Kate is THREEEEEEE!!!!

We'll skip the first half of Kate's birthday (let's just say it involved a large amount of fishing and an even larger lecture) and head straight to the birthday party!

We had her party on the evening of her birthday (July 21) at the Spanish Fork water park, which we had all to ourselves! A bit of explanation about that: no we don't spend extravagant amounts of money renting pools for 3-yr-old birthday parties. Two years ago we ran the "Speedy Spaniard," a 10K race on the 24th of July, and afterward they have a drawing for prizes. The grand prize was a pool party for 150 people, and I won it! However we couldn't schedule it that summer. Or the next. I had kind of forgotten about it, but when we planned this trip, Tim made some calls and arranged everything for us. The Spanish Fork Recreation dept. graciously allowed us to have the party this summer, even though it was two years after the fact. Thank you Spanish Fork! Conveniently, one of the available dates was Kate's birthday, so we planned a big bash! And now you know the rest of the story.
I know the banner is hard to read, but it says "Happy Birthday Kate!" My mom and I made it ourselves with our non-scrapbooking talent! And yes it did take a very long time. We were pretty proud of ourselves.

Of course there was the blowing-out-of-the-candle...(We forgot matches, of course, but luckily Trav's cousin Sam carries the only lighter in Utah County.)

And our family picture attempts went like this:
Mommy & Kate; Oh let's get Travis in here for a family picture; Wait... are we missing something? OH Brooklyn's part of the family too!
**Hee hee! Just kidding, little one! :)**

We also got to see a bunch of friends we hadn't seen in years! (This was the real reason for the party. The part where Kate turned 3 was just a ruse.) The Andrews were friends from our Orem ward who moved back to Utah just in time for Kate's party! We hadn't even met their two little girls!The Gertsches moved away from us last year, but fortunately we've been able to see them several times throughout the year, and we even got to have dinner with them the previous night. Travis had also called up several of his high school buddies who still lived close enough to come, and of course we had plenty of relatives. Here's a schmorgasbord:
All in all it was an awesome party! Kate, however, missed most of it because she was too busy playing in the sand by the volleyball nets.

"Ice cream? No thanks... can I go play over THERE?"

She and Maddie were fast friends, despite the fact that this is the first time they've met!

The one caveat: (there always has to be something) When choosing drinks, Travis & I selected "cherry limeade." It sounded good! Most of you probably foresaw the idiocy of serving BRIGHT RED PUNCH at a 3-year-old's birthday party. I will never learn. Kind of like the bamboo skewers of last year... So that is why we all have ridiculous red-rimmed mouths in every picture. (Mostly the kids. And maybe Travis.) Okay and I guess the OTHER caveat was my "ice cream cone" cupcakes, which worked out brilliantly in my head but less-than-brilliantly in real life, besides being ridiculously time-consuming. Thanks to Travis's dad for his last-minute help!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, sweet Kate! I can't believe you are 3! I still remember when you were this big:
What a beautiful, sweet, kind young lady you've grown up to be! We love you, Princess!