Emmy turns 6

I can't believe it, but Emmy is growing up!  I keep threatening to put a heavy book on her head to make her stop, but she won't wear it.  Yes, yesterday was her 6th birthday - Happy Birthday Baby Girl!!!

Since she hasn't really had the chance to make many friends yet (just four days in school), we didn't have a party, but that doesn't mean she didn't have a special day.  First of all, Grammie is here so that made it special, but then we also had all kinds of other treats lined up for her.

The day started with brownies for breakfast.  Yes, I served my kids brownies for breakfast.  Now does that make me the worst mom ever or the coolest mom ever?  Whatever my new title is, I served them because in our house the birthday person gets to choose all meals and Emmy took that literally and requested brownies.

I think brownies for breakfast might make you crazy?

After brownies came presents and the girl got just about everything on her list (which, for a 6 year old, was pretty reasonable).  Tubes of small plastic animals (arctic creatures, sea creatures and horses), a sea creature stuffed animal collection, a small fox stuffed animal she found at the Mt. Rainier gift shop, and a Playmobil horse set.  She also got lots of nice gifts from family - thank you all!

After a little play time with the new toys, we had Emmy's requested lunch, macaroni and cheese, then headed out on her surprise adventure - a visit to Wolf Haven.  Wolf Haven (or Wolf Heaven as Emmy and London called it) is a place I read about shortly after getting here; it's a wolf rescue and breeding facility located about 10 miles south of Olympia.  They offer tours through their facility so you can get up fairly close to the wolves.  They had gray wolves, Mexican wolves and red wolves (and two coyotes).

Afternoon siesta for the Mexican wolf?

It was hard getting good photos through the chain link fence.

One of the wolves was named London!

Emmy and London were thrilled to see the animals and even more thrilled to see the gift shop which had (surprise!) stuffed animal wolves.  If you haven't been around Emmy and London in the last two years, you might not understand that these two are fanatical about their stuffed animals.  The good part is that they play with almost all of their extensive collections.  And Emmy surprised me by using some of her birthday money to buy two small wolves and then promptly giving London one of them to keep.  Warms a momma's heart...

Stevie hanging with Mick in the back of the van.  Stevie decided not to go on the tour when someone "told" the center that we had a dog in the car.  The ticket seller told us they wouldn't be responsible for damages to our car if they had to break into it to rescue a distressed animal.  Mick was by no means distressed but we didn't want to risk having them do it.

We then returned home so we could cook Emmy's requested dinner (lasagna) and put the finishing touches on her cake.  Emmy and London played the whole car ride home with the wolves and the time before dinner and requested extra play time after dinner.  Those two are so great together.

I know, it should have been a wolf, but Emmy requested an orca cake.