Birthday season has begun

Rachel turned 9 two and a half weeks ago, which was the beginning of 'birthday season' for our family. From now on it's a mimimum of one birthday a month, so you'll probably see a bit of each person over the next little while (once I manage to get back here to post it that is!)

Her birthday this year was also the day of General Conference for us (which involves several meetings through the day where we get to hear from our prophet and others), so we mostly celebrated it on the Saturday. Rachel had a birthday lunch / party with all of us, Granma, Gramps, Nanny, and my brother David's family. We decorated the day before with some fun paper flowers and butterflies we'd made from folded paper, and instead of a cake she had our first try at a fruit bouquet - again plenty of flowers with some butterflies. The girls enjoyed helping me cut out the flowers and butterflies that morning from fresh pineapple and melon, and assembling the fruit. Not wanting to buy anything especially to help it stay together other than a pack of bamboo skewers, we had a ... hmm ... fun time getting it all to stay up! Rachel gave up in the end when her grandparents arrived, and Hannah stayed to finish it off, and she also made a little decoration to put the candles in as they were just going to be buried in the bowl of flowers.












We had a lovely meal together for lunch, and a few games - a treasure hunt around the house to find her presents from everyone, pass the parcel at Rachel's special request (she says she loves to play it :o) ), and a bit of a squished game of "vase of flowers", which is basically the game of "fruitbasket" but with flowers instead, and it was squished because our living room is just too small for that many people! She had what she'd wanted though and clearly loved everything about her day. Then we had popcorn, muffins and the fruit flowers and butterflies. We all really liked the fruit - my sugar-sensitive children a little too much, and they reacted to it a bit too much later, but not really until everyone else had left to go to the first session of general conference, which was fine. It was fun, and we have a better idea now of how to make a vase of flowers from fruit should we try it again! It makes a great table decoration too.



















Rachel enjoyed a bit of attention on her birthday too, as well as seeing Granma for General Conference. She opened a few things from her immediate family and enjoyed an e-card from Grandad and a message on the Mills blog from Gramps - both very much.

The following Saturday we travelled with the help of both of our Mums to Kidderminster, where Peter and Rebekah had a lovely afternoon / early evening of Granma and Nanny time at Granma's house. Meanwhile the rest of us had a lovely journey with Gramps as we all went to a small theatre in Ludlow for Rachel's main birthday present. It was such a beautiful drive, especially for those of us who live within a city and don't ever get to see 'real' countryside, that Hannah spent most of the journey looking backwards out of the rear window so that she could get a better view of the hills, fields and valleys. We were going to see the ballet of The Sleeping Beauty performed by the European Ballet. Gramps got to see his first ever ballet (Granma wasn't really into ballets), and although we didn't see too much of the dancer's feet from where we were sitting, we enjoyed the dancing, costume, miming and scenery immensely. It was a fun thing to do - a great experience to have for our little ballet dancer. Sarah was really taken by it, especially some of the dresses, and Hannah really enjoyed the main dancers. I just loved the group dancing most of all, but then I always loved dancing in groups too. We had a picnic tea in the car and a little wander in Ludlow where they saw one of the female dancers in the grocer's next door (all very exciting!), before going home to find two very happy younger siblings and an equally exhausted Granma.

We spent Sunday and Monday in Kidderminster too before travelling home via bus and train on Tuesday afternoon. Ironically we finished the journey home in Granma and Gramps' cars as all trains to Coventry were cancelled due to a broken down freight train, and after going from one train to another for some time only to have each one cancelled, we finally were able to catch a very cramped rush hour train as far as Birmingham International and were picked up from there not long after Mum and Dad finished work not far away. Very handy grandparents indeed! So many thanks to our parents for our journeys all round, and a lovely weekend.

I asked Rachel this evening what she liked best about her birthday, and she thought for a moment and then with a huge smile she said "turning nine". :o)
She's enjoying growing up.