Fearlessly Four (even in that heat)!

Gather one newly crowned Four Year old

Add in 9 other cousins/siblings

Mix liberally with 105 Degree heat

Sprinkle some sugar, alcohol and snackies on top

and BAKE we did.

Another niece celebrated another milestone last weekend, and the sun decided to honor the celebration by breaking out in gigantic rays of hellish heat. Thank god we had the pool to escape into!

Here she is ladies and gentlemen...this four year old ain't takin no guff from NOBODY - she's got two older siblings and one younger one.  She knows the game.

This is basically what the party looked like all day and evening:

 Cute Teen Cousin:

 Touch football in the pool was a popular attraction:

 and meanwhile, off in the shallows:

 and more touch football:

 and more cute cousins:

Here we have the Fearless Four Year Old showing off her newly acquired swimming and jumping talents to all:

 as well as her newly acquired aging mechanism:

 A brief respite from the pool was afforded to allow the party girl to check out the gifts:

 Barbies, shoes, clothes, Dora Crap and a hula hoop were unwrapped within 5-7 minutes:

Here she is with her daddy - so cute!

and then it was back to the pool to cool off!  Here is her cousin giving free lessons in how to use the newly acquired hula hoop:

 while her other cousin stole the shades!

Did I mention it was 105 degrees?

Did I mention it was 105 degrees?

She managed to gather enough strength to extinguish the candle before the flame added to the already intense heat!

Here are some last shots of the day....Monkey man:

 DEVOTED (Ha Ha) Sisters:

And a parting shot of the party girl, in her newly acquired Old Navy party dress:

(Did I mention it was 105 Degrees?)

Poolside Party - Fun in the Sun!

These kids keep getting older and older!  I swear my niece looked like this just the other day:

Now here she is, hosting her very own pool party at the ripe age of 12 years! (that's her in the yellow wrap)

As guests arrived, they joined in on the fun in many different ways.  Some were tossed in pool rather unceremoniously:

 While others made their own way in:

 and still others chose to hang poolside:

One of the party highlights was celebrating the first losses of teeth for two of the cousins - here they show off what they gave up for the money they earned (something like $14 between them - damn!!)

One of the nephews appears to be morphing into a Dennis the Menace mode here:

While a sweet niece posed rather nicely for me:

Note to self:  Do not tell these kids to say "cheese" anymore.  They take things way too literally:

Now here we have a REAL slice of CHEESE!

...and a glimpse of some sisterly sweetness:

 ...and back to the CHEESE:

 ...more CHEESE:

 another glance at more sweetness:

After hours of swimming, snacking and sunning, the party girl was finally ready to settle back and do some gift opening:

 a very happy kid opening her new keyboard from Noni:

Of course, as is the custom around here, as soon as the paper, ribbons and cards are swept aside...the cake must make it's appearance.  Someone, I WON'T SAY WHO, was a little excited at the prospect of random crumbs falling to the ground:

Here is the birthday girl in all her glory:

While wandering the house later on I came upon this quaint scene of grandma helping the birthday girl set up her keyboard:

A lovely party day was had by all - I even managed to get one of those "awesome type" photos that come with a combination of luck, timing and many, many throw away shots before and after the winning one appears: