went to her first few birthday parties when we moved to LA towards the end of last year and ever since, she has been talking about her birthday. We hadn’t done a party before now, so this was a first for all of us. We kept it super simple, just a few of our close friends, some games, a homemade pin the tail on the dinosaur (thanks J!), some takeout pizza and then a big bucket of soil and sunflower seeds for each of the kids to plant and take home with them.

I totally made the mistake of scrolling Pinterest with Belle a few days before and the end result was me panic-dipping chocolate strawberries and sticking on icing eyes an hour before the party. I really love this kid guys.

It was actually so fun to plan and arrange it with her. We made a list of her friends, wrote out little invites and planned her cake (which our lovely friend made for us!). Belle even choose the theme (and kept adding to it as the weeks passed), hence the rainbow/unicorn/dinosaur/volcano theme.

The timing all worked out, as both her Granny and J’s uncle and two cousins were here. It is always fun to add a few extra Brits into the mix. Who else would have made a round of tea at 5pm?

Also, this was just another example in our lives of our community pulling together and being amazing. Making cakes, playing with kids, helping clear up, baking, taking photos when I didn’t get chance to pick up the camera – our friends and family are the best.

Thank you to everyone who helped us celebrate our sweet Belle, until next year…