Melissa day

Today I enjoyed celebrating my niece Melissa's birthday. It was an awesome low key family time.

Wouldn't it be great if this was a picture of Ava and Vivi hugging Melissa hello?

Ah well it's still a sweet picture of them hugging another niece named Deborah who had been staying with Melissa in Toronto this week while attending a dental convention.

This is Melissa.

And this is Carmel. You'll see a lot of pictures of him because I never really get to see him at birthday parties because - screaming.

He's such a sweetie.

This is blackberry.

She's sweet too but she's shyer and wasn't as ready for her close up.

Josh cooked up quite a delicious spread for us!

Melissa was happy, truly she was!

Ha! I normally wouldn't include that one but it was just too funny.

Roxie is the best sleeper ever.

Carmel gave her a run for her money though.

Lots of fun games!

Ava with her mom Annette.

Annette and Melissa are the daughters of my brother Jim - ML's stemcell donor for those of you keeping score. Making Ava and Olivia his granddaughters. Deborah is the daughter of my sister Anne.

The ice cream truck came down the street for the first time ever! Maybe he heard it was Melissa's birthday.

It was a tough light but I love this picture anyway.

I'd sooner have this light:

Than this:

Must be annoying for those of you who like to see what's going on :)

Ava won the Apples to Apples game but Olivia had some very silly glasses.

Annette got some pretty questionable advice...

But we won a game anyway.

Awesome day!

Back to flowers tomorrow. Heading to the botanical gardens!

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