Happy Birthday Little Girl

Happy Birthday Rylee Kate!

I hope you know that your Momma and your Daddy love you very, very much and it's incredibly difficult for me to fathom that you are now 3 years old.

You made us a family and we can't even remember what life was like without you.

You're the best thing that has ever happened to us and being your parents has been the greatest gift we could ever receive.

Thanks for telling me all day today that everything I said was " just a great idea."

:)

(blogger is being retarded tonight and I want to post this before 11/17 is over so...picture of Rylee to come)

Christmas

Loving these. Need larger house.







I'm probably going to get the refrigerator. I don't know about the stove though. We already have the little wooden kitchen from Target (the blue one from last year, not this year's pink one) and I don't think we really need the other. It sure is cute though...

Rylee's 3rd birthday party!

Lots and lots of pictures from Rylee's cherry blossom themed birthday party!

The favors:

I decided to do a crayon favor months ago when I happened upon an etsy member that made little tins of crayons with each child's name spelled out inside. I was able to find the tins on clearance at Target, so I only needed to order the letters for each child's name.



I also ordered a sticker with each child's name on it to place on top of their individual tin and a sticker to be placed on the bottom that said, "Love Rylee." (after I received the stickers, I went out and purchased my own laminator/sticker/button maker)





After I had these in place, I spent hours and hours searching for the perfect favor boxes. I went through 50 websites and close to 300 pages of etsy. FINALLY, I found what I was looking for.

Shelley, who runs Bug and Boo designs ( http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5099181 ) was awesome at helping me get together exactly what I wanted in a favor box. She even shipped my order the next day and featured my boxes in her shop!







These were perfect! The tins fit inside along with a little thing of play-doh and I could not have been happier! I'll definitely be back to order more from Shelley, she was great to work with.

You probably noticed the name tags on each box - those also came from Etsy. (I'm like a walking advertisement for this website, they should pay me!).

Rosie, who runs Tokens of Love (http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6345555) was also a pleasure to work with! These favor tags were exactly what I was looking for. I didn't want a paper tag, I wanted something that the kids could take and use somewhere else.( I heard a few moms saying they would put their tags on their backpacks, which is a great idea) I love the way these turned out and tied the whole box together, I'm thinking about ordering a bunch for Christmas!

The cookies:

I make cookie favors each year to give out to the kids and adults as well. This year we did a cherry blossom and a silhouette cookie. (Rodney made the silhouette cutter)

Unwrapped:





Wrapped/tagged:







(I didn't think about this but some people had a hard time eating the silhouette. They felt like they were eating Rylee's head --- and they were!)

Decor:

I tried to do a little bit of decorating in the house to tie the theme together. I waited until Target put their outdoor stuff on sale at the end of the summer and bought a set of the cherry blossom lanterns to hang. I also bought the Martha Stewart pom kit to hang in the living room as well. (I bought it from Wal-Mart, $10 cheaper there than Michael's)

My friend April, who is an awesome florist, let me borrow her huge cherry blossom arrangement that she has displayed in her shop for the party (so have to return it this week!) and that really pulled it all together.





Activities:

I decided that since Rylee is turning 3 this year, we needed to do a little more with the party than we normally do. We needed things to keep the kids occupied and happy. I came up with a few different things for them to do.

The first table I had set up was a "popcorn bar." I had paper bags out with markers, glue and crayons for them to decorate and put their names on. I had 5 different flavors of popcorn for them to fill their decorated bag with.

White cheddar
kettle corn
carmel pirate's booty
carmel corn
white chocolate

The second table I had set up was for making your own stick/foam puppets. I found the kits at Michael's for $1/each and thought it would be a really good way thing for each kid to be able to do while they were there.

I also had cupcake decorating. In the weeks before the party, I made each child an apron and painted their names and cherry blossom branches on them. ( I failed to take a picture of the aprons, who knows why) We waited until after the cake had already been served before we let them do the cupcake decorating because I wanted them to be able to take them home.





(we didn't get that many photos of each table, probably because we were running around like crazy)

We also had the bounce house set up and the playset - so there was lots to do!

The food:

I always cook a big meal for Rylee's party. I have no idea why I enjoy doing this but I really do.

This year we did spaghetti again (also did spaghetti the year before last). I had spaghetti with marinara or alfredo, italian sausage, grilled chicken, sautted mushrooms, salad, spinach dip and chips and salsa. I also made cheesecake cups, chocolate-peanut butter cookies and my mom brought pecan sandies. (thanks mom!)

Of course there was cake too!





The bottom tier on this cake was vanilla with whipped lemon curd buttercream. The top tier was vanilla with whipped strawberry buttercream. (the entire cake was covered in vanilla buttercream). I had a lot of fun with this cake and I'm really happy with the way it turned out, especially in regards to the colors. Rylee seemed to really love it too!

So that was what we did with Rylee's 3rd birthday party this year! It was lots and lots of hard work but it was totally worth it. Thanks to every single person that helped (especially Rodney) and attended!

Here are a few random pictures from that day!

In between jobs

Rylee's birthday party is this weekend and I'm frantically getting things together. Frantically baking and baking and baking, trying to clean in between all of the baking, running to the store two to three times a day and trying to get my little birthday girl well again. She has a sinus/ear infection. Her fever got close to 103 at times and she's just been feeling yucky all together. She saw the doctor and is on antibiotics, so I'm sure she'll be fine by Saturday.

In the midst of all of this craziness that is my life, something really wonderful happened to this country.

I'm in between cakes right now, so I thought I'd jot down my thoughts.

I watched election coverage from the moment I got home from MDO on Tuesday (we had to leave early because Rylee had a fever) and could not keep my eyes off of the tv.

In between soothing and holding Rylee, baking 10 cakes and close to 100 cookies, I watched and waited.

I kept my laptop close to me as the night went on, specifically so I could chat about the happenings with Jess (and Amber too).

Right around 10pm, 10 minutes after my very, very hot child fell asleep on me and I carried her into her bed...I came back into the kitchen to pop some popcorn. I heard Rylee start to cry, "mommy." I turned to look at the tv to see what was happening with the local election coverage when I saw a picture of Barack Obama pop up on the screen. To the right of his picture read, "Barack Obama elected 44th President of the United States." I looked at Rodney and gasped. I pointed and rubbed my eyes a little bit. We smiled and hugged one another and then both started jumping up and down in disbelief. Rylee was still crying. The screen changed to a shot of the crowd at Grant Park in Chicago, tears started rolling down my face. I couldn't stop the tears, they continued as I sat on the couch. Rodney went to check on Rylee and came back in.

We were both very quiet until my husband who is usually funny and sarcastic in these moments, said two things that stuck with me.

"You'll never forget where you were at this moment. This is like our moon landing. You will always remember that you were at home when the first black president was elected in the United States. Both Mommy and Rylee were crying."

he also said this:

"You know what's really great about this? We have never known a black president. This is historic for us and radically different from anything we have grown up with or known in our lifetimes. Rylee will grow up thinking this is normal. This will not be weird for her, it will be normal."

I cannot stress enough how proud I am at this moment to live in this country. It's been a long time since I have felt like there were people fighting for me, the middle class. It's been a long time since I have had faith in this country. It's been a long, long time.

This election gives me hope. It gives me hope that we can come together and overcome the peril we have been facing.

I don't see color when I see our new President, I see hope. I see someone who is eloquent, hard working, family oriented, who fights for people who don't get fought for. I see someone who believes that all men and women are created equally. I see someone who is determined to make a difference.

I've been pretty quiet around people who make assumptions and believe that I feel exactly as they do - but you know what? It's time to come together. It's time for us all to stop the name calling, the finger pointing, the accusing, it's time to cross party lines and get behind our new leader. The leader that was overwhelmingly elected in this country by it's people.

You may not have voted for him but it's time to support him. We live in America for a reason. Our country was founded on the basis of freedom of choice and the choice has been made. It's time to look forward, it's time to move forward.

Be proud to live in this country, be proud of the history that was just made here. Know that this is a huge step forward for our country. Know that this is what happens when you live in a democratic nation, be accepting. Be supportive.

I prayed and my prayers were answered.

Thanks, America

Thank you.

Would you like fries with that?

Costumes

Mr. & Mrs. Kennedy



Captured in black and white