Emma is 4!

I cannot believe 4 years have past since I first met my precious little Emma! It has been such fun to watch her grow into the spunky 4 year old she is today!
Emma was totally different from her brother even before she was born. I often tell of when I was pregnant with Caleb: he would very seldomly stick his foot out to where I could see and feel his heel on the right side of my belly. I soon learned that I better not touch it or he would quickly retract and the cool experience of "seeing" his heel would vanish. Now when I was pregnant with Emma, she would do the same thing, but when I would go to touch it she would just gladly leave it there to get rubbed!
Anyway, I say all that to say: Even before she was born, she had her little personality.
Emma is: sweet, happy, courageous, bright, dramatic, LOVES to sing! (especially while playing by herself!)  shy, but when she gets comfortable - very bold. I am just recently starting to get reports of her "coming out of her shell" and talking when she's in her various classes. She loves playing with her "little people" and her and her bother have named them all - including 2 Sallys of which they had a birthday party for this morning, with a hand written sign and all! (I'm am currently writing this on Nov. 3 even though I will post this as the date of her birthday) She still loves Dora and Little Eisensteins. Emma has a great laugh! She loves to change her clothes! I have to put the reigns on that very often because laundry just becomes too much! She enjoys when I put braids in her hair (not while it's getting done, but once the torture of brushing is over) but at times asks for her hair to be left "flat and squrrily" (down and curly). She loves watching "Little House on the Prairie" and loves Laura.

On Emma's actual birthday, Mommy was at a Women's retreat in the morning :( but Daddy planned a great day that started at IHOP for pancakes where Emma got her usual smiley face pancakes,

 then they drove across the street to Jersey Gardens mall where Caleb and Emma got big balloons from Prato, but Emma's balloon flew away :( Daddy said she didn't cry.Next stop IKEA where they got to play in the ballroom and then ate frozen yogurt.

Soon after everyone was home and Mommy cooked up Emma's requested Birthday dinner: a gourmet meal of hot dogs, chips and salad. (yes, she requested salad :) Pop pop, Grammy Z and Auntie Kel came for the good eats and brought some presents and balloons!

Emma with her presents. She got 2 families from the Lil Woodzeez toys at Target (love these! So does Emma!) And she got some chocolate from Gertrude Hawk. (I gave her the little people sitting next to her on the chair in the morning via a present I left)

 Mommy brought home a chocolate cake for Dessert!

For Emma's birthday party, we had a pajama party!  We had it at Grammy Z's house as usual. 

 We had just family, and that alone gave us a party with 14 kids!

 Fun "Emma" flashlight and bowl from Oma.

The bed cake....

Happy Birthday to you.....

Make a wish...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EMMA!

We love you!

The Sister Hat...

Proud to say I successfully surprised my sister Kelly for her 30th birthday! (tired to for her 25th - not so successful)  After month of planning and stressing over what seemed like every little detail, it all went off without a hitch!

Took this while I sat and pondered what to do

With the chance of thundershowers in the forecast, I arrived at the picnic sight in Watchung Reservation a little before 11am (party to start at 2pm) and set out two tablecloths. I then started to feel some light sprinkling on my head, looked up to the heavens and said "real funny". As I stood there, the rain got a little heavier and then it began to fully rain. I grabbed the tablecloths and went to sit in the car for about 20 minutes. I sat and watched my picnic tables get drenched and began trying to figure out how I was going to dry these tables. Of course in the plethora of things I had stuffed in my car I had not thought of towels. Just as I began to start being discouraged, I receive a text message from a dear friend Lisa (who happens to live the closest to the park) that reads "So how u doing? going crazy? do u need anything last minute I can run out and get 4 u?" I then began singing the hallelujah chorus, the rain began to stop and I had towels delivered right to me! At this point I knew it was God telling me "It's gonna be okay."
JP met me at the park (with breakfast!) to help me set up and most importantly for moral support since I was a bit out of my head after staying up til 5am making a cake for the picnic and editing a video that would be viewed at the "After Party". It was a bit slow going since it was just two of us setting up, but then a little before 2pm a bunch of the youth kids from church showed up and things really started to come together. This was so encouraging to see! Setting up a tent, croquet course, volleyball net, hanging Ks from trees, opening coke bottles with keys, etc...  (Thank you: Marcus, Dan, Rachel, Steve, Marc, Sean, Luke and Justin!)
So what I counted to be at least 70 people showed up and most were there to surprise Kelly at around 2:50.
The way we got her there: Kelly and her 2 good friends, Jana and Danielle, normally plan a day together for each of their birthdays. Jana has a birthday a week before Kelly. So I had Danielle plan "Jana's day" with Kelly for the day of the party. Danielle even had Kelly make hummus and Kelly bought balloons (see pics of her carrying balloons as she was led in) for this "day for Jana". Danielle and Kelly went to Jana's work to "surprise" Jana, once Jana was in the backseat of the car, she then blindfolded Kelly who then realized the joke was on her! At this point she was told things so she would still think it was just the 3 of them hanging out. When they arrived at the park Kelly was still blindfolded with the addition of ear-buds and music blasting so she couldn't hear where she was either.


They led her to be standing if front of everyone who was standing under the "Happy Birthday Kelly" banner ready to yell "SURPRISE"

We served hot dogs, grilled up by Andy, with fixin's out of mason jars, served on a stand (which I forgot to bring chalk to draw on, grrrr!)





<--love him!








We also had a stand for Strawberry Lemonade, which the bees loved!

This is the cake. Kelly and I at one time saw a similar cake on a website and Kelly loved the idea so of course I couldn't resist making something like it for her. The picture in the back was made to resemble a picture Kelly took recently and the cake itself was to resemble the colors and flowers in her camera strap. (seen in the picture below)

Tried to give the picnic an old-fashioned type feel with mixed matched cloth tablecloths, games, the mason jars, etc. Above are the flowers used for the tables...





Misplaced the "0" candle (which we later learned was hid as a joke :) but in the absence of the "0" I improvised and couldn't have planned it better!

Some of the games we had out to play. Was happy to see them being used and enjoyed!

 After all the fun had at the park, we invited some of the young folk back to the Zaps backyard to view a homemade video we put together for Kelly. A primetime type news show entitled "15,786,084 minutes" in which we showcased Kelly as a children's church worker and, well, a few other things! (15,786,084 minutes is equivalent to 30 years)

Viewed on this makeshift screen, we continued to enjoy a rain-free day with popcorn out of pockets made from old magazines.

Pick one and fill with popcorn! 

Me as "Norma Leigh Borring" a reporter for "15,786,084 Minutes" and Kelly filling up on popcorn.

With lots of stress from weather, video editing and many other little things, 

the day was a complete success full of fun, laughs and surprises! :)

SLIDESHOW