A girls 1st American 9th Birthday party...

For Ava's *family* party we let her choose where she wanted to go for dinner - anywhere she wanted to go. We figured we'd be driving to Seattle to enjoy her favorite Ethiopian restaurant, but no, she wanted to go to Applebee's. What does an almost-9-year-old girl want from Applebee's?

A baked potato!

Nothing fancy. Nothing extravagant. Just a plain, regular, boring potato (with sour cream, cheese, and bacon. But don't call the cheese, cheese... just refer to it as "the shredded yellow stuff" - because Ava does. not. like. cheese!)

She was very worried that nobody would come. She was worried she'd have to eat a hot-dog (thank you Grandpa Dennis!). I was worried that it wouldn't live up to her expectations.

The cake. Or as I like to call it - a big, huge, piece of heaven!

Red Velvet Cake with the most divine cream cheese filling and an even MORE heavenly buttercream frosting.

Our sweet friend Bernadette, owner and fabulous cake-artist of BeeMarie's Cakes was able to craft this perfect-for-Ava cake which caused MUCH squealing out of both girls (and their sugar-deprived mama!)

It's covered in flowers and butterflies and ladybugs and truly an amazing work of art. If I didn't know how sublime her cakes tasted it would have been tough to cut into such a beautiful creation but since it is THE BEST CAKE EVER... I had no problem at all :) Many of you know that I've been 100% sugar-free since January 1st, 2010 - except for the 14 peanut-butter m&m's I had at the movies with Merideth. NO SUGAR...

However - I planned the inevitable sugar-coma that would surround my eating this entire cake - and trust me, it would be worth every tiny bit of discomfort (sugar=serious headache!)...

Ava had never had a birthday cake or candles so I let her choose candles (candles with colored flames to match the candle color) and then put the entire box on her cake (only a box of 12 - so not too bad). Here she is lining the outside edge of the cake with all of her candles.

Ava is a budding photog and LOVES to have my camera. She cried when I wouldn't drive back home to pick up her own camera - but was once again happy when I told her she could snap a few shots with mine. A little out of focus - but I love that this is the view that she had for her party. Her whole (immediate) family all sitting, all waiting, all watching - this little girl that we're all totally in love with. I love that it captures her perspective (and her sister, sneaking a lick of frosting when she thought nobody was looking!)

A girl and her cake :)

My favorite part of the whole evening. Jason and I bought her a bike. She's been asking and wanting and waiting for a bike. She can't ride one but she loves Grace's bike and promised that if she had one she'd try really hard to learn. The bike shop in town had to order the one that Jason wanted for her and we couldn't get it before her birthday. We figured we'd wrap up the helmet (she knows about helmets and having to wear one when riding bikes or scooters - so she knows what it is) and when she'd open that she would make the connection between the helmet and her "real" gift. So we're all watching her as she opens it up. She laughs and says, over and over, thank you mom, thank you dad. Pretty helmet. Thank you so much...

She was gushing... which was funny - because she never said anything about a bike.

She put the helmet on, she kept thanking us.

Jason said, "Ava, we got you a bike but it won't be here until Thursday"

Her jaw was on the table.

"You got me a bike?"

Jason told her yes - she looked to me and asked again, "Promise daddy got me a bike."

I assured her that we did.

I asked her why she was so excited about the helmet if she didn't know that we were giving her a bike....

She was just so utterly and completely happy with everything that was happening that she really, truly was happy just to have a helmet...

I loved that.