365 Days

I'm going to attempt the 365 Days project this year, but I didn't decide to do it until I had already missed 2 days this week! Oh well. Here's my first week. I'm not sure I'm crazy about the layout, but I'm crazy about the idea and I hope I can keep up with it. I like taking notice of the little things, although this week seemed like a big week with the ear piercing and the birthday bowling. Next week may prove to be more of a challenge.

Bowl Me Over

For Christmas, Mom gave me the book, Hello Cupcake, which is filled with tons of adorable cupcake designs. Now, with three small kids, I have decorated my fair share of cakes and cupcakes, but the cupcakes in this book really do take the cake. I'm not sure how successful I will be in executing some of the more elaborate ones, but I tried my first batch last night with ok results. K is having a little birthday bowling outing this morning with a couple of buds, and they are coming back for lunch and birthday cake. I thought I would try my hand at the bowling cupcakes in the book. Here is the process and the result:

Each bowling pin was constructed of a standard cupcake, a mini cupcake, and a donut hole. It was quite the sticky building project!
Pin innards
I wanted to make 10 pins, but this cupcake just would not cooperate for the dipping process. If my mind were sharper this morning I would think of some cute phrase about a split or how I should have made a spare. :)
My 9-pin cupcakes complete with bowling ball (ball is covered with black sugar and holes made from chocolate chips inserted point down). Definitely not as neat and drip free as the ones pictured in the book, but not too shabby for a first try! K was pleased.

When in Rome

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My Christmas posts are so random - I don't seem to be able to work on events in order. Oh well. For Christmas my parents gave K the Playmobil Roman Coliseum to go along with his Roman battleship, fort and catapult. My mom is a Latin teacher, so it's pretty cool that there's such an appropriate toy out there! K loves this stuff, and G was pretty excited about it, too (for the benefit of one set of faithful readers, I'll just mention that the Roman ship is NOWHERE near as awesome as that Playmobil pirate ship must be...). We had great fun setting up the Coliseum, which was complete with gladiators, wild animals, chariots, horses, and the emperor. We set up gladiator fights, animal hunts and chariot races. G got into the fun, too, setting up scenes when we weren't looking: Caesar's wife being lowered to an awaiting hungry tiger, and his wife being shielded by a loyal guard from a sneak attack from above. G loves Playmobil and mused, "if only I had lots of money and a huge empty space, I would fill it with Playmobil." Well, since our basement furniture is still not here (!!!!!), maybe we should just get a refund on the order and turn our basement into Playmobil land...

Ooh darling 'cause you'll always be my baby...

My conversation on the stairs with EB this morning (as she was giving me a big hug while we went upstairs to get lunch)

Me: "Are you my baby?"

EB: "na. gurl"

Me: "Nooo, you're my baby!"

EB: "na. Bi gurl!"

Almost made me cry, but not quite. :)

this girl loves her jelly beans. Here she's helping herself to her morning dose from the jelly belly machine. :)

"Hole in the Lobe" (yeah, I'm a Cosby fan...)

For a while now A's been interested in having her "ears appeared."  We've visited the earring store at the mall several times and watched other big girls get it done, but she's always decided just to wait.  Today at lunch she announced that today was the day to get her "ears appeared."  I figured she wouldn't go through with it, but she's been in an exceptionally good mood all day (despite waking up crying in the night last night, wailing that she no longer wanted her toenails...), and we decided to let her go to the store and take a look.  When we got there, there was a little girl already in the chair, and A watched her go through the whole procedure - the forms, the cleaning, marking the dots, and the piercing.  The little girl didn't cry, and A asked her some questions about it.  She then said she had to go potty, but that she wanted to come right back and have hers done.  I should also note that the deal has always been that whenever A is ready to do it, I would have my second holes pierced first so she could see that it doesn't hurt.  So we're standing there and my heart is racing b/c I'm realizing that I have to have my ears pierced on VERY short notice!  When it go to be our turn, A decided she wanted to go first, so she climbed in the chair, grinning from unpierced ear to unpierced ear.  She was giddy with excitement and didn't even flinch for the actual hole punch (how else to describe it?), and EB clapped for her when it was all over.  A kept saying, "did I REALLY do it?"  She also said, "I always wanted to have holes in my ears when I'm a mom, and now I will!" I believe she was also quoted in the earring store as saying to K, "why would I be scared to have my ears appeared? I rode the Tower of Terror!"  So my dear little girl now sports two sparkly pink flowers in her ears (which, may I add, are WAY cuter than what I had to choose from as a kid), and she can't wait to go to school tomorrow and show her girls.  Oh, and as for me, 2 little girls were waiting and watching A have her ears pierced, so we decided to go ahead and let them have their turns rather than be scared off by having to watch an adult cry.  A says she'll go back with me this week, because she insists that I go through with it!

Red Coat

A layout from our afternoon in Colonial Williamsburg earlier in the week. A had great fun climbing trees and on fences in her little red coat. We spent most of our time at our favorite old climbing tree, but you really can't tell because I was trying out a new zoom lens and could only take closeups. Oh well, I like her little mug anyway... :)

Birthday Boy

Whew - we're home. I think we've been gone for 14 of the last 20 days. Good to be back. Wanted to post one picture from the week of my baby boy, who had to go and turn 6 on me this new year's eve! It's the same every year - how can he be getting so big? where has the time gone? we blinked and he turned into a kid! But somehow SIX seems awfully big to me. Maybe it's because you now have to use that second hand to show his age. Anyway, he's so proud to be 6 and can't wait to tell his friends at school. And I'm, as always, proud of the little man that he is with all of his talents, his quiet nature, his people pleasing attitude, his love for his sisters, and his ever sweet smile and still kissable cheeks. Now if I can just keep from blinking again and making him turn 12!