5 Years

Only 2 months late posting this! Better late than never, right?!

Peyton's 5 year stats:

Weight: 48 pounds, 13 ounces (90th percentile)

Height: 44 inches (80th percentile)

She's a solid one!

PJ at 5 years:

*Gives the best hugs.

*Loves to give kisses on the lips.

*Is very sad when I can't be home to put her to bed.

*Plays the "who loves who more" game with her dad. She'll say random numbers like, "I love you 149+12." Then he'll come back with, "I love you 149+72." And then she'll pull out the big guns with, "I love you 149+infinity."

*Still loves to cuddle at night and ends up in our bed most nights. Most of the time I hardly notice she's there, but Rog does and after her birthday he fixed the lock on our bedroom door to lock her out in an attempt to break her of that habit. We're still working on it.

*Does a little snicker laugh that I really don't like. It sounds very much like she's making fun of you when she does it and I feel like it's very rude. Also working on this.

*Loves Logan when she's acting like his mom, but is easily annoyed by him as her playmate.

*Has trouble saying 13. (It comes out sounding more like 14.) She used to just skip 13 when she was counting, but I've worked with her and now she at least says 14 twice.

*Says she hates a lot of things.

*Is very athletic and has a very muscular build. 

*Is loving her dance class. It is a combo class and she loves to tell people she does ballet, tumbling, and tap all in 1 hour. She is learning how to do cartwheels and headstands in the tumbling part of her class and is constantly rolling onto her back and doing tumbling moves around the house.

*Is SO ready for Kindergarten. I know our choice to keep her home this year was the right one, but it has been hard at times because she gets bored easily and wants to have more interactions with kids her age. But we saved SO much money keeping her home and she didn't need more preschool to get her ready for Kindergarten (academically or socially). She is such a good helper with Logan (most of the time) and we've enjoyed our Mom-and-Peyton time together.

*Is doing GREAT learning to read and write. I've been using the book, Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons and she's picking it up very quickly.

*Will create little craft projects for herself. 

*Loves making cards for us. They usually consist of two stick figures and the word LOVE, sometimes with stickers or stamp pictures.

*Is a good little organizer. She enjoys organizing her drawers and other things. 

*Is also a hoarder. She loves to collect little trinkets from random places and keep them in her drawers. (At least she keeps her collections pretty organized!)

*Gets mad at me if she sees I've thrown something away she wanted to keep.

I am the absolute worst at recording funny things our kids say, but here is one of our favorite Peyton quotes. This was soon after we moved into our new house which was right after we saw Zootopia.

"Did you leave the door open?" 

"Yes, yes you did."

"Did Logan get in?" 

"Yes, yes he did."

This picture was actually from our April trip to Disneyland (so right before Peyton turned 4), but Mariah just recently sent it to me and I love it. 

Dancing at the Denver Zoo.

With the Denver Zoo hippo at 2 months and 4 years.

Splash pad dancing.

On the random elephant at Voodoo Donuts.

Morning buddies.

Waiting for a summer outdoor movie to start.

Peyton loves nothing more than being my twin. I'm enjoying it while I can because there's no way she'll want to be my twinner forever.

Flying around the house on a broom.

Whenever Rog gets me flowers he gives one to Peyton and she loves it!

Such a good helper.

The 3 Phillips girls cousins.

Her friend Kinley's mom sent me this picture. Glad she has at least one girl who lives close to be friends with.

Donut face!

I love my little dancer!

She's a strong one.

Loving on her baby cousin, Grey.

One morning Peyton and Corbyn came downstairs wearing some of Logan's clothes. So funny!

She got this sleeping bag from Grandma Dixie for Christmas and has had fun setting up beds around the house.

For the longest time she was convinced mom had an "o" at the end of it. It was too cute to correct!

Just being a cutie.

All the kids took turn trying out her dolly's binky one night.

Enjoying some ice cream on a daddy-daughter date. I'm not sure what flavor it was, but the colors couldn't be more perfect for a little girl.

She doesn't like this picture, but that's what she gets for joining me in my bed nearly every night.

One day she asked me to paint her nails to match her outfit. Then she said she needed to watch a show while they dried. Lol, she got me!

Look, it's Mickey the Mouse!

I'm pretty sure I already posted this picture on one of Logan's monthly updates, but it's too cute not to share again!

After the holidays we learned that Barnes and Noble does story time with a craft every Wednesday morning and we started going almost every week because she loves it. It's like her little preschool.

If you can't find Peyton, the play room under the stairs is a good place to check.

Catching some air jumping onto the Love Sac.

This was her favorite outfit for a couple months and she would often ask me to take pictures of her when she was wearing it.

She loves showing off how strong she is by picking kids up. This is her lifting her friend Elsie when we were in Utah in April. She does it quite often to Logan with mixed results.

These two buddies love helping me clean the windows and come running anytime they see me doing it. 

I always wanted a girl and I'm so grateful Heavenly Father sent me my Peyton girl. Life would be a whole lot less sweet without her in it!

Peyton's Birthday

We started Peyton's birthday off opening presents. From us she got a Rapunzel dress and an Anna dress for Samantha (want), a princess bike (need), a Moana dress and a Little Mermaid dress (wear), and Aqualicious (read).

She also got to open her presents from Grandma Dixie and Grandpa Mike. From them she got Life Junior and Mermaid Island.

Then we had donuts for breakfast. I had gone to yoga that morning, so I stopped and picked some up from Fred Meyer on my way home. (They were unfortunately not the best, but she was happy with them.)

We sent Corbyn off to school and dad off to work and got the rest of us ready for the day. Then we went to Barnes and Noble for story time. I can't remember what book they read and what craft they did (maybe a robot?), but I do remember thinking it was too bad it wasn't a very girly book/craft that day. Some of their crafts are picture worthy, but this one sadly was not. I thought they were having story time at 11:30 at the Disney Store, so we killed time at the mall waiting for that. Peyton and Logan played at the play area...

We got her free birthday cookie from the Barnes and Noble Kids' Club and we stopped to look at the fish.

Then we went to the Disney Store and apparently they were not actually having story time because we were there on time and nothing happened, but we had fun looking around for a bit while we were waiting. I had told Peyton we could eat lunch at the food court and ride a few of the rides they have there or go home and have mac & cheese. Well of course she decided she wanted mac & cheese, but she still wanted to ride the rides. They only took cash and I didn't have any, so we went across the street to Target where I let her pick out something from the dollar spot (an ice cream sun catcher to paint) and got cash back when I paid with my Target debit card.

Peyton and Logan rode the carousel...

And Peyton rode this ride.

By then it was well past lunch time, so we hurried home to make mac & cheese and put Logan down for his nap. Peyton got to watch shows while I made dinner and her cake. For dinner she wanted Corn Chowder and Cheddar Cornmeal Biscuits. For her cake she wanted a chocolate cake with white frosting, so I made this Chocolate Cake with Buttercream Frosting. I accidentally undercooked the cake by a few minutes and ended up with raw sections in the center of each layer, so I scooped that part out and filled in one layer with pieces from the other layer. It ended up being a single-layer cake instead of the double-layer cake I had planned, but it still looked cute and tasted amazing.

We sent Rog to pick up Grandma Lori and Papa George from the airport while the rest of us went to Corbyn's t-ball game. We had missed the email saying the game was cancelled, so we got there only to find that no one was there! So we went home and waited for Rog to come home with grandma and grandpa.

Peyton opened her gifts from them (a Rainbow Fairy dress, an Amulet Princess dress, and a Seafoam Mermaid Ball Gown dress - all from the Little Adventures Outlet Sale). The Rainbow Fairy dress was an immediate favorite and she had to try it on before blowing out her candles.

The next day she got to go to Build-a-Bear with them to make Fluttershy.

Rog met us for dinner at Red Robin Express and then Rog and I left for a weekend in Seattle to celebrate our 10 year anniversary... And that was Peyton's birthday!

Peyton's Birthday: Party

After I finished the Relief Society Birthday Celebration, I only had 3 days to pull together Peyton's party. The invitations were out, Peyton and I had purchased all the party favors for the girls one day at Party City, I had ordered the piñata ahead of time, and I had picked up the sheets to make temporary tattoos... But other than that I had a lot of work to do in a very short amount of time! 

My sewing table was quickly taken over by rainbows and all things My Little Pony.

These crate paper rainbows were fun although they didn't stay up particularly well.

I used the Equestria font to make this banner.

This is my favorite way to do balloons because you don't have to pay for helium!

All the heart eyes for a rainbow of paper straws. 😍

We started the party giving everyone a cutie mark. I made them using this tutorial. (You definitely don't need a Silhouette to make them. I have one and I didn't even use it because it was easier to just cut them out by hand.) I definitely earned my Pinkie Pie cutie mark!

After everyone got their cutie mark, we sang to Peyton. 

And did a cake walk with the cupcakes (Peyton's request).

Mini cupcakes were perfect because that way everyone could do the cake walk a few times.

While half the group was doing the cake walk, the other half made rainbow bracelets and then they switched. I may have bought a few too many beads, but they are good to have on hand for various projects and many many bracelets have been made since the party. 

Then we played Pony Bingo.

These Brightside Skittles (found at Walmart) were perfect for our color scheme. 

Peyton had been talking about having a piñata at her party pretty much since her last party. I did not want to make one, so I ordered this one from Amazon. Rog and I feel kind of meh about these new pull-string piñatas, but Peyton was happy about it and that's all that really mattered.

And you better believe everyone was pretty happy when the candy came out (even if they didn't all get a chance to pull a string).

Another thing Peyton really wanted was to have Pirate's Booty at her party, so we finished off the party watching an episode of My Little Pony and snacking on Pony Puffs (aka Pirate's Booty). I bought these fry boxes forever ago on Pick Your Plum and was delighted to finally find a use for them! I printed off these cupcake toppers to put on them.

We also had drinks in every color of the rainbow (with coordinating straws), but somehow I only took a picture of a yellow one. I used the cupcake toppers on those too.

Peyton watches My Little Pony all the time, but this was really the first time I'd sat down to watch an entire episode.

I used some of the leftover bags from the RS Birthday Celebration for the goody bags (again with the cupcake toppers).

The boys got Play-doh and a punch balloon. The girls got a My Little Pony cup, camera, comb, sticker sheet, and a couple rings. Party City has a huge collection of party favors to choose between for pretty much every party theme you could think of.

We didn't get a picture of the whole group since everyone showed up at the beginning, but many had to leave early. We had Kinley and Emery Martyn, Sofie White, Ryah, Delainey Giotta, Wren Tutt, Sebastian Locker, and the Yates boys. One huge benefit of being moved into the Happy Valley ward was a lot of new friends for Peyton. The Sunnyside ward did not have a lot of girls her age. Everyone was so generous with their gifts and she ended up with a lot of new My Little Pony toys (and a few other fun things too). 

We had a fun time celebrating our favorite 5 year old!