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April25th

Our Easter Table

Posted in: Family Traditions

I hope everyone had a fabulous Easter. We had a great time with friends yesterday. Kade had a bowl of cereal yesterday morning and about 3 bites of ham at lunch and I’m pretty sure that the rest of the calories consumed were some form of candy…so you can imagine what his energy level was! Luckily (?) grandparents had sent out a Dancing/Singing Bunny for the kids and Kade spent most of the day hopping along with that. Last night he slept for 14 hours straight! Nothing like that crash after a sugar high…

As promised, here are a couple before and after pics of what I worked on last week for our Easter table. I wanted dessert to be able to double as a centerpiece, so I made little nests out of chocolate and Chow Mein noodles and then filled them with chocolate eggs. Then I covered some floral foam (because it happened to be cheaper than styrofoam) with moss so I would have something to hold my cake pops.

I didn’t have 12 matching napkin rings, so I whipped up these out of some cardboard and leftover scrapbook ribbon. The napkins I had left over from the last time we hosted Easter – they were white ones from Bed Bath & Beyond that I just dyed at home.

Next I wanted some flowers for the table, but didn’t want to fork over the cash for real blooms. So instead I did a quick Google search for tissue flowers and then made these one night while watching TV. I think they turned out pretty cute, especially with the jelly beans filling the vase instead of water.

And my favorite project this week was attempting Bakerella’s Cake Pops. These took absolutely forever, but since I’m not doing them every week, I think they were totally worth it.

But the real cuties of the day were, of course, Berlin and Kade. Here they are with their Easter baskets, before the sugar high.
July8th

Happy Birthday Kade!

Posted in: Family Traditions

I’m sorry for the hiatus from blogging lately. There was a lot of party prep going on, then visitors and a birthday party and then immediately after the party we left for vacation. But we’re back and settling into a routine again, so I wanted to update you on Kade’s Birthday Party.

As you know, it was a crayon themed birthday party. I covered all the tables with butcher paper and scattered crayons around so guests could get their creative juices flowing.

We had colorful plates and napkins and plain white cups that you could decorate with, what else, but more crayons. And then I served bite sized mac-n-cheese with mini-burgers and pigs-in-a-blanket. (Maybe subliminally the theme was hyphenated food?) And lets not forget about the monster batch of Monster Cookies.

And then, of course, we had chocolate cake and ice cream.

I made a “Coloring Book” cake and a crayon box out of graham crackers. The sugar colors are from Party Works and I thought they were the perfect final touch. On a side note, I really love how easy it is to decorate with Royal Icing, but I am NOT a fan of how difficult it is to eat it since it sets so hard!

Kade was more interested in identifying the colors on the cake than blowing out the candles. And my little neat-freak did have one meltdown when he looked down and realized how big of a mess the chocolate cake and ice cream had made on his hands and chair.

We were SO thankful for all the friends that came to help us celebrate! We are incredibly blessed to be surrounded by such great people who love our son!

Our volunteer photographer for most of the party – THANK YOU JASON!

I think the costume box was a success. He opened it and started trying on hats and then turning around so people could ooh and aah at how dashing he looked. I’m pretty sure being the center of attention is a trait he inherited from his father.

In my opinion, I didn’t think a little boy’s dress-up box would be complete without a set of fake mustaches. Like a little girl’s box without jewelry, right? Kade did not agree. He wasn’t even a fan when Dad wore one.

My parents sent out a sheriff costume and I don’t know which he was more excited about…dressing up like Woody from Toy Story or finally being able to hold a knife!

Kyle and I found a Radio Flyer tricycle on Craigslist and Kade wasn’t too sure there was really any reason to share.

Making up.

This was the chalkboard growth chart I made for Kade (more on how that came together coming soon).

We love you, Kade! Thanks for giving us so many wonderful, adorable, unique, glorious and funny reasons to celebrate 2 amazing years with you.
June9th

Crayon Birthday Party Invitations

Posted in: DIY

In just a few short weeks, my darling baby will be turning 2! I can’t believe how fast 730 days have flown by!! Even he knows he’s not a baby anymore because whenever I try to cradle him in my arms like an infant and rock him, he says “No, Big Boy!” and squirms around until he’s upright. So I’ve decided I have no choice but to get on the toddler bandwagon and start party planning. A few weeks ago, I decided to go with a “coloring” theme since he’s such a little artist. At this stage, colors are definitely his favorite toy and so I figured he’d enjoy it.

I started looking around online for different invitation ideas and stumbled upon what may be the greatest “coloring invite” idea I’ve ever seen. It’s from Chica and Jo. You download blank labels for six crayons and then add your party details; then just print the labels and wrap the appropriate crayon. I printed the labels on sticky paper to make the wrapping a bit easier and they suggested I leave the original crayon wrappers on, as wrapping wax could get a little messy. It worked great.

The only difficulty I ran into is that once six more layers of paper were added to the crayons, it was a kind of a tight fit in the Crayola box. When you opened the box from the top, you had to take the crayons out one by one and then they weren’t in the order I put them in which made the invitation not make any sense, especially if the unsuspecting recipient had no idea why I was sending them a random box of crayons. So Kyle suggested I cut the box in half with a razor blade and just to make things a little bit clearer, I made up a sticker to add to the front that said “Open Me!”. That worked perfectly, because now the tight fitting crayons stayed snugly inside the base and the top easily slipped off to reveal the party details.

I was really pleased with how it turned out and am trying to figure out how I can make crayon invites applicable to all gatherings now.
June2nd

The Cookie Monster

Posted in: Family Traditions
So there are a few things coming up in June that I need cookies for, one of which is Kade’s birthday party. We are doing a “color” theme (more on that soon) and so I thought an M&M cookie would be appropriate. Growing up, I remembered my mom making a delicious oatmeal cookie with M&M’s and so I scrounged around in my recipe cupboard until I dug up the recipe for Monster Cookies. My first missed clue that I was getting in over my head was the fact that the first ingredient is not 2 or 4 or 6 eggs, but 1 dozen eggs! Somehow, I managed to ignore the audacity of that and dove in anyway.

My second (not as missed) clue that I was getting in over my head was the fact that before I had even begun to add any dry ingredient, my mixing bowl was full to the brim and dough had completely swallowed the entire beater. At this point I had to find 2 identical bowls and divide the wet ingredients in half by weight. Then those bowls were emptied into my two largest bowls in the entire house (the only things larger are basically my mop bucket and our cooler we take camping). Then I finished mixing in the chocolate chips, M&M’s and 18 cups of oatmeal.

Then I started baking…and baking…and baking. I actually only finished one bowl the first night and stuck the second in the fridge to finish the next day. Now in the cookie’s defense, they really do taste amazing. And now that it’s over, I’m really glad that my cookie baking is finished for the month year.

Kyle had asked me before I started why they were called Monster Cookies and as a kid I had always assumed that they were the actual poster cookie for the Cookie Monster on Sesame Street, but after baking a recipe that produces 12 dozen cookies, I’ve decided it’s because it’s a monster of a cookie project. Kyle disagreed and said it’s because after eating seven in one night, there’s a monster in your stomach!

For all you brave cooks, the recipe is below:

Monster Cookies
- 12 eggs
- 2 pounds of brown sugar (4 1/2 cups)
- 4 cups sugar
- 1 T syrup
- 8 t soda
- 1 pound butter
- 3 pounds peanut butter (6 cups)
- 18 cups oatmeal
- 1 pound M&M’s
- 1 pound chocolate chips
Mix in a large bowl (No, put that one back and get a bigger one) in the order given. Drop by tablespoon on ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake for 12 minutes at 350.