Happy Birthday, Princess!

Clare turns four years old today! Happy Birthday!

We had a princess party (of course!) this weekend for Princess Clare. Shawn bought her a new Cinderella dress from the Disney store (her first "real" princess dress), and Clare truly looked like a princess. She has been so excited about her birthday and princess party for days. This was the first time I think that Clare understood it was her birthday, and she was so thrilled about the whole day. There were games (Kiss the Frog and Pass the Tiara), presents, a pinata, and a castle cake. Clare enjoyed the idea of the castle cake more than the eating of the cake - she is not a big fan of cake or candy, unless it's chocolate, but she loved looking at her cake. And she had fun goofing off with the cake for her friends!

I say it every year, but it's hard to believe that Clare is now four. Four just sounds so old. Where did my baby go?? Who is this big girl who looks so tall these days (relatively so!)? Clare is learning how to play games with Jamie (she especially loves her new animal match-up memory game from Auntie Becky, Jasmine, and Alex - we play it multiple times a day), she speaks in complete sentences the majority of the time, she even has a preference with clothing now. It is so exciting to see Clare growing up!

We received Clare's second trimester report card and IEP progress report yesterday. We are very pleased with Clare's progress at school, and it is obvious that she loves school, her teachers, and her classmates. And they love her, too! Last trimester, she received "Satisfactory" in all areas except for her attention span, where she received a "lower" designation. We were pleased to see she has moved up to a "Satisfactory" in that as well! (It's kind of odd to me the way her report card levels are grouped, but it goes "Mastered," "Satisfactory," and "Making Progress But Not At Expected Rate.") Her IEP review shows progress in all areas - speech, occupational, and physical therapies. Clare still has much to work on, but that is the point of school! She brought in cupcakes to share with her classmates and eagerly told us how they sang "Happy Birthday" to her at snack time. (And she informed us that her classmates sang "Happy Birthday, Clare" but that she sang "Happy Birthday, Princess!")

Clare also had her pre-op physical yesterday for her surgery next Monday, and she is good to go! Finally healthy! Let's keep her that way!