I think we have a bear!

Who knew Mommy was so funny?

Always a ham!

My new thing

Sara, you will be sad to know that you will no longer be earning 25 cents a button--because after almost 29 years I have finally learned!

My mother-in-law is a master seamstress. She has made many gorgeous clothes for the girls. I will NEVER be able to do the things she can, but she has inspired me to learn to sew. My patient friend Jennifer has been encouraging me to do this for over a year--and she told me she would teach me! So, I am learning. She started with --this is thread! I knew nothing! I have made the girls each one thing. Don't look too closely!

My bib model had already gone to bed for the night!

And this model wasn't in to posing!

Loving the Weather

We have spent many hours outside the last few weeks! Springtime is such a wonderful time of year! God is so good reminding us mercies year after year!

Since Leigh isn't crawling she is in her pjs outside a lot so her sweet feet won't get torn up!

bubbles with Daddy

What a fun day!

It was an absolutely gorgeous day today so our family went to the zoo! We had a great time!

Checking out the flamingos!

I love that pointer finger! Leigh was mesmerized by elephants!

Well, I couldn't get a good picture because Leigh was too interested in the bears!

The penguins are at our zoo for the next 5 months. This was the main reason we went and the girls had great fun looking at them. There are 3 of them and they were very playful!

If you know my girls you know they love fruit!! I mean seriously love fruit! I am probably the only mom anywhere who limits fruit for their kids!

This is how Sara Beth eats her strawberries...

Before

After

"Leigh's birthday-again"-as Sara Beth said. Sara Beth had her party on the same day as her actual birthday, so it was very confusing that Leigh had 2 birthdays. She never said she wanted another one she was just confused! She didn't care very long when she realized she got to eat ice cream cake for breakfast!

Here is Leigh with her first bite of ice cream!

Sara Beth gave Leigh this very cool car! You can tell what Leigh thought of it!

Snuggle time with Daddy before work!

Happy 2nd Birthday, Bryson

Happy Birthday, Bryson! Your party was so much fun!

Bryson, my sister's little boy, turned 2 on March 3rd. His party was last weekend in Atlanta, however, I am just now getting around to posting! As you can tell, it was a bubble party! How much fun! Elizabeth, Clark, and Sara blew up 92 clear balloons (I tied). The kids had great fun playing in them. She also rented bubble machines and had bubble wands for the kids to play with. Bubbles bring joy to everyone-even the adults had fun playing in them. She also got a commercial roll of bubble wrap and everyone had fun jumping on it! Very creative Elizabeth and lots of fun!

Happy Birthday, Leigh!

Baby Leigh, you've been a joy from day 1.  Through the sleepless nights, the mouth-wide-open smile, the refusal to eat with a spoon, the love affair with ducks, and the red-headed temper, we wouldn't have changed one thing!  We love you, and we pray for many more wonderful birthdays.

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Leigh's Birthday Party

Leigh has been able to say duck since she was 8 months old. So naturally, that is what kind of party she had. I have been asked by several to write out the details of the party. I will try to write out what I did.

Here is the duck cake that I made. I got the 3d duck pan from Hobby Lobby. It took 1 1/2 pound cake mixes to make it. I used a #32 star tip to ice the cake. I put it in a blue tin also from Hobby Lobby. I cut up a blue plastic table cloth to make it look like it was in water and then used clear "marbles" from the flower section. I used big flat ones and little round ones to look like bubbles. I was planning on using something else that H.L. was out of, but I ended up liking the marbles more--found them just walking around looking for something that might work. We did not eat this cake--it's actually still sitting on my counter!

The smash cake was very easy. I took a duck cookie cutter and lightly pressed down on my cake. Then frosted it yellow and blue. Very easy!

Baby Leigh loved her presents!

Big sister (dressed in a get-up) helping to blow out the candle!
Not so much into the cake!

Honey made the dress for Leigh!

My favorite view!

These were the party favors. I gathered all the duck/water songs I could find and made a cd with them (actually Sara did because I couldn't figure out how to on our computer). Then from Dollar Tree I got duck bubbles. I tied one on there per kid in the family.

Dinner: We had about 25 people there (we have large families) so dinner had to be easy. I did Mexican Pile-up. I got the recipe from Dale Sorgenfrei--anyway very easy to prepare and good for the kids because they can pick out what they will eat. I trippled the recipe and didn't have many leftovers.

1 1/2 pounds ground beef (or turkey)

1 can diced tomatoes

1 small can paste

1 can kidney beans drained

garlic salt to taste

chili powder to taste

brown meat and drain fat. add the other ingredients, stir and simmer (i put them in a crockpot)

layer regular fritos, rice, meat, then pile on: grated cheddar cheese, shredded lettuce, chopped tomatoes, chopped onions, salsa, chopped pecans, chopped black olives, and coconut (just try it)

I gathered all the duck items from around our house to use as the center piece of the kids tables which doubled as toys for them to play with.

Birthday Party Central

There have been 549 pictures taken on my camera over the last week. It will take me a while to go through them and pick out ones to post. These below may not even be the best ones.

After several hours of cooking on Thursday afternoon, I stepped back, looked around, and this is what I saw.... a complete mess!



This was the outcome of the mess: 3 cakes and 48 cupcakes! We celebrated both of the girls birthdays this weekend. Sara Beth turned 3 Saturday and Leigh will be one on March 11th. We had both parties on Saturday at our house so that all of our family would be able to be there. Sara Beth had a Pinkalicious Party and Leigh had a duck party. If you don't know the book Pinkalicious you need to find a copy to read.

Birthday tradition around our house is to have cake and ice cream and open presents for breakfast. Since cake and ice cream were on the menu for two times already on Saturday we decided to skip it for breakfast. Sara Beth did open her presents though.

The plan for her party was to rent a jumpy slide and for the kids to play in the backyard (we gave them a "park" in the backyard for their birthdays). Well, even though it had been 75 and sunny all week Saturday was freezing, windy, and cloudy so we had to go to plan B...The Garage!

I bought a bunch of playdough and all the accessories and the kids had fun playing with it.

Aunt Laura and SB making a lady out of playdough.

Daddy even got in on the whole pinkalicious theme!

I also bought black butcher paper from the teacher store and put it on the garage wall and gave them pink sidewalk chalk to draw with.

Also, they got to put pink sprinkles and dots on their cupcakes before they ate them.

Sara Beth blowing out her candles. She was so excited to have all of her friends sing Happy Birthday. It was her favorite part!