Yesterday was Pauline's 3rd birthday. On Wednesday night, after the kids were in bed and Olaf and Esther went to the Kindergarten for an information night, I made some strawberry muffins for Pauline's birthday. Those acted as her birthday cake/breakfast yesterday morning. We all sat down at the table together in the morning (which never happens during the week) and lit candles for Pauline and sang happy birthday. Pauline also opened her presents from the family, which were a big fuzzy pink Lillifee pillow with a fawn on it and a new dress. She put the dress on right away and wore it for most of the day. Then we ate the muffins before Olaf took the kids to Kindergarten and Maria's.

With everybody gone, Esther and I began preparations for the birthday party. I baked another 3 dozen muffins (strawberry muffins for the kids and Eierlikör muffins for the adults) and Esther baked a marble cake and a strawberry torte. Needless to say, there was plenty for everyone to eat. Esther also put up balloons and decorations (Lillifee, of course) and I made a birthday crown while Pauline was at Maria's.

The first gift that Pauline got to open when she got home was the big one. She got a new bike from Günter. It's so cute. It's all pink, of course, with a little flag on the front and training wheels. She was really excited to sit on it, but didn't really have much interest in actually riding it. Nonetheless, she was excited to have it.

The first guest, Zaynep, got there at about 2:30 in the afternoon. The plan was that her mom (Güner) was going to drop her off a little early and then go to the dentist because she had an appointment at 3. Güner just had a baby in March and had planned on taking the little Elef with her to the dentist, but then had second thoughts and Esther asked if I would be ok with keeping an eye on the little one. Of course that's never a problem for me, so I gladly took over. When Olaf first saw me holding the baby, the first thing he said was, "I didn't even notice you were pregnant," to which my response, of course, was, "Surprise!" A couple other people actually commented on the fact that Elef and I looked similar enough that you might think she was my baby, and she was pretty content to be in my arms as long as I kept her with her back against my chest so that she was upright and facing forward the whole time. She's so precious.

In the end Güner never went to her appointment because she just didn't the energy or desire to deal with it, so she stayed here the whole time, but I was still taking care of Elef for a good part of the time. It gave Güner a chance to relax a little bit without having to focus all of her energy and attention on the newborn, which she really appreciated. At one point she half jokingly asked me if I wanted to babysit, which of course I do, so I'm actually going over to their house tomorrow to take care of Elef for a couple hours while Güner has some errands to do. I'm actually really excited about it.

And of course David, my other little love, was there, too. I just can't get enough of that little boy.

The party itself went really well, aside from the fact that I kicked off the celebration by breaking Olaf's favorite schnapps glass. Ooops. He's not really upset about it, but I'm still obviously going to see if I can replace it for him. Other than that, though, it was a good day. There were 8 kids there: Pauline, Gustav, Fabio, David, Jette, Malte, Zaynep, and Julia. The girls all played very well together with almost no fighting or arguing or anything, and for the most part the boys left them alone, or at least played nicely with them. Aside from a few minor incidents and Gustav throwing a hissy fit because he wasn't allowed to open Pauline's presents for her, there really weren't any problems or anything. There were so many situations, though, where I felt like such a mom. I specifically recall one situation where I was sitting inside the house with Elef and heard Julia outside crying by the swing set, so I toted the baby out there to see what was wrong. There I stood, with a baby on one arm, comforting a crying child with the other, and lecturing a third about not hitting other kids. I often feel like I'm the first one to react when the kids are fighting, or start crying, or get hurt, even when it's not Gustav or Pauline. I just go straight into mom-mode when kids are there. I guess that's a good thing, though, and at least all the little ones like and trust me. Plus, the parents never seem to mind that they get a break from parenting every once in a while.

Today there was nothing in particular going on, just watching the World Cup with the family. Günter is still here because he's staying until Sunday, so after I drove Gustav to Kindergarten this morning we all had breakfast together. Then I took care of Pauline for a few hours while Esther took a nap and Olaf took Amelie to the vet to get her vaccinations. At around 1 Esther called the Italian restaurant down the street to order some pizzas, which I picked up and brought back to the house just in time for the start of the Germany v. Serbia game. I don't think I've ever seen such horrible refereeing in a professional game in my life. That jackass was just throwing cards all over the place, like he doesn't understand that a foul does not necessarily equal a yellow card. It doesn't help that Germany started the game out playing like crap, or that Podolski's PK was unsuccessful, but Klose's red card was killer. It's never easy having to play a man down like that, especially for almost the entire 90 minutes. And don't even get me started about the US goal against Slovenia that got called back for literally no reason. What a bunch of crap. It was not a good day for soccer. Let's hope that tomorrow fares a little better.