Tatum turns THREE!

Tatum's actual birthday fell on the weekend we were trying to get out of our house. We had her party quite early before all of her friends went out of town for Christmas. On the big day we decided to take some time off from packing and we headed to the Children's museum and for lunch at the mall, both requested by the birthday girl. This is the cake Brennan decorated the night before. All along we had been planning on a Daniel cake. But then we went to Collin's winter wonderland party and Tatum was convinced it was a Frozen party and regretting her choice I think haha.  Luckily daddy came through with this awesome Olaf cake.

Such a treat to have daddy at the museum with us.

She was very proud of the rocket they made.

Nothing better than chicken nuggets and chocolate milk from Chick Fil A.

We played mailman at the museum, not one of our usuals but she was sure a cute mailman.

I don't normally dress the kids in coordinating outfits. We had an appointment that mornig for their birthday photos and wanted a couple together. Hence, the coordination.

Another first at the museum was painting on this window. It was a lot of fun for all of us.

Brennan was feeling like an Olaf pro after that cake I guess. :)

Opening a present from mom and dad. A Daniel Tiger trolley and characters!

She also got that teepee from us. We even managed to bring it to Singapore and she is loving having her own room with that set up in it.

We pretty much moved in with my parents that night even though we we hadn't emptied our house yet. But we headed there that night for a birthday bash with family and stayed through Sunday and headed back to our place sans kids early Monday morning to begin the long and painful process of moving into a storage unit.

Grandma and Papa got her a new baby. She was just a little excited about it. :)

I'm pretty sure this 3 year old had a pretty dang good birthday. 

A few things about Tatum at 3:

1. She is my little social butterfly. She must get it from her dad. It has been sad to watch her adjust to life here and the absence of her friends. She often asks me where all of her new friends are as if I'm hiding them somewhere. I'm sure it will change in due time but she sure does miss having friends to play with. 

2. She loves to play dress up, read, and play pretend. Mostly pretending to be a mom to her baby. It is pretty fun to watch her try to act out what she sees and observes.

3. She is very inquisitive. Why is officially her favorite question. And my answers always get another why from her until I just don't know how to answer! It can be exasperating but I know it really is a good thing that she is thinking and wondering about these things.

4. She loves Frozen and Daniel Tiger. :)

5. She has a love-hate relationship with her brother. I'm trying to teach her to choose to have it be more of a love only kind of thing but it is hard of course. Hopefully she will figure out soon that he is a built in playmate but I'm sure it is annoying to have him taking her stuff all the time.

6. She says the funniest things and I need to do better about writing them down. I always think there is no way I will forget it but by the end of the day I always do. But just now she wanted to bathe her baby and so I was telling her we would just have to pretend. She really wanted to use water so I told her it would ruin her baby. She of course wanted to know why so I said because she isn't waterproof. Tatum stood there thinking that through for a minute and then said "But we are waterproof." Made me smile.

7. When she doesn't understand what I said in answer to one of her many questions she will ask "What?" and I will repeat myself and she will say "What?" again. I'll say it yet again, even though there doesn't seem to be any way she couldn't hear what I said and she will say "What mom I still didn't hear that again?". It took me awhile to realize she was doing this when she didn't understand the words I was using or what I meant by what I said. Now instead of driving me nuts it just makes me chuckle.

8. She still likes her milk warm although we have yet to find a milk here in Singapore that she will drink.

9. I will never grow tired of hearing her call Declan "Little Mister" or otherwise speaking to him in a motherly tone.

10. She is obsessed with finding things that match each other in color or pattern. When the kids get in the pajamas at night she as to find something on hers that matches something on Declan's.

11. She knows most, if not all, all of her letters and can count from 1 to 15. We are still working on number recognition.

12. She can sing Angels We Have Heard on High and it's about the cutest thing ever.

This list could just keep on going. I'm typing it while I watch her play and I just keep thinking of more so I will just stop now. :)

Tatum sure keeps life interesting and I sure love having her around. She helps me be a better pweaon and I'm so grateful for that. Happy birthday Tatum!