Two

i know it's been a really long time, but this is a really long post with lots of pictures and a video! (Ha!) yes, our darling amelia is now 2. we had this year's festivities in LA, and it felt like a wedding. we had the rehearsal dinner on her actual birthday--a big chinese banquet feast. no fireworks though, amelia went to bed way before. then the next day, we had a zoo-themed party at nancy yiyi's pool house.

amelia even wore a dress to match the theme--uncle paul and annie yiyi got her this gorgeous dress with giraffes:



one of my aunts is visiting from france; she owns a fabulous vietnamese restaurant and kindly agreed to make all the food (vietnamese spring rolls, grilled shrimp, beef skewers, shrimp papaya salad):



then there was swimming:

then there were cupcakes:

then opening presents (here with alicia's help):

then hitting the pinata; poor pinata, pictured here, was beheaded by cousin ryan:

so what presents did amelia get? well, she got about eight dresses (seriously, girls really do get more clothes than toys as gifts), a ton of other clothes, a real china tea set (that she loves, but i'm not sure how long it's going to last; to start things off, cousin andrew broke the handle off the creamer on the first day), and a super cool, modern dollhouse, pictured below:
she spent a good 15 minutes giving the momma doll a bath and putting her on the potty. too bad she doesn't put herself on the potty. but anyway.

amelia also got to spend some time with her great grandma. although great grandma wasn't feeling up to going to the party, she did share some pretty great laughs with amelia:

all in all, it was a fabulous weekend. thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes!