When I asked Lucy what kind of birthday cake she wanted, she said, “Princess cake!”

Ask and ye shall receive, baby.

I got some comments on FB that seem to imply people think I made this cake. I did not. I have spectacularly awful baking skills. This is one of those grocery store “fill out the form with the code number for which character-branded cake you want, and what you want it to say.” Boom, done. Princess cake acquired.

I tend to think that 3 is not an age for a big birthday party, since kids that age are too young to remember it. So we kept it small and low-key: Catie and Lucy, plus my cousin’s kids, plus Chris’s kids, added up to 6 kids, and with family visiting (my sister flew in from Texas, and my brother and his girlfriend came over from Charlotte), we had 9 adults.

Since 15 people in my house seemed like an awful lot, we used my neighborhood’s clubhouse, which was perfect, because it’s a nice big space with a lot of seating, and a playground right next to it for the kids to run around.

I got veggies, chips/dip, fruit, stuff to make sandwiches, and a couple of pizzas, and all of the grown-ups ate and talked while the kids were in and out. It was really nice.

I wasn’t really paying attention to the time, and it had been over 2 hours before I realized we should do cake and presents. By that time, Lucy was already kind of tired and not at all sure about this whole “singing happy birthday” thing.

That’s her “what is all this shenanigans?” face.

We started to open presents, but by that point, she was doing the thousand yard stare, and it was pretty rapidly apparent that girlfriend needed a nap. So my parents took her with them to their house, where she promptly crashed, while the big kids continued to play outside, and the grown-ups cleaned up the clubhouse.

One random moment from that – Chris’s daughter accidentally let go of her balloon in the clubhouse, which has ridiculously tall vaulted ceilings. Since we were supposed to leave it clean, we didn’t want to leave a stray balloon behind. It became very Walter White and the fly in trying to figure out how we were going to get the balloon down.

My cousin’s husband and Chris together somehow devised a Swiffer tied to a broom with an extension cord to try to catch it, but that didn’t work. Finally, we got out the vacuum, Chris stood on a barstool while Tony held the vacuum up in the air, and it was juuuuust tall enough to reach.

Balloon rescue success!

After we finished cleaning up, my cousin and her family took off, Chris and his kids took off, and my sister and I took Catie over to my parents’ house. We found Lucy still asleep.

When she woke up, she opened the rest of her presents, which was much more enthusiastic since she was more perky after her nap.

She got a set of Frozen action figures, which she loved.

My mom, because she knows my girls, had the foresight to get Catie her own set, so they wouldn’t fight over them.

(They’re these, for those of you who are curious. They cost less than half the current amount when my mom bought them, but it took forever because they shipped them from China, and they had a really horrible chemical smell when they arrived. My mom soaked them in vinegar and let them air out in the garage for weeks before they were ok. So, not really recommended, but if you have Frozen-crazy children and are desperate, there you go.)

My sister gave Lucy Barbie-sized Anna and Kristoff dolls, which she immediately stripped naked, because that’s what she does with all of her dolls don’t ask me why I don’t know.

And she got to be a “butterfly fairy.”

Really, what more could a 3 year-old ask for?

So, yeah, third birthday is now in the books. Can’t wait to see what the coming year brings.