Feliz Cumpleanos, Daphne!

On Daphne's actual birthday, we woke up bright and early! First thing on our agenda: Family Pictures! One of my dear Texas friends, Emily Mulkey, is an incredible photgrapher. I somehow convinced her to take pictures of us, so we headed over to the Dallas Arboretum:

Emily's pictures are works of art. I can't wait for y'all to see them! Go to her website to find out more about her! Emily Mulkey Photography

I LOVE the Arboretum! I so wanted to go exploring the whole think like my friend Marcy and I used to do back in the day!

You'll notice that most of the pictures are of Isaac and Daph because Tori was sort of done with the photo shoots at this point....

They have so many new exhibits since the last time I was there... like the Beatrix Potter village. Here they are walking into Peter Rabbit's house... we actually saw a little brown bunny hopping around outside! Victoria was ecstatic!

Unfortunately, the kids were way too hot after just a little bit of exploring... we probably only explored 1/3 of the park! Although we had been in Texas all week, the only time we spent outside was in the pool. My kiddos were covered in sweat and we were ready for a break. Since it was Daphne's birthday, we wanted her to choose where we had lunch. The only restaurant she wanted to go to was Cafe Rio... but they don't have those in Texas. So... I suggested we go to my favorite Mexican restaurant in Dallas... Mariano's.

I LOVE Mariano's! I dream about their salsa sometimes.

Ummm... excuse me, I ordered the LARGE bowl of soup....

And tiny tacos....

Sisters snuggling!

After all the yummy fajitas and salsa, it was time for the birthday song, this time in Spanish!

After lunch, we took Tori and the boys back for naptime, while I took Daphne for a birthday treat: Mani-pedi at the nail shop! Daphne's favorite color is blue:

Daphne LOVED getting her nails done... she often asks to go, so this was a fun birthday treat for her! Lots more birthday pics to come!

Herzlichen Gluckwunsch zum Geburtstag, Daphne!

While we were in Texas, we celebrated Daphne's 7th Birthday... a lot!

The night before she turned 7, we went to dinner with my Mom, sister & family, and met our dear friends, Phil and Heidi Graham. Heidi was like a second mother to me through much of my life, so it's always imperative that we visit with her! I was bummed that we didn't get to see either of her sons, OR their grandbaby, but maybe next time!

We met them at a German restaurant near my sister's house called The Bavarian Grill.

If you like German food, or have ever been to Germany or even wanted to go to Germany, this place is really fun! They have created the perfect German ambiance and I definitely had some flashbacks to our Summer in Germany! On the weekends, they have live accordian music and the girls just had to get their groove on:

Matt ordered an entire side of pig:

Okay, it was just a pork shank, but it was HUGE!!

The owners have a little mechanical train that rides around the top of the restaurant (a la Mr. Rogers' trolley), which was very fun for the kids to watch!

Tori did get a little restless waiting for everyone to eat, so we walked around the restaurant. They had pictures plastered everywhere and it was so fun to see all the places we had actually been able to visit! It still seems a little like a dream.

The waiter came over and played handbells to sing Happy Birthday to Daffodil in German... she LOVED it, can you tell?

Here's a video of the girls dancing! (Remember you'll have to actually visit the blog to see the video- just in case you are getting this via email! http://mattlaurahunter.blogspot.com/)

Guess What Daphne Did At School TODAY?!

Well, she got bangs. Not at school, but... something happened at school that necessitated the bangs. There was much drama and many tears on her part, so I won't go into details. But I think the finished look is pretty cute!

Here Comes the Bride!

One of Daphne's favorite things to do these days is play dress-up. I know, I know, What's new, right? Dress-Up has been one of Daphne's favorite activities for years now. But, the new part, I suppose, is that she is sort-of preoccupied with marriage these days. On this day, she dressed up like a bride (that's a slip on her head) and waited in the front room for Matt to come downstairs and marry her. Then, they came up with their own "secret dance moves" for the wedding dance. Tori and I got to sit on the couch and I performed the ceremony and then watched their magnificent dance moves. I totally wish I had recorded that!

The other new dimension in Daphne's imaginative play is that she likes to bring Tori into the mix... usually against Tori's will. But on this occasion, Tori wanted to dress up. When Daphne put on her pink tutu, Tori kept rubbing her dress and saying , "DapDap" (which is her word for Daphne), and then rubbing her own clothes and saying, "Baby." (which is what she calls herself). Daphne decoded the message and ran to get Tori her own frilly pink dress to wear. And Victoria loved it! She kept it on all morning and refused to have it removed. I had to pull it off of her as she screamed so that she could eat her lunch!

Dates with Daddy

A year or so before Victoria was born, we started taking the kids on dates. Usually Matt takes Daphne out and I take Isaac. Our little tradition has gotten much trickier since Tori was born, and now Matt usually tries to take each one on a date. On MLK day, Matt took Daphne sledding.
I love her face in this one- (those pink things at the bottom are other sleds...) Here she is on a much smaller hill:

And of course, the long, steep walk back up the hill:

Sometimes she needed a little help from Dad!

Sweet and Sassy!

The Sassy: April 30th was the last day of school for Daphne and me! We had a really great day and Daphne wanted to wear her yellow clothes because she was so excited about the sunshine. She looked positively darling and I said, "Daphne, you look like a ray of sunshine. She said, "I look like a boiled egg!"


Many of you know of and were praying for Matt's brother and his wife (Jude and Natalie) as they delivered their precious, stillborn daughter, Isabella, this April 2. Thank you so much for your prayers. Natalie has started a blog where she shares some of this experience: The Hunter Family, if you would like to know how they are doing.
And the Sweet:
I was able to go see Wicked Matt's parents and sisters. My kids love the soundtrack and we listened to it quite a bit during April. There is a song where Glinda and Elpheba are parting ways and a line that says:
"It well may be that we may never meet again in this lifetime
So let me say before we part: So much of me is made from what I learned from you;
You'll be with me, like a hand print on my heart."
We were listening to this particular part when Daphne said to me, "I know what that means, Mommy. It's like, if you died, I would always remember you and you would be like a hand print on my heart." And then she said, her eyes welling with tears, "I think... I think Baby Bella's hand print is on Natalie's heart."
Yes, yes it is, dear Daphne. We love you Jude and Nat!

Deep Thoughts by Daphne

Daphne Faith Hunter is a force to be reckoned with. At 4 1/2 years, She is beautiful and brilliant and demanding and challenging and powerful. Sort of like our own little Alpha female. We love her immensely and I know that I talk about her challenges often, but those are never meant to be complaints, merely expressions of thought. I have no shortage of those. The past week has been full of speculative thought on Miss Daphne's part and I just had to share some of the occasions with y'all:
We were listening to the song, "Popular" from the musical Wicked, which Daphne loves. We have tried to explain to her that in the song, Glinda is wrong, that being popular really is not as important as just being yourself and knowing that God loves you. After the song, Daphne said to me, "Mom, Not everyone is popular." And I said, "No, not everyone is popular, but that's okay." Daphne matter-of-factly replied (flipping hair behind her shoulder) "Some people aren't popular. That's just how God made them."I have only trimmed Daphne's hair once before and the ends were getting pretty ragged. So, I trimmed the ends off of Daphne's beautiful curls and Daphne asked if she could take them to school and share them for science time. I agreed and asked if she knew why they are science and said, "When you cut your hair will it stay cut, or will it grow longer?" Daphne very thoughtfully said, "It will grow longer." Then she looked up at me intensely and said ( holding the ends of her hair in her hand), " I will put them in my cubby and I will get them out every day and I will watch them grow longer and longer!"

On the way to school, we were listening to the news and I heard a story about a woman who is being charged with child endangerment for driving while talking on her cell phone and breastfeeding a baby at the same time. I shouldn't have been surprised that Daphne was listening, but a few seconds after the report she said, " Well that won't work." And I said, "what?" Daphne said, "Driving and feeding a baby and talking on your phone. You'd need 3 hands. That's the first reason it's a bad idea. The second reason is that you'd go to jail and the three reason is well, aliens might have three hands to do it, but aliens aren't real. So."

Daphne was eating a snack in the kitchen and said, "Mom- I don't think it is fair for you to love only Daddy and nobody else." I tried to explain the different types of love and why I love Daddy differently than her and other people. After my long oratory, she huffed and said, "Well, Jesus loves everybody."

Some of the questions/comments from just the past week:
"Why do we say Christ after Jesus?"
"What does dissolve mean?"
"Why do we say outer before space?"
"Why did you choose to marry in the temple?"
" I want to go to the sacred grove, but not at night- it would be too freaky."
" What's in a cloud?"

I'm sure there are more that I can't think of, but my favorite is:

"Mom, I don't want to get married because I want to live with you forever."