Happy Birthday Margarita!

Here's my little girl 10 years ago. This is one of my all time favorite pictures-because it was the moment when I became a mom.

We didn't find out what we were having (we never do) and we were sure she was a boy. I'll never forget Guapo saying, "It's a girl?!?" when she was born. The wonderful surprise of having a girl made the month of bed rest, two embarrassing false-alarm trips to the hospital (one involving getting "checked" by a handsome ER doc in Moab while Guapo and.my.dad looked on), and the awful delivery, totally worth it.

I remember not wanting to go home from the hospital- I didn't have a clue what to do with a baby! My parents came in for the birth but then had to leave before I left the hospital, so I went home a new mom without my mom or Guapo's mom (Margarita arrived 3 weeks early and she had already purchased her ticket for a week after her due date). Luckily, I got a good one-she was a great baby and has been pretty easy ever since then. I have this, what I am sure is an erroneous idea that "girls are easy, boys are hard" because she has just been a breeze. I know, you're thinking-wait til she's a teenager, and maybe you're right, but for now, she continues to be my good girl.

She is the first grandchild on my family's side



..and she was the second in Guapo's family. Here she is with her older cousin (Guapo made her wear the disgusting Laker jersey):



There are now 11 grand kids on Guapo's side and these two are STILL THE ONLY GIRLS!

You've probably noticed I don't blog about her as much as I do the boys. I feel like I have to protect her privacy-I'm thinking at some point she won't want people having access to her life on the Internet. The boys are still younger and I mostly just blog about funny little things they say or do. She's kind of past that age so to blog about her I would have to give info I'm not sure she'd appreciate me giving out later on in life. I'm sure I'll reach that point with each of my kids as they grow up.

But, you should know she is a great girl. She is very talented in many ways and I hope she will take the time to develop those talents-especially now while she is young and has lots of free time. She is a great big sister, someone who can get along with just about anyone, almost always happy, independent and just a fun person to be around.

To celebrate, she had a small birthday party-3 friends came over; we went swimming and then out for sushi-one of the benefits of living all over the place-my kids will eat almost anything. Margarita LOVES sushi. She will even eat plain seaweed!



I gave Vanessa $25 to do a little "Brazilian-birthday-table-magic" She decided on a horse theme since Margarita loves horses:


I made the cake (totally professional looking, don't you think? not):




Happy Birthday Margarita! Thanks for being such a wonderful daughter. :) I love you!