Veronica had a wonderful birthday weekend. How do I even begin to describe it?

Friday night: Cupcakes and presents galore from me and Jason, my parents, Coby and Chad, Aunt Cathy, and Debbie. Cards from Jason's family and one from Jeannie holding money for her piggy bank. She liked her presents, every single one, but some favorites emerged:

Orange socks from Coby
A blue skirt and shirt outfit with green trim from Coby
Slipper socks from Coby
The "Finding Nemo" book as part of the LeapFrog system from Debbie
The kitty-cat card from Nanny (my grandmother)

And the two biggies:

The birthday bear from my folks, made just like her ever-present yellow bear; and
A Dora DVD with her face super-imposed over a cartoon body, with Dora saying her name repeatedly, and with all the characters celebrating her birthday, also from my folks. (You can buy these sorts of things from here.)

Saturday she played with Audri and had a great time. They went outside with sidewalk chalk and bubble soap, and Audri got her a Dora and Boots for the bathtub that she will not take a bath without. When the girls were outside, we had them run around in their "bare feet," which they of course heard as "bear feet" and ran around giggling at the state of their tootsies.

Sunday had Veronica and I attending the next Lamaze class reunion, where she befriended Catherine's daughter Melanie and had a good time, albeit playing on her own more than playing with the other kids. They offered cupcakes with plastic rings on them, some adorned with Hello Kitty, some with Batman. Veronica, of course, picked out the Batman ring.

Veronica is probably under the impression that birthday celebrations last three days. And why wouldn't she? Especially when Dora keeps telling her it's her birthday almost every day on the TV.

We finally got Veronica off the Dora kick for a few minutes last night, as Jason, noting her affection for monsters (she adores Monsters, Inc.), put the first LOTR movie in the DVD player for her to view. Lest you think the basic plot went over her head, she started referring to the center of the action as "de monster ring" and giggled gleefully whenever someone turned ghoulish in trying to get it (especially Bilbo's grab for it in Rivendall, we watched that five times.) She yelled "oopsy-daisy!" during the rock troll battle and pointed out every time an Orc was onscreen. She was excited by Galadriel, "de queen!" In short, she loved it. We may view Part II tonight. Good lord, that's Jason's kid to a tee....

That's it for now, and I'd say that's enough. More later, though, as I still think of cute quotes and things happening over the past view days.