He's THREE!

So the much anticipated "airplane birthday" finally arrived! He'd been telling strangers about it for months, and even tried to convince me his birthday was in November instead of December. The big day finally got here, and he's still talking about it and re-enacting scenes from his birthday and party, so I guess it lived up to expectations (but when you're a kid, presents, balloons, cake, friends... how could it not?) We started the day with the traditional Dahl Family "birthday morning" - with all the decorations up. Usually we open all the family gifts that morning, but Dave is gone so early in the morning, he didn't want to miss out on all of it, so he got to open two. (And yes, that is technically Christmas paper... something my December birthday BFF Ally told me NEVER to do. But I figured with elks and snowflakes, it might pass for "winter" paper. And he probably wouldn't notice yet anyway) After breakfast and presents we went to BounceU, Chick-Fil-A for lunch, and then to the mall. We went home and made pink cupcakes, with pink frosting, and pink sprinkles, and opened the rest of the presents. We had his birthday party the next day. Invited some friends and family over, ate pizza and cake (which was nearly a disaster), opened presents and had a pinata. He was one happy camper, and is still not totally convinced his birthday is actually over. The day of, he kept asking "is that my birthday tree?" (Christmas tree), "is that my birthday snow?" etc... Sure Owie, it sure is your birthday snow.

He got a Star Wars transformer X-Wing toy... trying to show it off, but you can't tell.
At BounceU... a place full of big bounce houses and slides etc. I had a groupon for it... It's awesome, with workers there to help your kid up the tall stuff, so I didn't have to haul him, and my pregnant belly up. This slide picture makes me laugh for some reason.
One of the bounce houses had a blaster gun thing... Owen said it was a "Star Wars blaster" and that he was "shooting tie fighters"
Train ride at the mall. They have this Christmas train that drives all over the bottom floor of the mall. He didn't ride it the last time we were at the mall, we said we'd come back for his birthday. He'd been talking about it ever since. He loved it, but lost his ticket partway through the ride. When I went to get him out of the train, he broke down in tears over losing it. Luckily another mom had picked it up, and got it back to him. Crisis averted.
He got some birthday money in the mail from a relative, so we used it to go "make a bear fluffy" at Build A Bear. We visit the store every time at the mall, but have been waiting for a special occasion to do it. He picked a Star Wars bear (noticing a theme?) It was either that, or the pink one (but the Star Wars one had a button you could put inside that would play the Star Wars theme song... once the sales person showed him that, he was sold.)
Insisted on carrying it's "house" all by himself, even though his legs were exhausted at this point.
Birthday presents from mom and dad, and one from Grandpa and Grandma Dahl.
The nearly disastrous birthday cake...I tired to make a runway cake on my own, apparently I am terrible and decorating cakes. So, I went to a grocery store to ask if they could put a runway on a cake. They said sure. We went to pick it up, looked just as bad as the one I tried to make. We brought it home, tweaked it a little, put lots of airplane toys on it to try to cover up the extra ugly bits, and Owen loved it. (He even saw it in all it's ugly glory and said "Oh wow, awesome!") Oh we love him!
Opening a package from Nana and Auntie Holly. More transformers!

As kind of a last minute thing, I hung these extra streamers on his bedroom door the night before his birthday while he was sleeping. He loved those streamers. He would regularly run back there and say "just checking to see if my birthday door is still there". At his party, I heard him asking his little friends "do you like my birthday door?" And one night Dave was tucking him in, and sitting by him on his bed. Owen was wiggling and squirming like crazy, and finally he said 'Dad, I can't see my streamers!" I guess Dave was blocking the view. I finally took them down last night. He didn't notice for awhile, then out of the blue said "I'm going to check if my birthday door is still there"..... busted. He was a little sad, but I keep trying to tell him now we have CHRISTMAS to look forward too!

We love our little Owie guy, and can't believe he's three already! He is getting so grown up, speaks really well, and loves to sing. He loves fighter jets, Star Wars, playing pretend, and cute little animals. He also loves to do puzzles, and to help me cook/bake. He has a funny sense of humor, and some killer dance moves. We are so happy he's part of our family! Happy Birthday Owen!