Tomorrow we have to go shopping for Breanna’s birthday since the big day is TUESDAY. I can’t believe it’s two days before her birthday already. Two years ago, I was at a bar, watching George play. To this day, one of the guys in the band, who is also the bar manager, tells me how disappointed he was that I didn’t go into labor because he really wanted to deliver the baby and serve everyone free celebratory beer.

It’s hard shopping for the second chid. Most of the things Breanna plays with is stuff that Hayley had at that age. That’s great, of course, the more use a toy gets, the better. But still, it’s hard when you don’t know what to get brand new for someone.

I know we’re going to get her a tea set. She loves little else as much as playing tea party (“tee pah-tee!”). She serves us and keeps pouring her pretend tea for as long as we’ll sit with her. When we went to a birthday party last night, she remembered that the birthday girl has a tea set in her room and she dragged me up the stairs to go and get it.

We’re also probably going to get a little kitchen set with more dishes and play food for her. The only thing she really loves as much as tea sets is the play kitchen. She will spend a great deal of time making soup, baking pies, and filling containers with food. Also at the party yesterday, she went to the basement playroom and nearly died on the spot over the Dora kitchen and all the play food that is different from what we have, and I had to actually drag her upstairs to the kitchen at cake time because she would have happily continued baking her own pretend cake rather than look at a real one. (And really, I had to drag Hayley up to because she was content to keep drawing on the chalkboard, hence the reason I added chalkboard to the list of stuff I want to get for Christmas.)

After we buy those gifts, we have to also get stuff to make a birthday cake. I told her it was her birthday soon and she immediately asked, “cake? Cake?” Yes, baby. You can have a cake.

Expect me to be a bit blubbery by Tuesday.