Adalyn's 4th Birthday!!!

Wow I can't even believe 4 years has gone by since Adalyn came into our family. I really can't remember my life before her! I wanted to first tell about her birthday party and then I put together some pictures of her from the beginning to now.
So first off Adalyn could not wait for it to be her birthday that is why I started the birthday countdown. Whenever she would ask me "is it my birthday yet?" Which she did everyday for a month I would tell her, "go look at your countdown, is there still paper?" It really did help her understand a little bit better about waiting.

Anyway, she told us she wanted a princess party with her friends so I invited over some kids from our ward she likes to play with and they painted, played some games, hit a piñata, had cake and ice-cream and then she opened her presents! She enjoyed having the spotlight on her and kept reminding the kids that it was HER birthday! It was a fun party and she loved all her gifts, she got moon sand, play-doh, a dress, crayola magic markers and paper and her favorite from her friend Ellie was a purple my little pony with a DVD and a book called Purplelicious! It is the cutest book. For those of you who don't know Adalyn is obsessed with purple. Everything has to be purple, she only wants to color with purple have purple shirts and pajamas, EVERYTHING!! It's been going on for almost 2 years now.
We gave her for her birthday a T-ball set which she loves and can hit the ball really far she is definitely athletic (YEAH!!) and a hand held v-tech v-smile pocket and game, and our big gift to her was her Barbie bike! We figured she should be learning how to ride a real bike with the help of training wheels. She was so excited. She got a few other things as well.










Now that she is 4 she is learning so much and can understand so much more it is a really fun time for us and her. She can play games and is learning to write more, she can write the letter "A" and "D" and "i" the number "1" and "2" and draw a balloon, a person which is hilarious and hearts and circles. She started sunbeams in January and every Sunday we listen to the new primary songs they’re learning. It amazed me this past Sunday she could sing every song on the CD. She is so smart and has and incredible memory!
We also had a talk with her about now that she is 4 she needs to be our big girl and be a good big sister. Also that she needs to have some responsibilities which will be pulling up her covers on her bed, learning to buckle herself in the car and learning how to go the bathroom all by herself without my help.(she needs to know that for pre-school) If she does these things than we started with her a "Coin Jar" which is every time she does something nice, plays well with Ellie or just does what is asked without whining than she gets a coin(a nickel) and if she is bad than she gets one taken away. My sister Jackie gave me this idea; it's an instant gratification or punishment which she needs. She knows that every week if she has enough coins then she can take them to the store and buy what she wants. So far it has worked really well. If we tell her we're taking a coin she stops what she is doing. It's awesome.