Happy 9th Birthday, Zoe!

Hard to believe, but Zoe turned 9 today! And Zoe will remind you that it happened at 3 o'clock this morning -- she's still so thrilled to have discovered that information about the time of her birth! She wanted to set her alarm for 3 a.m., but I put my foot down on that one.

It was a very Chinese birthday this year. Zoe declared last month that for her birthday she wanted "everything Chinese and panda." I did lots of running around and found a veritable smorgasbord of pandas -- a Groovy Girl panda, Hello Kitty dressed as a panda, a "realistic" stuffed panda, a "realistic" panda figurine, a My Little Petshop panda, a Hello KaiLan panda tshirt, a blown glass panda ornament, a National Geographic panda game for Nintendo DS. Whew! Add in a handful of Chinese tchotkes -- a Buddha magnet, a dragon backpack charm, an ornament of a Chinese girl playing with a Chinese yo-yo, the American Girl Spring Pearl doll I bought years ago and saved for her -- and I think we achieved success in the "everything Chinese and panda" department.

I went to have lunch with Zoe at school, and brought a celebratory dessert for the class -- ice cream and fortune cookies. The fortune cookies were a HUGE hit with the 3rd grade. They're at such a great age -- old enough to read the fortune by themselves, but still a little young to get much of the advice being doled out. Asking them what they thought their fortune meant was a hoot. They really had a ball sharing their fortunes with each other. I wasn't sure whether they'd like the fortune cookies, but no worries! We'll definitely do that again.

Family celebration tonight with Mimi and Grandpa. We went out for dinner and Zoe got to pick the restaurant, and given the theme of the day, you won't be surprised to hear she picked Chinese.

It was murder getting the girls to bed tonight -- Zoe said, "I don't want this day to ever end!" I, on the other hand, am worn out and can't wait to take myself to bed where I can shed a few tears because my baby is growing up so fast!