The Lightner Family: Seven is Heaven…

Grace turned Seven just two weeks ago… my baby is SEVEN! That is really hard to believe. She is just wonderful and we are incredibly blessed to have her as our daughter. Because her birthday came on a Sunday this year with Life Group in the evening, we had to be a little creative with how we celebrated her special day…. we just made it into a whole weekend event. On Saturday we spent the day together as a family and then had her special dinner of Hard Shelled Tacos. For an added surprise, our friends from Kansas were in town and had dinner with us… it was great catching up with them again! Grace LOVED her dinner… and ate SEVERAL tacos with rice!

We started off the next morning with some presents from us, Grampa and Nanna, and MomMom. She had to open the card from Grampa and Nanna before any of the other gifts!The card from Florida DID contain SEVEN dollars… Grace was hoping for that, expecting that, and she was NOT disappointed!

MomMom sent a nice card and a Dalmatian costume… she loved it and immediately tried it on! I KNOW she will use that over and over again to play puppies, their favorite game!

Grampa and Nanna sent some great things to use in the coming spring… spring IS coming, right? Grace loved her butterfly net and bug cage…oh, the fun she is going to have finding bugs, putting them in the cage, and then observing them like a real scientist!

She also got a container for growing seeds where you can see the roots growing and then some gardening gloves to use to do the planting!

As a gift from us, we got her a gift card to go to Build a Bear to make an animal of her choice. It was to be a special girls date… lunch after church and then to the mall. She had never been there before so this was going to be real treat!!!

For breakfast, she and I made cinnamon rolls… her absolute favorite, but I wouldn’t let her have seven even though she BEGGED!

Then the girls and I went to church without the boys – they were not feeling well. I had to teach a class, so I HAD to be there – Danny had the day off except for Life Group that night!

After church, the girls and I went out for lunch… a really big treat for the three of us to be on a date. The girls LOVED getting to have soda as well – Grace picked Diet Coke to be just like her Daddy! I guess that is what a grown up girl drinks!

Then we headed to the mall to go the Build A Bear Store… in the very last bin of the store, Grace found what she was looking for. She found a DALMATIAN! I knew that is what she was looking for…. she needs another one for her collection… her family of dogs that she sleeps with each and every night! She was delighted to see its black spots, and she named him LUCKY after the dog in the 101 Dalmatians Movie. First she stuffed the dog and then she made a wish on a butterfly to add to the inside of the dog. The lady from the store sewed up the puppy and gave us his birth certificate. Next, Grace found some clothes for him… pajamas actually! Here she is dressing him for the first time!