AN: I've been more inspired to write on this story than my other story so for those of you waiting on Toe to Toe it may be a few more weeks.

Special thanks to PTB betas CapriciousC and AnthroBug you were both extremely helpful. Also a huge thank you to Pemberly Rose my lovely prereader and to Twilight Cakes for the banner.

Disclaimer: SM owns Twilight.

Someday I'll wish upon a star

And wake up where the clouds are far

Behind me.

Where troubles melt like lemon drops

Away above the chimney tops

That's where you'll find me.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Judy Garland, Wizard of Oz

Jake's Birthday

Bella POV

Edward had let the family know that Jake's birthday was fast approaching and Renesmee wanted to do something special for him; so we decided to throw a surprise party. I called Sam to let him know, but we decided not to tell anyone in Jake's pack because they couldn't hide their thoughts from Jacob. Esme and I cooked lasagnas for the humans and the wolves while Edward and Renesmee made several different types of cake.

She was so independent it made me sad sometimes. She was growing up so fast that it was hard to give her all the experiences a normal child might have. She looked through the recipe book, and was so enamored with the beautiful cakes, that she decided to make four. Of course, my husband, bless his heart, couldn't say no to our little girl. She told us all about the candy Billy had given her and how much she enjoyed lemon drops; therefore she picked a lemon crème cake. The other three cakes she chose because of their pictures. They were Italian cream cake, red velvet cake, and baked Alaska. I was very concerned about the baked Alaska, but Edward promised she wouldn't be allowed near the confection while they were using the mini blow torch on it.

I was stunned when Edward asked if she wanted to lick the spoon for the cream cheese icing and she actually enjoyed it. Perhaps getting her to eat human food would just require more sweet things at the start. Carlisle loved the idea and decided that we should begin introducing fruits to supplement her diet.

Renesmee was also working on a special gift for Jacob with Esme's help, but neither would reveal their plans.

Billy and Sam managed to keep Jake busy for a few days before the party. He only had time to visit Renesmee for about an hour a day at the cottage and both were beginning to show signs of crankiness. We explained to Renesmee that if we wanted the party to be a surprise, we needed to keep Jake away while we prepared. We had the food prepared, the house decorated, and the guests, with the exception of Jake's pack, invited. Alice laid out several outfits on the porch. Sam assigned some of the younger wolves to patrol during the party. After everyone arrived, he phased to tell Jake that we had a situation and he needed to get his pack over here ASAP.

Jacob POV

We arrived at the Cullens' place and Edward was waiting outside. He told us all to get dressed since there were humans in the house.

What? Sam told me there was an emergency. Please tell me no one bit a human. My thoughts were laced with panic while I pulled on the clothes he gave me.

"No, nothing like that. We just needed to talk to you and Sam about the people who are in the house," he answered with a calm smirk.

Who's here? I asked, while slipping on the really expensive shoes that were with the clothes.

"You'll see," he said cryptically.

When we were all over-dressed, we walked into the house to a chorus of, "Surprise!"

I saw a "Happy Birthday, Jacob!" banner hanging from the ceiling.

Was I really that out of it that I didn't realize today was my birthday? I'd been busy doing errands for Billy and running patrols for Sam since all the wolves in school had exams the next week and we wanted to give them extra time to study. So all the patrols were being run by Leah, Paul, Jared, Sam, and me; however, only Leah and I were unemployed, so we were taking most of the burden.

I smiled at the little bronze-haired angel who had obviously orchestrated this. I noticed all the imprints, most of the wolves, Charlie, Sue, Billy, old Quil, and all the Cullens were there. I noticed that the four wolves who were missing were the four newest, all of them were twelve and thirteen. I was a bit worried about them running patrol with no supervision; they were only kids.

Edward quietly answered my thoughts, "Sam has Drew sitting in the woods just outside the house and I'm monitoring the patrol while Nathan, David, and Josh run."

I relaxed and let myself enjoy the party, knowing Edward would let Sam and I know if anything went wrong. I was surprised all the wolves were okay with eating the food made by vamps, but I guess we'd gotten past our old issues.

Nessie was so proud of the cakes she made. She wanted me to taste all of them before I ate the lasagna, but luckily Edward stepped in to explain that they came last and that we needed to put candles on one first. The party was a lot of fun and it was nice to see the Cullens and my friends getting along so well.

After most of the guests left, Billy gave me a full set of woodworking tools. Then the Cullens began giving me their overly extravagant gifts and I couldn't say no to anything because I'd make Nessie feel bad since she worked so hard planning the party.

Edward and Bella went first. Edward handed me an envelope and said, "This is as much for my peace of mind as it is for you."

I raised my eyebrow, confused, as I opened the envelope. There was a letter inside and some other papers.

Jacob,

As shocked as we all were when you imprinted on Renesmee, we now know we couldn't ask for a better protector and friend to our little girl. You are a member of this family now and with that comes certain privileges. One of those privileges is the opportunity to attend any college, regardless of the cost – when you are ready to go to college, we will happily cover the cost. Additionally, I am giving you access to an account we set up for you. We know you will be reluctant to take funds from us, but this is an interest only account. We have a trust set up for Renesmee and this account takes a very small percentage of the interest earned on that account and deposits it into your account on a monthly basis. Please take this as a gift of the heart. We care about you.

Edward & Bella

The other documents were the legal papers attached to the account he had just given me. I had no idea how much money was in it, and I think Edward wanted to save that conversation for another day, so I simply thanked him sincerely and moved on to the rest of the presents.

The next gift was a full designer wardrobe from Alice. Emmett gave me a brand new high-tech phone with all the bells and whistles, while Rosalie gave me luggage.

"Ready to get rid of me so quickly, Blondie?" I quipped.

"You'll see, dog. Move on to Jasper's present," she answered.

I did as she said and opened a long box with a blue snowboard, a jacket, and boots.

"Awesome, but I've never been snowboarding before."

"Don't worry, we'll teach you – the others prefer skiing, but Emmett and I like doing tricks on boards," Jasper said.

Esme hurried over with a smile on her face and handed me a thin box. "This is from Carlisle and I."

I opened the tiny box and saw an airline ticket for Jacob Wolfe, dated February 1, 2007, to a location I couldn't pronounce in Sweden.

"We're going to Riksgränsen, Sweden next month for two weeks for a ski trip and we'd like you to join us. You can bring anyone in the pack you would like as long as they can make up any school they miss. Jasper already has passports for everyone in your pack," Esme explained.

My jaw dropped. When Jasper said they'd teach me to board, I'd assumed he was talking about doing that locally.

Seeing that I hadn't reacted the way she expected, Esme continued, "We prefer Riksgränsen, for a couple reasons – mostly that it's in the Arctic Circle so we will be visiting during perpetual twilight and night and we won't have to worry about the sun. Also, we all need to relax and we thought it would be fun to visit Scandinavia. The ski resort doesn't actually open until the week after we leave, but we have arranged for accommodations and activities. There's plenty of snow when we'll visit, but not enough sun to make it worth the resort's time to open up for the public and turn on the lights, but we don't need much light with our eyesight."

I hugged her since I still hadn't come up with words and she always felt like a mom to me.

"Thank you," I whispered.

"You're very welcome, Jacob," Esme responded softly.

"Jacob, just so you're aware, we were serious. Bring any members of your pack you like, just let us know soon so we can arrange tickets, accommodations, and sporting equipment for them," Edward told me.

"Thank you all. I obviously need to ask them to find out if they're interested and available."

Then it was time to open Nessie's gift. I tore the paper off the small rectangular box and opened it to see a homemade picture frame covered in tiny heart-shaped rocks. In the frame was a picture of Nessie and me from the previous week. Esme had taken it. I was really touched she had made this for me and it meant more to me than any of the other presents.

"Did you make this?"

"Grandma helped with the glue gun. Apparently, I'm not allowed to use anything hot. Daddy wouldn't let me use the little blowtorch for your cake either."

I said a quick thank you in my head to Edward, then asked Nessie, "Where did you get the rocks?"

"I found them in the woods when I've been out hunting and going to and from our house."

"Thank you so much, I absolutely love it Nessie." I gave her a big hug.

After thanking everyone and bringing Billy home, I headed out to talk to my pack in human form and ask them if they wanted to join us in Sweden. I was surprised that Leah wanted to come; she was usually a bit standoffish with the vamps. Embry and Seth wanted to come, but they had to check with their moms and make sure they could make up the school work. Quil wasn't interested in being away from Claire for two weeks. I understood; on the plus side for him, he'd get two weeks off from patrolling since no one would be able to link with him in the pack mind and Sam didn't want to put Quil at risk like that. Sam's pack was giving me a gift of running extra patrols while we were gone; apparently, he and Carlisle had done some negotiating for my birthday.

Edward POV

Carlisle and I had spoken extensively about our lifestyle and introducing Jacob to it. He was a proud young man and I knew he wasn't happy about me just handing him an account and a scholarship to college, but he was also kind enough not to refuse it with his father and my family there. Bella was pretty upset with me when I told her after Jake's birthday party what we had given him. She understood his perspective on the gifts and didn't want to make him feel uncomfortable.

"Love, you are now a Cullen and he may not be one of us by name yet, but he is a member of this family for better or worse," I explained gently. "You and he seem to think the better parts are the worst parts. I need to work on acclimating him to being a member of this family and that includes financial considerations. You, my dear, made your choice when you married me to accept the fact that you are now a wealthy woman. We've never really discussed just how extensive our wealth is, but if you and I don't slowly acclimate Jacob, then one day Carlisle and Esme will present him with a trust and he'll be really angry at them. He needs to understand it's not pity money, it's just how we live and we choose not to concern ourselves with acquiring money when we already have plenty."

Bella sighed. "Edward, I just worry that these huge gifts will make him feel inadequate."

"Love, though this may seem extravagant to you or Jacob, it isn't to us Cullens. Since we have plenty of money, we don't mind giving each other nice gifts. I gave Alice a Porsche less than a year ago and that wasn't a huge gift. Carlisle bought Esme an island, which is what we would consider a huge gift, and even that didn't make a dent in his net worth. Anything under a hundred grand is basically pocket change to us and, no, when I said we gave Jake pocket change we didn't give him that much. His account will accumulate two to three thousand a month depending on the current market rates in the mutual funds I set aside for Renesmee in her mini trust."

"Mini trust?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, I knew giving him a portion of the interest from her real trust funds would be too much right now, so I set up a mini trust that I would have put in Jacob's name, but I was worried that would upset him too. This seemed like the best way to deal with the issues I knew Jacob would have while slowly habituating him to having some access to money."

"Why are you so insistent that he take our money?"

"Bella, love, do you want Jake to go find a job that will take him away from Renesmee and his studies? If we can't convince him to take some money from us, he'll have to do that to support his father. I just want her to be happy and him being around keeps her happy and safe. Besides, how do you think Esme, Emmett, Rosalie, Jasper, and Alice all became wealthy? I had a substantial inheritance after my parents passed away and Carlisle had money from his years of living as a doctor with no dependents. Also, the Volturi gave him some money when he was with them. Carlisle and I were exceptionally good at investing in our own rights, but when Alice joined us she had the ability to multiply our funds. Carlisle has given us all a certain amount of money to live our lives and with Alice's help we all grew what we started with. Everyone, other than Carlisle and myself, walked into this family without personal wealth. Jasper and Alice were nomads, her fashion tastes were sated through theft before Carlisle provided her with money to play with. Jasper was always fairly low maintenance. Rosalie was just the opposite – she walked into our family as a social climber and she has always been high maintenance. Emmett was a poor coal miner in Appalachia before he went hunting that day and almost died. Esme was a battered wife and a school teacher. We may have had an easier time transitioning to the financial implications of becoming Cullens because we had no ties to maintain with our previous families. You and Jake will have to adjust while also being the children of middle class parents. I'm sorry, but that is the reality of your lives."

"I'll do my best, but shouldn't you explain all this to Jake rather than ambushing him with large gifts?"

I pinched the bridge of my nose in frustration, she still didn't understand that these weren't large gifts. "Bella, there are some things that are just tradition in this family and you and Jacob will have to adjust to them. For example, no one other than me purchases cars in this family. I buy all the vehicles as gifts. Esme buys or builds the homes. We will never go house hunting because it would take away something that Esme enjoys doing for us. Alice purchases the clothing. Do you really want to take away their joy by telling them they can't do those things for you or Jake? I promise I'll talk to Jake about all this when he's ready, but not before. Until then, Carlisle and I will keep slipping in small gifts here and there to get him used to the idea of having money."

"Small," she huffed sarcastically.

"Money and education are two of the advantages of being part of this family. He needs to get used to it."

Bella obviously didn't want to talk about money anymore and changed the subject. "Speaking of education, when are we going to begin teaching Renesmee? She wants to learn."

"Soon, I need to confirm subjects with each family member then I'll unveil the plan tomorrow, if you approve of it, love."

Bella POV

Edward laid out an incredibly rigorous curriculum for Renesmee and I was concerned it would be too much pressure, but he reminded me that we needed to allow her to set the pace and she wasn't a normal child. I'll admit it seemed extremely ambitious to me, but Edward assured me that she would be better off with a challenging education and promised that no one would put pressure on her. I understood after he explained that and realized that my concerns were the result of thinking of her as a normal child. She was extremely excited to be able to learn the material. She helped Edward choose which subjects she would learn when and who her teachers would be for each subject.

The entire family had a role in her education. Esme and I were assigned Literature and English, Edward and Carlisle took on Natural Sciences, while Jasper and Rosalie would handle the Social Sciences. The history of both humans and vampires was assigned to the two family members who had experienced the most, Jasper and Carlisle. Emmett and Alice were teaching math since they handled most of the money for the family.

There were other subjects she wanted to learn as well: music and language. Then we added some mandatory subjects, including power control and expansion, self defense, and how to behave like a human. Edward and Rose worked with her on her music with three tiny instruments that were just right for her tiny form: a piccolo flute, a quarter violin, and a miniature piano. The first time she picked up her piccolo with Jake in the house, I thought he would die; she had no control over her pitch so the notes were all sharp and Jake had to leave because of the headache he was getting. He loved her, but he was a wolf and high pitched sounds had quite an effect. It was made worse when Emmett purchased everyone dog whistles so we could all greet Jake appropriately.

She decided she wanted to learn as many languages as she could. Edward created a plan where she could master a language by immersion in about six months. Renesmee preferred not to speak, but understood that to learn languages she had to speak them. She was assigned to two family members for each language. During this intense immersion, when she wasn't in formal lessons she was instructed only to speak in the designated language to each person. The languages she declared she would learn were Mandarin, Arabic, Russian, Japanese, German, Greek, Latin, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Italian, and Quileute. Edward decided she should tackle Latin and the Romance languages first, then Greek, Quileute, and German, and last Mandarin, Japanese, Arabic, and Russian since he thought she would need additional time for those last four languages since they were some of the world's most difficult languages. Edward was instructing her in all languages except Quileute.

The entire family would be responsible for teaching her right from wrong and how to behave like a human. Jake was responsible for ensuring she was exposed to social situations with humans when visiting with the pack families.

Jacob POV

Nessie and I were heavily engaged in our school work with the Cullens. I was basically covering any subjects that would come up on a GED test or the SAT and ACT tests while her education was a bit more rigorous. I was excited for the trip and Seth and Embry had made arrangements to join us so with Leah we would have three of my pack with us for our ski trip.

The day of our trip had arrived and Carlisle had rented a minibus to get the thirteen of us and our luggage to the airport. It was a twenty-one hour flight with two layovers. None of my pack had ever been on a plane before, so we were all lucky that Jasper was with us to keep us calm. Everyone was concerned about Bella and Nessie being around so many humans in an enclosed space, but we had wolves to dull the scent and Jasper to keep them calm. Before leaving, Edward made sure both Bella and Nessie hunted until they were full. Additionally, Carlisle had somehow managed to get a medical pass to carry packets of blood on the plane in case they were needed. He could give the girls a packet to drink in the bathroom if they needed it. It was our hope that neither would need it. No one wanted Bella to try human blood – she had resisted this long – but she had never tasted it since becoming a vampire. Our party of thirteen took up most of the first class cabin on all three flights, so there wasn't much worry about the closeness of other humans. The vamps each got meals and then discreetly gave them to us when the flight attendants weren't paying attention.

Nessie was very shy on the flights. She sat beside me for most of the trip, occasionally swapping seats with one of her parents to cuddle or talk with them. The flight attendants were totally enchanted by her and offered her coloring books and extra cookies. She happily took both, but didn't really see the amusement in the coloring books. She thought she could draw better pictures without the black outlines.

Suddenly I heard Alice gasp. "Stop breathing!" she said just loud enough for us. "Jake, get a grip on Nessie!"

I held my girl close and then a few seconds later I knew what had happened. I smelled blood and then Nessie started struggling to get away from me. I saw that Edward had a firm grip on Bella. Our flight attendant had cut herself on something in the galley. Emmett swapped seats with Alice to keep a grip on Jasper.

I realized that the vamps were okay since they didn't need to breathe, but Nessie was really struggling. I took one of the blankets and covered her up with it and then whispered firmly, "If you need to bite, you bite me. Okay, Nessie?"

She put her palm to my face. No, Jacob, I promised you and your dad that I wouldn't bite you anymore.

"I don't care," I told her firmly. "If you need to, you go ahead and bite me or tell your grandpa to take you to the bathroom and give you a packet of blood, okay?"

I'd like Grandpa to bring me to the bathroom, please, she begged through her gift.

"Doc, Nessie needs you to take her to the bathroom," I told him.

He was there a few seconds later bringing Nessie to the restroom and, shortly thereafter, he returned her to me and she seemed much more in control. He checked on Jasper and Bella and then he went to help the flight attendant, so her wound wouldn't tempt any other family members. I got Nessie to take a nap a while later and she slept until we touched down in Newark for our first layover. We found a mostly empty corner in the airport where we could talk about what happened on the first flight.

"What happened exactly?" I asked Edward and Alice.

"The flight attendant broke a wine glass and cut herself on it. Everyone did extremely well," Edward answered.

We talked for a while longer and I was worried about how the next flight would go, but Edward assured me that everything would be fine. I had to accept his word. What could be worse than a flight attendant bleeding in a cabin full of vampires?

The second and third legs of our flight were much better and my pack and I even slept for a while.

It was dark when we arrived even though it was mid-morning. Edward rented four SUVs and signed us all up as drivers on all the cars. The lady behind the counter told us about fifteen times that the cars ran only on diesel and that we'd be responsible if we accidentally filled up with regular gas. As we walked out of the airport, I expected it to be colder since the pilot had said the temperature was negative twenty. Edward told me the pilot was using Celsius and it was really only negative four Fahrenheit.

We went to the resort and got checked in. They got five luxury condos for us, one for each family unit and one for my pack. Our condo had a fully stocked kitchen, four bedrooms, a fireplace, and a hot tub. We unpacked, got cleaned up, and then met everyone at Carlisle and Esme's condo.

Carlisle explained the arrangements they had made, "We are free to use any of the facilities here at any time, but the staff just want a couple hours notice to make sure things are up and running. So, if you want to use the pool or one of the lifts just call guest services and the staff will get everything set up and then leave us alone. I've paid for privacy, so they are aware we don't want anyone around when we are using the resort. However, humans are a bit curious, so if you want to drop the pretense and use your full speed, strength, or agility be sure to check with Edward first to make sure there are no observers. Jasper's in charge of all the sports equipment."

Jasper took over, "I've made sure we have snowboards and skis to fit everybody. I want everyone who's new to this to try both so you can decide which you prefer. We also have some very fast snowmobiles and sleds that I've rented to play with during the week. Today we'll do bunny slope lessons on skiing and snowboarding for the wolves, Bella, and Nessie so we'll each bring our boards and skis. Emmett and I are in charge of the boarding lessons, but first Rosalie and Alice will be doing the skiing lessons."

We got on our ski gear and headed out to the slopes. Rosalie and Alice explained proper posture, how to turn, how to stop, and how to ski in most terrain. Then we all gave it a try. Nessie, Bella, Leah, and I got the hang of it easily, but Seth and Embry were a bit competitive and wanted to see who could throw more snow on a stop. It was hilarious watching the two of them face plant.

"Seth, Embry!" Rosalie yelled. "Who told you to stop like that? We're starting with the basics."

Edward chuckled, "They were mimicking what they've seen in the Olympics."

Emmett and Jasper were laughing loudly and each of them pulled the stop Embry and Seth were trying and showered them with snow.

"Boys!" Esme chided her sons.

"Sorry," they both answered sheepishly while giving Seth and Embry a hand up.

Rosalie then explained again how they were to use a "V" stop until she taught them more advanced techniques. Alice taught us to ski with or without poles and Nessie asked why we bothered with poles when skiing without them was so easy. Alice explained that when we start doing moguls they'll be essential. Once we all got the hang of basic and intermediate skiing, Emmett and Jasper got to begin their lesson on snowboarding after we swapped equipment.

They explained that basic boarding was a matter of balance and the trick was to not be afraid of falling. We did fall a lot, but eventually we got the hang of it. Our learning curve was a bit behind Bella and Nessie; they seemed to easily learn, but they also probably listened better than we did. It was kind of weird to think that Bella had been the clumsiest girl I'd ever met and yet she was incredibly graceful as a vampire. Emmett and Jasper quickly moved on to showing us how to do tricks once we had mastered basic boarding. Nessie and Bella weren't interested in learning to do tricks. They preferred skiing, so Esme grabbed some sleds and brought the vampire girls to a different slope to do some sledding while we learned how to do tricks with Leah and the guys. We had a lot of fun, but eventually we decided the day was done.

Edward told us the next day we had a snowmobile trip planned and Esme would bring a picnic for the wolves. He said we needed to be ready at seven am. We headed back to our condo and spent some time hanging out in the hot tub and talking about our day. It was awesome to just relax with my pack and not worry about the day to day stresses of our lives.

In the morning Edward came and collected us and took our passports to hold in his waterproof case. He told us we may end up crossing borders and it was better to be prepared. Jasper handed me a weird harness thing and told me to put it on before I got on my sled. I saw Edward and Bella also had on the same harness, but no one else had one.

What's this for? I asked in my thoughts.

"It's so Nessie can ride with any of the three of us that she prefers. She'll start with me, so you can get accustomed to the sled," Edward answered.

It was apparently as close as we could get to a seat belt for Ness. Each adult had their own sled and we all had a blast riding across the icy ground. We all raced around. Emmett and Jasper were ecstatic that Edward was carrying Ness because that meant he was going slower and being more careful,so they could actually win races.

We stopped at about noon, which was a dusky gray twilight. Esme got out the food she had packed for us. I was surprised when I saw steam rising off the food as she opened the cooler. Esme explained that she had packed the food with heating packs to keep it warm and that she thought we'd all enjoy a hot meal and drink. We enjoyed the casseroles, muffins, and hot chocolate while the vampires horsed around in the snow. Leah seemed to have finally gotten over her vampire issues and was even thankful for the food. She had explained during a patrol after my birthday that her previous issues were with her being overprotective of me and thinking Bella was using me callously. However, she understood better after I imprinted and she was working hard on being nice to all the Cullens.

Later, on our way back to the condos, we stopped to look at the Northern Lights. Nessie loved the colors dancing in the sky and I felt really blessed to have become a member of this family.

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