May the 4th be with You: A Mother's Birthday

My mom at 4 years old

Today in my mom's birthday!

She has her own awesome blog too you know. She writes about her chicken visitors, the kids that she watches, her adorable granddaughter and often really, really, REALLY yummy recipes.

These are my parents before they even thought about having me or my sister. 

 This is my mom now- older and wiser but still having a grand time tubing down hills!

I don't even know what it up with my dad's hair.

 My parents made birthdays pretty special. I got cool cookie monster cakes. (And some snazzy red overalls!) I don't remember ever being told I couldn't have a party, even though now I know they had to work really hard to be able to afford it. 

My mom was really good at that- keeping us kids in the dark when money was tight. Sure- I noticed that we didn't have many luxuries and we did have a few years in a crummy condo, but I still had toys, clothes, books and more importantly, a fun childhood. She never let on just how close we came to being in big trouble financially until I was older and out of the house. 

This shows how much Chucky Sue and I look alike!

My mom has always been good at having fun. She's a nanny now, so her talent is being used well! She can think of craft or cooking projects, silly games or songs faster than anyone I know. She also loves kids, and once she has fallen for a kid, oh boy! That kid will be in her heart forever. It may take a while, but once my mom loves you- it's for good.

I've always been a fashionista.

 My mom sacrificed a lot for me and my sister- she worked crummy jobs while we were in school, but still managed to find time to take us to have dance lessons, soccer practice, T-ball games, swimming lessons, shopping trips, church activities and play dates.  Now that I'm a parent, I know how much time, energy and money can go into ONE of those activities, let alone two kids doing all of them!

Even after I got married and had kids, I knew my mom was always there for me. It may earn me some guilt trips and lectures, but if we are in a bind- she has always come to help in any way she can. Most recently, she has paid for Angelina's headstone. The huge financial undertaking aside- she knew how important it was to me and Jake. She made it happen and we are so grateful.

My mom last summer, with Chucky Sue.

Chucky Sue loves her Nonie. Even though they are far away from each other they have a very close relationship. Chucky Sue knows how to use my phone to call Nonie. She loves watching Nonie's chickens, and seeing Nonie play with toys. One of these days I will have to record their Skype chats! When Chucky Sue colors she likes to tell stories about her scribbles, more often than not, one of them is a Nonie scribble.

All in all, my mom is an amazing woman. She is funny, smart, silly and caring. She is what I hope to be as a mother. 

Happy Birthday Mom!!

Happy Birthday Chucky Sue!

Let's just move past the complete and utter disbelief that my little teeny weeny preemie is now a big strong TWO YEAR OLD, and go into a party recap shall we?

can't believe she's TWO!

sorry, that one slipped out.

The party was just a family affair, I'm not quite ready for friend parties yet- let me get used to doing all this for people who are stuck with me no matter what!! I apologize for the iphone photo quality, I had planned to use our point and shoot, but it died the morning of the party! We're looking into quickly solving that problem. (Remember you can click on any photo to make it bigger!)

The decorations were fairly simple- pink and purple balloons, rainbow colored pasta layered in glasses, and a pinkie pie on my chalkboard. I covered our table with butcher paper and had crayons out so the kids (and silly grown ups) could color on it.

I also made a crayon melted rainbow thingy. I had wanted one for her room for a while, so for about $5 I made this as a dual purpose decoration!

Coloring the pasta was a lot easier than I thought. A few tutorials on Pinterest had me worried about finding time to heat up the pasta to keep the color from bleeding. But after a few tries, I found that mixing the pasta with food coloring and a touch of vinegar then letting it dry completely before playing with it was just fine. Chucky Sue has played with the rice a few times since the party and unless she truly slobbers all over it, she comes out of it clean as she went in.

nice bright colors, forgot to put purple in before snapping the pic though!

This cake. Oh. This. Cake. Jake has been hearing about this cake since AUGUST. That's when I first joined Pinterest and saw my first rainbow cake. (There are so many of them on there now!) I spent about 5 hours over two days making this dang thing and I was very pleased with the results. It was my first time using anything but buttercream to decorate a cake. I rolled the fondant a little too thin because you can see the blue and purple layers through the white- but I covered it up with all the other decorations. Coloring the white fondant was easier than I expected. The internet experts had warned me that adding liquid to the fondant would just make it a horrible sticky mess. I was able to color them just fine by adding a little powdered sugar and kneading the dough a lot.

The pony toys are from Wal-Mart, they were perfect for my pony obsessed little girl. I didn't fancy having to make my own pony out of modeling chocolate. I just used a little frosting to hold down each statue (yeah we bought a lot- we gave them out as favors and They happen to be my favorite MLP toys.)

Rainbow Dash chilling with Rarity and Gardenia Glow

Then came in the inside of the cake- that's what took the longest, baking two layers at a time took a lot longer than just baking two 9 inch cakes. The cake was delicious, it didn't dry out even though it was baked two days ahead of time. The fondant was nasty to eat, but I put a lot of icing between the layers and on the dirty ice layer so it wouldn't be all play dough tasting.

with a side of rainbow sherbet!

All in all, we had a great time! Chucky Sue absolutely loves her cousins. She even shared her toys pretty well with Dorita (seen here trying to climb up the popular slide.) We played apples to apples, pin the tail on the pony and just chatted. The food was nothing spectacular, just a buffet of Chucky Sue's favorite foods- hot dogs, gold fish, chips, pickles, apple juice and cheese! I got what I wanted out the party- Chucky Sue's face lighting up at everyone who came, playing with her new toys and eating a giant piece of cake!

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

Happy Birthday Babies

Happy late Birthday Chucky-Sue!!

what? just one cupcake?

I made a mess, but didn't eat much.

just chillaxing with my presents

mmmmm greeting cards are yummy.

aaaand melted down from all the excitement. (Don't worry, Nephew and Niece helped open the rest of the presents)

I could get all emotional now, but I'm saving that for a later post, just enjoy the cute photos and check on my mom's blog, lambertslive.blogspot.com for pictures of her whole trip.

1979: The Year of Jake

Jake turned 31 erm, "29" this month. We celebrated by driving to Pigeon Forge in a hail storm! Fun! We're here for AdventureCon, a pop-culture convention. (Basically the lame little brother of Comic Con in San Diego.)

In Honor of his birthday, here are some "Back in 1979" facts!

In 1979 a gallon of gas cost $0.86 (HOLY COW.)

In 1979 a Sony Walkman cost $200, that's more than an iPod.

In 1979, YMCA was suing the Village People for ripping off their name. They lost.

In 1979, Pink Floyd released their album "The Wall" (which was my lullaby album in 1988, Chucky-Sue has only listened to "Another Brick in the Wall")

Strangely, in 1979, Trivial Pursuit debuted, and in 2010, Jake DOMINATES this game.

Jake shares a birth year with Katie Hudson, Heath Ledger and one of his favorites, Jennifer Love Hewitt

And why do I bring this all up? To remind Jake that I wasn't even a twinkle in my daddy's eye when all this was going on! Happy Birthday you ole fogey! I love you!

Happy Birthday Jake

so what if it's only for another 15 minutes :)

My old man turned 30 today! We spent the day feeding the neurotic Jasper and the rolypoly Farley, then to the longest job interview ever (where I hid in the car away from the biggest dogs ever. it was at a correctional camp) A quick hop over to Big City for some  window shopping* and topped it off with a movie night. (Angels and Demons, the book was better.)

Now I'm going to go snuggle him and remind him to take his bengay and call the AARP back. :)

Happy Birthday Jake!

*= us wishing we had the extra funds to buy those cute clothes, interesting books and nifty gadgets

Twenty First Birthday!

I'm three days early, but I had planned a fabulous This Is Your Life birthday post, and me not having a computer is not going to stop me!

So there are a few years in a person's life that mark important changes, I've tried to find photos of all of them, let's see:

Being Born:
thank GOODNESS I do not have a photo of the actual birthing, but here's the earliest photo I could find of myself- I'll have to make copies of the other ones my mom has at her place.




First Birthday:
The love affair with chocolate cake begins!



Siblings:
For an eldest child, gaining a sibling is a big event! My sister Mae joined our family shortly after my 3rd Birthday.



Baptism:
in our church, Children aren't baptized till they are 8 years old (check out lds.org for more info!) I was baptized with my good friend Nikki who is just a few days younger than me.





Being sealed:
I was lucky enough to get to go to the Toronto Temple and be sealed to my family, sadly I don't remember much, the nursery and taking photos outside in the gardens.



Sweet 16:
Instead of a huge party, I spent my 16th birthday in France! I actually missed about 6 hours of it, due to the time difference, but it was worth it! I spent two weeks in France with my school's french club- It was amazing, we saw all the sights in Paris, Nancy, Strasbourg and northern France. I would post all the incredible pictures, but I haven't had time to scan them in.

Graduation:
After 1 elementary school, 2 middle schools and a high school that was too tiny for a football team, in 2006 I graduated! I remember the pointless several hour long practices we had for walking. (thankfully I had Colleen to get me through it, not to mention the 4 years prior =D ) It was only 3 years ago, but it seems like a whole other life.




Marriage:
I'll be the first to admit that a "normal" 21 year old probably wouldn't have marriage on their list of accomplishments :) I was incredibly lucky to find Jake as quickly as I did (though it felt like forever to GET him, he was stubborn!)




Now I'm (almost) 21, and I am proud of what I've done and become for these past 21 years. I may not always act like it, but I've had a pretty good life! I've always been surrounded by people who love me and want what's best for me. I've forged fantastic lifelong friendships and have learned so much from everyone in my life. So here's to You, thanks for making my life wonderful!