Week of July 29 - 2 Years Old!

It has indeed been a busy week for the whole family, and a ton of new photos and stories to share. With Papa here for the week for birthday celebrations, and a number of different celebration activities, this week I'll share with you the actual birthday cake and gift festivities. Next week, I'll share the once again fun and successful outing to Gilroy Gardens, and some other activities with Papa (got a lot of great photos of Papa and Emily paling around).

Last year, being Emily's first birthday, and with the tradition that a babies first birthday is a very big celebration and milestone in Chinese tradition, we did a big birthday last year. This year, we kept is smaller and limited to just close family members, creating a more intimate event where we actually had time to enjoy each and every moment with Emily as we celebrated.

But before we could start with the cake ceremony, Emily insisted in doing some chat time on her new toy flip-phone cell phone. So let's start with a couple of pictures of Emily on the chat using her little Barbie cell phone (which is part of her Barbie "Hello You" purse ensemble that Daddy gave her the day before her birthday). [I'll share more about the Barbie purse ensemble in another chapter of Emily's adventures here]. So this new toy cell phone is actually a good thing for Emily as it makes her a little less inclined to want Mommy's Blackberry, or Grandmas cell phone, though I need to add that a little earlier in the day, Emily offered to swap cell phones with Grandma..LOL. Yes folks, Emily punches the buttons and has live imaginary conversations on her cell phone. It is a blast to watch and interact with her in this manner.



On to the Cake! Emily could care less about cake a year ago at birthday time. This year, cake is interesting and yummy for Emily to experience! Though she was not too pleased when I lit the candle for her to blow out and so I assisted with that part, and the cutting of the cake as well. Check out Emily action with the cake (which was a banana nut cake center, with banana cream filling, and a whipped top layer frosting).







Cake was fun, but opening presents was just as much fun for Emily. So next I would like to share some photos of Emily enjoying opening and playing with some of her presents. We are not all inclusive in these next photos as Emily received a number of presents from friends and relatives by mail (not shown) and I think we have a couple of notices about items back ordered that will arrive later. Opening presents this year was totally fun for Emily because she has a developed so much since last birthday and can really be. Like opening some new outfits to wear, a new toddlers learning laptop (from Papa), and a Cinderella play hut from auntie Patty. And of course in our family there is the always popular "red packages" especially the one from Grandma and Grandpa (Nancy's parents) stuffed with a stack of crispy new 20 dollar bills.