Happy 6th Birthday, Lillie!!

January is a busy month for the Sakai's. We just celebrated Keola's birthday on the 7th and a week later it's Lillie's BIG day! I'm a little late in posting. With our internet down for a week, ice/snow, sickness, and stake conference, I'm only now getting around to updating our blog.

On the 14th, we told Lillie she had 4 surprises that day. 1st Surprise: We headed to the mall where she thought for sure we were going to the inside park. But instead, we REALLY surprised her by going to the movies to watch Tangled for the second time.

2nd Surprise: To Lillie's excitement, after the movie we headed downstairs to...of course, the inside park.

Love, love, loving this dress, Lillie decided to dress up for her birthday!
After playing for only a short time, the mall had to "clean" the play area. So, Lillie decided to go exploring in the jungle.

aka, the mall potted plants.

Mommy and her Big Girl!

3rd Surprise: Dinner at a new restaurant...The Melting Pot.

The Melting Pot is a fondue restaurant that is really fun and really yummy. First course, cheese, of course!

Lillie dipped bread pieces, Granny Smith apples, and some cut veggies, in some delicious melted cheese.

The entrees were plates of raw teriyaki marinated sirloin, pork and veggie dumplings, duck, chicken, shrimp, and some vegetables.

After dinner, it was time to blow out the candles.

Happy Birthday, Lillie! Make a wish.

So the morning of Lillie's birthday, she was so excited, she got up a little early. You will see the repercussions in the following pictures!!

After the cake, it was present time!

Aunty Shelly and Nika sent Lillie some rubberbands and clips specifically to wear with Lillie's blonde locks!

Despite the sleepy eyes, Lillie was also THRILLED to get a drawn out treasure map of our house with an "X" marking the spot of a gift from Haliaka. Once we got home, Lillie was so tired she held off the treaure hunt until the next morning. The first thing the next morning, Lillie found her disposable camera and picture album to fill. Cousin Haliaka is TRICKY!!

Aunty Bertha sent a Sleeping Beauty story book.

And cute stuffed animal. (Remember the note about repercussions!)

Grandma sent a cute paper vase filled with flowers and her picture.

Cousin Katie, Aunty Nani, Uncle Joe sent a travel Scrabble game, which Lillie loves playing.

Nana and Papa sent a box a beautiful shells and jewels, which Lillie can't get enough of!

Repercussions!!

4th Surprise: Sleeping in Mommy and Daddy's room! Of course, Keola and I sort of forgot about this one, but not so surprising, Lillie reminded us about it a few days before her birthday.

Lillie had been asking about a Pillow Pet for ages now, so Keola and I decided to get her a purple unicorn.

Here was Lillie's set up birthday night.

Lillie's birthday week at school was a wild one. We had an early dismissal on Tuesday and late start on Wednesday due to icy roads, a scheduled early dismissal on Thursday and no school on Friday due to a teacher's workshop, and a holiday on the following Monday. So, on Tuesday, we decided to make cupcakes to celebrate Lillie's birthday at school. Her teacher made a little birthday "crown" that Lillie wore all day and the class sang Happy Birthday to her followed by chocolate cupcakes.

It was a GREAT birthday for a sweet girl!!

Happy Yakudoshi, Keola!!

Keola celebrated his 41st birthday last night and we were SO fortunate to have him mom help in a BIG way. We first stopped at Georgetown Cupcake for the birthday treat. I know, some may say, "Who would pay good money for simple cupcakes!!??" Trust me, I was one of them. Keola always said we should try them and I just mocked him thinking what is so special about cupcakes!! Well, he finally convinced me and after one bite...WOW! I was blown away at how super rich, moist and delicious these little cakes were! Well, I couldn't resist and bought a dozen for the evenings celebration.

Then the fun began. We headed to Grace's Mandarin, a fancy Chinese restaurant that we went to for Lillie's birthday last year.
I made a menu for our guests, filled with scallops, shrimp, crispy beef, and the list goes on. It was so YUMMY! In the excitement of the occasion and frankly the drooling over the food, I forgot to take a picture of the super delicious, beautiful dinner. Instead, I just have a picture of the menu I made. Sorry!
Here are our friends. You all know Keola. Below him is Brian Williams, friend and also counselor in the stake presidency, and his wife Jennifer. You all know Lillie. Sharon and Rick Slade, also friends from the stake.
Happy family!
I JUST missed Lillie's BLOATED mouth full of chocolate ganache cupcake (her second by the way!). When this girl sees a camera, she tries posing as best she can. I DID get the chocolatey crumbs on her lips!

After all was done, these 4 scrumptious bites were left for us to devour.

Happy Birthday Sweetie!

Outside the restaurant. Seriously, so grand and so delish. We promise to take anyone if you visit us!!

If you've been keeping up on our blog, this picture has been taken before, just different characters!

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Thanks SO MUCH, Mom!! We had a GREAT time and a wonderful Yakudoshi celebration!

I couldn't resist putting in this super cute picture of Lillie on her way to school. She's such a little string bean!

So on New Year's Eve, Keola and I decided to take advantage of the after Christmas sales. We headed to Target and tried to find some decorations to possibly make a snowman tree for Winter. Here's the goodies we found...after picking through a LOT of things that were left over.
While looking for snowman things, we found a few great things to add to our Christmas decorations next year.

After all was said and done, our receipt said we saved $198!!! Shocking, I know!! Wow! What a difference a 75% clearance makes! Why haven't we taken advantage of this before??!!?

So on New Year's Day we took down our Christmas decorations and started decorating for Winter.

Lillie is keeping Mr. and Mrs. Snowman company.

The snowman wreath is keeping the door warm and festive.

A few snowmen on the bookshelf with a couple almost falling off, on purpose!

Here's Lillie with the finished product.

Happy New Year!

We celebrated the new year pretty quietly. We ran some errands then took Lillie to one of her favorite places...the "inside park". Lillie always has fun and always meets new friends.

Meet the captain of the ship.

Thank goodness for new friends and inside parks on cold winter days!

After playtime, we tried to find a fun place for New Year's Eve dinner. We finally ended up at...

Waiting for dinner... and finding fun games to play.
I know this is blurry, but you may not have believed me if I told you Lillie had...PASTA!!

Mom's dinner

Dad's dinnerDelicious food and fun family time!