Three Years Old!

Though Shelby's 3rd birthday on June 5th went unmentioned here, don't think we didn't celebrate. We doted on Shelby for the whole week. In fact, Shelby is still singing happy birthday to herself and reminding anyone else that will listen that she is "three years old"! This was an especially exciting birthday for me, because Shelby was able to actually participate in eating her birthday cake. It is incredible to see how far she has progressed in eating this past year (as you can see in the video above)!

Shelby's actual birthday dinner was spent at her favorite Mexican restaurant where she ate rice, half an avocado, and refried beans. We had a small birthday party down at the pavilion in my parents' neighborhood the following Saturday and invited all of Shelby's teachers and therapists and some of her friends. We had to keep it pretty small so that Shelby wouldn't get too overwhelmed, and it turned out perfect. On the menu were her favorite foods: mac and cheese, hot dogs, and cupcakes. There were pools for the kids to splash around in and I think all the guests (young and old) had a good time helping us celebrate Shelby. More importantly, Shelby was in birthday heaven.

Shelby did not really want or need anything this year, so gifts were difficult to figure out. Her favorite birthday gift turned out to be the book Pete the Cat that her class had been reading at school. She loves singing the Pete the Cat song, "I love my white shoes" almost as much as she enjoys the happy birthday song. Check it out here if you're interested: http://harpercollinschildrens.com/feature/petethecat/audio/pete-the-cat.mp3. Shelby's teacher, Ms. Tara told me that Pete the Cat reminds her a lot of Shelby and it is true. Our girl has faced more than her fair share of challenges this past year (a shunt revision, multiple doctor and therapy appointments, sedated brain scans, getting glasses, a month of intense constraint induced therapy, and regular spells of vomiting that we now know are migraines) and through it all, she just keeps going and doing her thing (while constantly singing). I need to take a page from that book!

Happy birthday to our big three-year-old girl!