Happy Valentine's

We had a great Valentine's Day, and Cam and I celebrated it by going out the night before, which is always nice to do without the girls! Cam and I found these cute mailboxes at Target's dollar spot so we filled them with the girls' Valentine's from us, they thought they were pretty special. Hallie being the inquisitive girl she is, didn't know who to say "thank you" to so she kept asking if the Valentine's came from us or another mythical creature like Santa or the Easter Bunny. I assured her they were from us so she knew who she could thank!? Apparently we have a "to smart for you own good" child on our hands!? All I can say to that is, Sydnee please just believe what we tell you to believe in! :)

A Girl's Night Out Swapmeet

A couple weekend's ago, I hosted a girl's night out swap meet. What is that, you ask? Well, it was a selfish idea really. I was sick of my wardrobe but didn't want to take the time and money to go shopping for new outfits, and I was in a rut for meal ideas for dinner and I was sick of making the same meals over and over again...hence the girls night out swapmeet.

I had my friends bring two dinner recipes to swap, then they had to bring any and all clothes, shoes, accessories that they are sick of or don't wear anymore to swap. Then before the night was over, we all went "shopping" and took home each others clothes that we thought looked cute and were our size! I was a little worried about how the swapmeet would turn out, but my friends are still talking about it and once in a while at church, we'll stop each other and say, "That's my shirt, It looks so cute on you!" It was a huge hit, and those that wanted clothes went home with one or two grocery bags full of new outfits! It was so fun, so thanks to all my friends who donated tons of cute clothes, it wouldn't have worked without you!

Oh ya, and I made the dessert pictured above at the girl's night out and it was to die for (thanks, Mom for the idea). I had a lot of requests for it, so here is the recipe:

Chocolate Strawberry Trifle

2 large pkgs. chocolate instant pudding mix, made according to pkg.
2 pints strawberries, washed and halved
1 large tub of cool whip
1 box chocolate cake mix, made according to pkg.
1 chocolate bar (optional) for chocolate shavings on top

Directions:

1. Make the cake mix ahead of time, allow to cool completely. Cut the cake into 2" squares and lay one layer of cake squares on the bottom of trifle bowl.
2. Pour 1/3 of chocolate pudding mix on top of cake squares. Pour just enough pudding to cover the cake squares.
3. Lay sliced strawberries on top of chocolate pudding until pudding is covered with strawberries.
4. Put a layer of cool whip on top of strawberries.
5. Repeat all four layers again until it fills the trifle bowl (you'll have extra to fill another medium sized mixing bowl, probably). Make sure top layer is whipped cream and top with chocolate shavings. Enjoy!
   

Going Private?

I'm playing with the idea of going private with my blog... I haven't done it yet because I figured people wouldn't take the time to log in with their username and password to look at our blog, but lately I'm considering it because I have a map that tells me the locations of my blog's visitors and I have noticed some South America locations that have come up... a little fishy since I don't recognize the username!? Since I'm considering it, will you still view my blog once I go private? Give me your vote!!

Adult Assembly, Sewing, Stuffing, Painting, Ironing, Required!?

Here are the finished products... to see the assembly required, keep reading!

Two of the gift's that Hallie got for her birthday were one of those build-a-bears, however, it was the kit so we got to build it ourselves! Hallie wanted to keep both bears since she decided they were going to be sisters, and let Sydnee and Daddy make one bear while Hallie and I made another... what a sweet sister Hallie is to share with Syd! Anyway, after church on Sunday, we told Hallie that we'd make the bears. So on the way home from church, Hallie did NOT let us forget that we had promised to make the bears so we opened the box and pulled out accessory after accessory. Finally we pulled out the 4 page instruction sheet on how to hand sew these bears!?!?!? I was already stressed out and knew this would be a long project and Cam being the optimistic man he is, said, "This will be fun!" To which I replied, "For who? Not the parents!"


And so we began sewing... and sewing... and sewing.

I did the wrong stitch on one side so I had to redo it again, which allowed Sydnee and Daddy to get ahead of me (hence the picture where Sydnee is holding up one finger since they were now #1)... this was not a race, but to them, it was and so far, they were winning in getting the bear done first.

(Yes, Sydnee is crying because she wanted us to be playing with her instead of making these bears... I feel your pain, Syd!)

Once we got the hang of it, it was pretty fun making the bears ourselves. And when I say making the bears ourselves, I mean we sewed it, stuffed it, ironed on butterflies and hearts to the bears' clothes, painted jewels and hearts on the bears' skirts and shoes, and even tied bows around their ears! Three and a half hours later, we were finished... THANK GOODNESS!! Hallie of course loved decorating the bears' clothes and she gets them dressed over and over again throughout the day.

So thank you to Hallie's friends, for the Build-a-Bear gift. And to all parents considering getting that for your child... please note that when it says, "Adult Assembly Required," that's an understatement! But boy did they turn out cute and it was a great family night project to do together. I think they love their bears... what do you think?

It's a Princess Dress-Up Birthday Party

This year Hallie wanted a princess party... surprise, surprise! So to change it up a bit from last year's Tinkerbell party, I made it a dress-up party. All the girls came dressed as princesses of course, and the boys came dressed as the princesses transportation (trains) and one firefighter, in case any fires broke out. They all looked so cute!

(Back row: Makenna Albert, Kerra Stewart, Hallie, Jaxton Routsong, Kye Stump.

Front row: Rose and Lana Winter, Braden Spagnolo and Adam Manter)

To keep the party simple, we did one craft. The girls decorated their own princess crowns and the boys decorated swords. We played a princess game where they kids had to put Cinderella in her window in the castle, blind folded! They all had fun with that game and the boys were begging to do it again, it was so funny!

Above: Here's Sydnee playing the princess game...

After the game, we sang Happy Birthday and dug into the princess cupcakes I made and ice cream... yum! Hallie got lots of fun presents including two Barbie's, Build-a-Bear bears, dress-up clothes and a princess blow dryer and curling iron, arts and crafts stuff, and an I Spy game.