The Newest Member of the Family

After Barkley passed away we were going to be a one dog family.  Things were going so well with just BB and she was able to go everywhere and she was just the best dog ever.  Ever.  And then Zach discovered duck hunting and just HAD.TO.HAVE a labrador retriever.  He found the one that cost the most had the best hunting lines and reserved her.  Pepper has been costing us warming our hearts since day 1.

 Sweet, sweet kisses with that puppy dog breath.  This might be the sweetest thing I've ever seen.

In all honesty, I really didn't want another dog.  I didn't want to spend the money, have the responsibility, do the potty training, deal with chewing and destruction, get up at night any more than I already do, and find one more thing to give attention to.  But, she's pretty dang cute and I fell in sort-of love with her pretty quickly.  (As a side note, since I'm writing this blog WAY behind...don't ask me how I actually feel about her this second in time...)

The other family member that we had to worry about was BB.  Would she like her new little sister or be just as annoyed with her as Jenn is now?  The progression of their relationship is below:

First Meeting

Getting To Know Each Other Slowly

Finally Getting Snuggly

Full On Playing and Becoming BFFs

It must be rough being so dang cute.  Zach bought Pepper this duck toy on the first day he got her.  She LOVES this toy and chews it daily.  Almost to the point of wondering if she has an obsession with this duck.  She's a duck dog for sure.  And she seems to like shoes, and stuffed animals, and soccer gear as well...

Good Morning Sweets

We don't drink coffee in our house.  Well, we didn't until Zach bought a Keurig...but mostly, we don't drink coffee in our family.  So, when I saw this cute cup o' milk recipe in Family Fun magazine I thought it would be a fun (and warm) drink to try.  I mean, the coffee cups have to get some use, right?!

Here is the recipe - Melted Frosty

Strike A Pose

Lucy turned 5 in style.

Portraits By Kristi

The After Party

Most really good parties have after parties, right?!  Well, we just had a really good party, so it seemed in order to have an after party.  Technically it was a pre-planned family party, but we'll just pretend that our party was so awesome we had to keep it going.

Lucy continued with the diva persona and pretended to be a rock star.  She had just gotten that outfit from the Allen family and wanted to try it on.  It sure looked cute on her.

 Happy Birthday To You, Happy Birthday To You...

 ...Happy  Birthday Dear Lucy, Happy Birthday To You!

 And then the party took a turn...and it was time for everyone to go home.

A Party Fit For a (Drama) Queen!

For the BIG F-I-V-E Lucy wanted a party fit for a (drama) queen.  She had been to a party in December (Gabi's Fashion Fete) and wanted to do the same kind of party, but with the amount of girls that she wanted to include it was going to be more cost effective crazy to have it at home.  So, after scouring Pinterest and everything Barbie, we came up with a plan for the BIG party. 

Pinterest provided lots of ideas for cute cookies, cake pops and vases, and cakes.  That website is trouble fantastic!

 My neighbor makes bows, and this being a fashion party...and wanting to help her business, I decided to make the goody bags a bunch of pink jelly beans with a bow (and business card) attached.  They turned out really cute.

 During Christmas one of my favorite cookies are the peanut butter cookies with the Hershey kiss in the middle, so this was a cute variation on that cookie.  In hindsight, we probably should have done sugar cookies with the "hugs" in the middle, but we made strawberry cake cookies instead.  They still tasted yummy enough to eat at least five a few.

One of the fun ideas we came up with was to get a red carpet (thanks to Kirsten Tremble and her parents) so that the girls could do a photo shoot and pose.  Lucy was the model as Matt Molinari set up the photography equipment.  He had to get it just right, because we were dealing with models here...

The girls would have their choice of sunglasses (Barbie brand of course), feather boas, jeweled rings, necklaces, and bracelets.  All of the most important accessories!  After the accessories are chosen, they got their hair done, their nails painted, a little make-up applied, and then their photo taken.  In other words...they were treated like queens!

 The girls (Haley and Bailey) had a good time choosing their extras and getting all dolled up.

 Sophia and Lucy look fancy!

 The birthday girl and her modeling shot.  The photos turned out really awesome!

 We were able to mostly get all the girls to look at the camera and sit at the same time.  (Can you see all the feathers on the ground?!)  We had quite the turnout at the party.  We probably could've made it the Project Runway:  Mini Version for a theme.

 Tyler and Bobby "crashed" the party.  They dressed up like rock stars, turned on a song, and then did break dancing in the middle of the living room.  The girls crowded around the boys and were cheering.  It was epic!  Everyone, but Lucy, thought it was quite fantastic.



Five years ago on this day my life was chaged forever.  There is a bond between a mother and a son and I was already lucky enough to have that with Tyler, but I never knew how special it would be to have a little girl.  She might make me scream and want to cry on a daily basis.  She might have attitude bigger than any rock star or diva.  But she also has the biggest heart, the brightest eyes, a smile that will light up a room, and a kiss so sweet you'll never need candy again.  She is my little girl and my heart and soul.  So, happy birthday Magoo.  On this day you deserve to be the Birthday Queen!

It Hasn't Been 5 Years, Has It?!

Oh, Lucy, we are going to cherish this last day before you turn the B-I-G 5.  For years and years you've acted older than your age, sassier than a teenager, and been smarter than the average Goose.  But, the day has finally come where we need to accept that you actually are growing up and becoming a big girl.  Your birthday falls on a Saturday and that's when the big party is occuring, so we took Friday to celebrate you family style.  We had a couple of presents for you to enjoy and then a family dinner to attend.

In this photo Lucy is wearing the flower girl dress that I wore in the wedding when my Dad married Rebecca.  That's a pretty old dress!

This year Lucy is into her "American" doll and her one request was an outfit (not pajamas this time) that her doll could wear and a matching one for her.  She's pretty excited about her gift.

 And with every new dress you need new shoes, right?!

 Lucy wanted to wear her new ensemble to dinner at Benihana.  She looks pretty grown up...with the bangs and fancy dress.  Where did my little girl go?!

 The kids love Benihana and we seem to eat there for quite a few family birthday dinners.  It might be the free ice cream and Buddha glass...or the onion volcano. 

Lucy doesn't like me to sing this (because of the words...not my voice!), but there is a Taylor Swift song that fits my mood on this momentous day.  "Oh darling, don't you ever grow up.  Never grow up.  Won't you stay so little?  Oh darling, don't you ever grow up..."

A Colorful Surprise

Pinterest has made me a better, more creative, and crazier mom.  There are so many fantastic ideas on there to fill the time I don't have, cook elaborate meals, and make a party look pretty spectacular with someone else's ideas.  This cake was one of those items.  I was searching on Pinterest to find ideas for Lucy's dress up party and I found this cake.  It was something that had to be made.  More for me than for Lucy.  Because, let me tell you why.  Rainbows are awesome.  Cake is good...especially one this big. And with a birthday coming up we needed a cake anyways, right? 

I couldn't really find directions on how to make the cake, so I kind of just went with what I thought would work.  I bought two cake mixes...white cake and a strawberry cake.  I thought that the pink cake would help to make the red, pink, orange, and purple layers.  I divided the cake batter into fourths and added food coloring until I got the desired color.  I put them into a round cake pan.  Mine were kind of big and I probably should have used a smaller diameter pan.  With the white cake I made the yellow, green, and two different shades of blue.  Next time I might make only six layers and then each would be thicker.  I baked them according to the directions, but shaved off a few minutes of the baking time.

 Once everything was cooled I set the purple layer on a plate and put some vanilla frosting on top and then layered the dark blue, light blue, green, yellow, orange, pink, and then red with the frosting between each layer.  This cake has a ton of frosting (if you so choose), but it kind of has to.  And if you're making a cake this decadent in the first place it's probably going to be quite sweet.  Just like the little girl I made it for.

Once I got it stacked (not straight) we added pink!  Lots of pink frosting (a can and a half).  I've seen a lot of designs for the outside that were cute, but this was the easiest at this point. I bought some Skittles and made a rainbow five and a little rainbow.  I also put Skittles around the bottom of the cake.

 I wanted the cake to be spectacular.  Really badly.  When we cut it open there were lots of oohs and aahs and even I was amazed.  The colors were very vivid and it actually looked like a rainbow.  People even said it tasted good!

Happy Birthday Magoo!  This was a milestone birthday, but I'd make you this again any day of the week.  And not just because I love cake.  But because I love you.

Twin Day

Instead of Blue Oak spirit day there was a twin day.  Tyler and Noah (a classmate) knew they had the same shirt, so they decided to be twins.  Little did they know how alike they would actually look!  Tyler said that for the rest of the year people were calling him Noah.