Tonight I am a proud mamma....

My son, Michael, placed 2nd place in his category at the science fair tonight.
He is so happy!
And of course, Fred and I are very proud of him! (-:

His project was based on whether a robot (his Robosapien Robot) could effectively handle objects as efficiently as a human.

As you can tell by his smile, he is so excited. Check out his red 2nd place ribbon, we stuck it on his project board.

Fred and Michael got some one on one time as they went up to the ceremonies tonight so that made it even more special. I wish I could have been there, but we didn't find out about it till last minute, and I was babysitting. But forunately Fred did take pictures for me!

This project really has sparked an interest in robotics for Michael as he wrote the company that made his robot, and one of the head engineers from Hong Kong wrote back directly answering his questions. He was so excited that they took the time to write. Unforunately he was unable to include the letter in his project because he recieved it past the deadline.

So tonight we are celebrating because a little celebrating and a lot of encouraging can make small dreams become big dreams.

FRIDAY (TGIF) FILL IN'S

1. I'm tired, I'm overwhelmed, I just want to sleep for 20 hours.
2. Why do I have make dinner and not get to eat any of it?
3. How does this embroidery machine work, anyway?
4. Every morning, I put chapstick on my lips.
5. I consider myself lucky because I have a great family.
6. One day we’ll see an end to all of our bills cause we'll be debt free.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to maybe going to a tupperware party at Meeper's house depending how I feel, tomorrow my plans include spending the day with my grandmom cause her breast cancer surgery is Monday and she is nervous, then maybe a craft party Saturday night and Sunday, I want to have a day to relax, but I doubt I'll be so lucky!

A faithful companion has been lost....

Today is a sad day...

My mom and dad lost their beloved dog, Cody.

Cody had a love for strange things like bike helmets and sponges, and although he often spent his time driving my brother and I crazy with his lazy carefree ways, he was a great loyal and devoted dog for my parents.

He was always mild and well behaved. My mom babied him like crazy, and took him to my grandparents farm every week.

He was always the slowest of all our dogs...following the pack, but lagging way behind...I think that had a lot to do with all the food my mom gave him all the time.

My dog and my brother's dogs will be heartbroken not to have their pal on their romps around the farm.

In the end, he ate a sponge and the pieces of it caused a blockage in his intestines. The vet had to remove 2 feet of his intestines in a surgery to try to save his life, but in the end, it wasn't meant to be....

So today we lost a friend...one that we'll always remember...a gentle soul.

Thursday Playgroup - The Letter "G"

In this week's playgroup, we focused on the letter "G" as in Gingerbread men! Meeper had picked up a Gingerbread Cookie kit at Christmas time, but when our grandfather passed away in December, we postponed playgroup until after the holidays. So what a perfect project for this week!

The kids loved making their Gingerbread Cookies!

What child doesn't love icing, candy and cookies?

After the project, Jamie read the poem, "The Gingerbread Man". As she was reading, each child had a picture of a character in the poem so when she named their character, they got to hold up their picture. It was a nice way to keep the children's interest, and make them feel like part of the story.

Then we proceeded with our songs, and review of shapes and the alphabet. The kids are really learning a lot of new things. I am always amazed of how much my daugher retains from these meetings because sometimes she doesn't want to sing or partake in the activities. But she belts the songs out at home, and it has really helped with her retention of the alphabet.

Another side benefit of this time together is that the kids learn to share. Allyson wasn't too fond of sharing the toys at her house last week, but it is something that she definately needs to learn so I love that it is an added bonus to our meetings.

So another week down...

Kara (Meeper's daughter) and I are patiently waiting for "I" week and "M" week...

Can you say Ice Cream and Milkshakes?

We are all about that....we were even thinking of other ice cream treats for every letter...like "H' could be Hot fudge sundae. (-;

Cake Decorating - A Presidential cake

This Monday, we worked on a "Presidential Cake" in cake decorating class. Meeper and I weren't too thrilled to use black icing on our cakes...but I didn't have to worry, my icing never turned black. (-;

This is our teacher's demonstration cake....

That's George Washington in the middle in case you were wondering....

Here is Meeper with another case of the giggles...

And here are our finished cakes...mine on the left, Meepers on the right. I didn't use enough dye in my icing to get the black, and my George Washington looks...well I am not exactly sure what he looks like, but not so much like George.

Its all good, I am even lucky that I had a cake. I had frozen my first cake days before cake class and when I pulled it out of the freezer, somebody had layed something heavy on top of it and crunched down the middle.

So I baked yet another cake, got the icing on it, and put it in my cake container. Then hours later, my ever so lovely 2 year old daughter came cheerfully and happily skipping in my living room with my cake container just a swinging away. Luckily the cake was unharmed!

Next week is the "doll" cake...something I had attempted before with my kitchen aid bowl so I am really happy to try again, especially since I think I am going to do a princess cake for my daughter's birthday!

Can't wait for another fun night of cake decorating!

Butterfinger Cake

Some of you asked about the Butterfinger cake I made for my family yesterday. It is very simple and you can find the recipe here, another great blog!

My kids aren't super picky when it comes to cakes and candy so I am even able to just mix butterfingers (or any candy) in any icing and they are happy campers specially when you make it a double layer cake and the candy icing is in the middle too. (-:

There is also another recipe that you can make a Butterfinger cake using sweetened condensed milk. I tried it before, and the kids liked it too. You can check out that recipe here.

Happy baking!

My own little Betty Crocker....

Tonight I, with Allyson's help, made a couple cakes....

a Butterfinger cake for the family,

and a cake for my cake decorating class on Monday.

After I was done, I was talking to my mom on the phone, and Allyson was "washing" dishes in the sink. A brand "new to her" hobby.

She started putting water in my used cake batter bowl...

next thing I heard her say..."we have to get some eggs" as she walked to the fridge. I, of course, pretended I wasn't paying attention sensing a photography opportunity. After all, she was dressed up (on her own accord)...

I told my mom that things were about to get interesting, and Fred and I watched her. She took an egg out smashed it on the counter, and threw it all in the mixer bowl with all the water she had already added. UMMM YUMMY?

Now this was funny the first time...

obviously this won't be as funny the 2nd or 20th time.

Girls morning out ------------Cinderella and Shoes?

This morning, I took my favorite little princess to see "Cinderella" at the awesome little theater near here. If you follow my blog, you will realize this is the same theater where I took my son to see "It's a Beautiful Life"

Ally was SUPER EXCITED that she was going to see Cinderella...

that is until the play began.

She wasn't getting Cinderella as a peasant. She couldn't fathom it. She kept asking, "Where's Cinderella?". But I felt a little better about that when I heard several other kids near us questioning the same thing.

When Cinderella finally had her makeover, then I heard, "Mommy, are we going home now?" I really thought she would love this, but she really just didn't get it.

After the play, the actors (in character) did a meet and greet with all the little princesses so Ally did appreciate that. When we left, she got upset because she wanted to go back and see her again.

I should have seen this as a sign we should head home,

but me...I always push my luck!

After the play, we stopped by a childrens clothing consignment shop near the theater. Allyson was enthused by the "frilly" Easter dresses they were selling. That ended quickly as she realized they had shoes.

MY DAUGHTER IS OBSESSED WITH SHOES...

I do not know how this happened.

I literally will wear my shoes to threads because they feel comfortable

until my mother starts in on me and I get tired of hearing her complain about them...then I buy new ones.

So where does this obession come from??? Her dad is surely not obssessed with his shoes...so I just don't know, but she is definately obsessed.

So off we went to look at the shoes...nothing special...nothing we needed.

But then we were starting to leave and it happened.

Allyson's first FULL FLEDGE public temper tantrum.

Definatley one for the record books!

Needless to say, we got NO shoes today.

Firefly Friday - Playgroup Happenings

This weeks book was

"The Very Lonely Firefly" by Eric Carle.

Jamie, my sister in law, has been tasked with being the storyteller.

She also had a simple, yet creative way, for the kids to make their own fireflys.

She premade the firefly wings out of construction paper with a paper punch hole in the middle. Then she bought glow sticks. We snapped them, added the wings to the glow light strings and wallah "Fireflys". It was a great project to go along with the book!

Thanks Jamie!

Here is the gang with their homemade fireflys.

Check out my adorable little nephew in his cute little cap.

There are A LOT of benefits to playgroup, but one of the things

I LOVE

about it is that I get to see all the little cuties in my life once a week..and watch them grow!

It makes me so happy!

Sometimes we have to put someone in timeout...

we don't like to do it,

but some of these kids are just plain onry.

Don't look now, but there is a

particularly onry

one in time out as we speak.

Check out that smile while she is in timeout.

She is Meeper's daughter so expect no less.

But I know that smile well ,

my daughter has that same smile when she is in timeout.

I guess it runs in our family.

Thankfully our broke television now has a better use.

Since playgroup was at my house,

we got to finish out the day

"TONYA" style,

and for me, the day would not be complete without ice cream.

My house, MY RULES.

So the kids had mini splits...

And what about the adults you ask????

We had full fledge gigantic banana splits....

Okay so what if mine was the only gigantic one??

...there is no crime in that. (-;

FRIDAY (TGIF) FILL IN'S

1. Give me a day at the spa and I'll be one happy girl.
2. Whenever you are on dayshift, I am HAPPY.
3. I wish I had more money in the bank.
4. A banana split was the last thing I ate that was utterly delicious.
5. To live in this world and watch my children grow is a true gift.
6. Other than this one, the Masked Mommy is the last blog I commented on.
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to hanging with my family, tomorrow my plans include seeing my grandmom and a night out and Sunday, I want to have our Sunday family dinner with all 5 of us!

Sisterhood Award

Mamma over at All This is True bestowed upon little old me the coveted "sisterhood award". THANK YOU MAMMA!

So, here are the rules:

1. Put the logo on your blog or post.

2. Nominate at least 10 blogs which show great Attitude and/or Gratitude!

3. Be sure to link to your nominees within your post.

4. Let them know that they have received this award by commenting on their blog.

5. Share the love and link to this post and to the person from whom you received your award.

Since I follow over 200 blogs and I could never just chose ten....I am chosing anybody who reads this and wants to be my friend. You guys are ALL awesome!

Alright the real reason for the cop out is I seriously can't take time away from my blog reading to chose any 10 or else I would get behind...I know you totally understand! (-;

Mamma, YOU ROCK!! I love your blog...

and your mantra reigns supreme in my house.

"The laundry can wait, I blog."

(And so can meals and housekeeping)

Valentines Day Gift - Sorry I am late posting this..

I wanted the kids to give my mom a little something for Valentines Day. She came by to drop of little gifts to the kids so I thought she would enjoy getting back something in return.

I just picked up a cheap wood frame from the craft section at Walmart, and used some scrapbooking paper I had bought previously for the scrabble tile necklaces. Just modpodged the paper to the frame, put a couple more coats of mod podge on top and called it a day!



Just for the record, it wasn't as easy as I have made it sound...I did get some air bubbles that I tried to push out with a credit card. In doing so, the paper tore in some places...not horribly but enough to notice. But imperfections are often in homemade things, and I knew my mom would appreciate the thought so I didn't make a big deal out of it.


I got the kids together, and took a quick snapshot...framed the best one. It's as easy as that.

I had Michael make a potato stamp and stamp a brown paper bag for wrapping paper like we used to do in grade school. See I did learn something in grade school. Michael bucked tradition and went with green and black hearts...such a little rebel.

My mom was thrilled with her gift and it didn't cost much at all!

A great tutorial on how to do this project is found at Tidymom.

She has made several adorable frames! Check her out!

Playgroup Friday - Valentines Party

Let me start off with the cupcakes that I made for playgroup....a red velvet cupcake with almond icing topped with a milk chocolate heart. Mhmmm.

This is the first time I have made a chocolate topper, and it was super easy. Just pipe the shape on a parchment paper with melted chocolate, freeze, and poof...a chocolate heart. I love this idea cause I pretty much have chocolate on hand at all times so it is something I can pull together in a pinch!

Baby Ava's mom contributed some delicious pretzels coated with all things great! LOVED THEM!

Now on to the playing and educating....the older kids I babysit were off from school because of Presidents day so we were thrilled to have them participate. We even got one of them to read to the younger kids. It was very nice! This week we stressed the letter "E" so we read Dumbo (the Elephant) to the kids.

Of course we worked on our usual things during circle time, colors, shapes, alphabet, songs.

After circle time, we had a snack of the pretzels, handed out Valentines cards and worked on coloring an Elephant drawing while we waited for our pizza to arrive.

As usual, the kids had a great time....even if it didn't look like it...
This is Meeper's daughter...I love this girl, and she is going to love me when I pull this picture out when she is older. (-;

Tonight I have reached my limit....

That is my "blog following limit"...who knew there was such a thing???

HOW CAN THIS BE???

"You may only follow 200 blogs per account. Please unfollow some of the blogs you are currently following."

200 blogs...that is not nearly enough!?! I need more!! And like I can really let somebody go and then replace them? I just don't have it my heart.

Seriously. 200. Sheesh..Seriously.

Friend Makin' Monday

Its Friend Makin' Monday at All That is Good...so I thought I'd join in on the fun since I don't have time tonight to post about anything too time consuming, although I do have lots of things to post...(-;

1. jog or walk: walk
2. coffee or tea: sweet tea
3. pepsi or coca cola: PEPSI
4. flats or heels: flats (I'm a hair under 6ft tall)
5. fries or onion rings: onion rings
6. cats or dogs: both
7. skim or whole: whole
8. small purses or large: small or none
9. van or suv: either..I am rockin' a van right now, and it is wonderful!
10. winter or summer: summer
11. 1 piece bathing suit or 2: either
12. sit down restaurant or fast food: sit down
13. McDonalds or Burger King: No competition...Burger King hands down...
14. White Gold or Yellow: ummm, I guess white
15. Fish or Chicken: CHICKEN
16. Edward or Jacob: Edward!
17. Pizza or Burger: Either
18. apple or orange: apple
19. Spend or save: A reformed spender who falls off the wagon occasionally
20. 1 story or 2 story house: 1 story

Valentines Day Shirts

Yesterday was a day of projects, and one that I worked on was Valentine's Day shirts. My sister in law, Jamie, made adorable freezer paper shirts for the kids around Christmas, and I LOVED them.

Instead of using freezer paper, I used my Cricut to make the stencil for the shirts.

I picked up a couple shirts for my daughter at Walmart on clearance after Christmas. On my cricut, I chose a heart pattern. I removed the heart and used the "remaining" stencil for the design. Of course, since I was using vinyl it adhered right to the fabric perfectly.


On one shirt I added a heart shape to the middle of the stencil so this area would remain pink and give me a heart in a heart design. The other shirt, I cut out I (heart) you to put in the center of the heart stencil so that when you took the letters away, the outline of the letters would show.

Prior to painting, you should really put a piece of cardboard in the shirt to prevent the paint from seeping to the back of the shirt. I skipped this step..but trust me, you'll want to do it. (-:

Using fabric paint, I sponged the cutout of the stencil with paint....paying special attention to get the paint around the edges of the stencil. I wanted a washed out look so I did not put the paint on thick.
If you don't have a cricut, you could do this with freezer paper, and also use stickers to make a "design in a design". I was fortunate enough to get a ton of vinyl from Lowes at a deep discount, but if I had to buy vinyl from a craft store for this project, I most definitely would have went with freezer paper to cut costs.

Here are the finished products. I think they turned out pretty well, and it was a quick project. I think it is a cheap way to dress up a plain tshirt...I'll definitely be doing this again soon! After our Valentine's Day party tomorrow, I should have some pictures of my daughter wearing one of them, and we'll see how durable they really are! (-;

Homemade Sticky Buns and Donuts...OH MY!

Michael's class is discussing family history, and last week each child had to bring in a long standing family recipe...as in one that has been passed from generation to generation. This week, they had to bring in the finished product for the kids to sample. My overly ambitious son decided that he would not submit just one family recipe, but two. Lucky me!

My belated Great Aunt Marion's sticky buns are stuff legends are made of. She once had a man at a church auction pay over $100 to win a batch of her sticky buns, people love them that much. This was only my third time making them, and I learn something new each time...this time, they got a little dry from overbaking (hey I was making donuts too!), but lesson learned and they are still edible...and they passed my hubby's approval.

And just a funny little side note about my Great Aunt Marion. I always thought her name was Lillian Marion. For years that is what I thought my mom was calling her so I called her that....except what I just found out in the past few years is that my mother was actually calling her "Little Auntie Marion". Say it fast and you can see how Lillian came out of that. My aunt probably thought I was nuts!

Thanks to her daughter, Penny, for reminding me about them, and getting my grandmom to give me the recipe. Penny's sticky buns are just as good as her moms...my grandmom even thinks they are better.

For the next recipe, we have my grandmom's glazed donuts. She has made them every single year for Christmas. She wasn't feeling too well yesterday so I couldn't bombard her with my million how to questions. So I followed the recipe as best as I could decipher it, and made my own glaze from an internet recipe.

They turned out really good...definately better than I thought they would. I couldn't stop myself from eating them this morning, and then of course the kids had to have one.

So we packed them up and off they went to school with Michael. Michael was so happy that I ended up having enough time to finish them. He went to bed way before me. And I have to give a shout out to my hubby who helped finished up when he got home from work, and then cleaned the kitchen for me!!!

So a HUGE thanks Fred!

Cake decorating...

I cannot possibly tell you how much I am loving my cake decorating class. It has been awesome!

Today we had to bring an icing cake to class so that we could decorate it. Meeper and I did heart cakes for Valentines. Ummm, yeah, easier said than done when you have a two year old asking for a piece of it and just not getting why she can't have any. But eventually she settled on washing dishes, and forgot all about the cake.

So here is my icing cake...umm, I know I messed up the frosting in a few places, but my wonderful teacher demonstrated frosting a cake to me again, and I think I get it now.

Meeper and I had a bite to eat on the way to class, and enjoyed a nice conversation with my neighbor. I have the greatest neighbors...they ROCK!

But that is a post for yet another time..tonight is all about cake decorating....

Meeper and I came fully stocked with our cake decorating supplies. We are taking this class ultra seriously in our own giddy giggly way.

Here are Meeper's practice lines...aren't they fabulous?

You go Meeper!

Doesn't this pink icing look yummy??? Actually it is very, very sugary, even for this sugar addicted girl...but I still manage to eat as much of it as I put on the cake. Imagine that?

Whoa Meeper!?!? Don't get ahead of yourself! Put that frosting down STAT!

You are scaring me..

Here is Meeper being "one" with her cake....

Here is Meeper's masterpiece..

And here is my "masterpiece"....

And here they are in perfect harmony...

I think that Meeper and I did a very good job on our very first cakes if I do say so myself. And we definately had a great time giggling as we so often do! I have already learned quite a bit in only the first two classes. I can't wait until the next class!

And here are some of the cakes from the others in our class...

Can't wait for the next class in two weeks...but maybe our teacher will enjoy a break from Meeper and I. Meeper ended up with icing on her eyebrow and face..I ended up with it in my hair. Things can get a little wild when we are together...and the laughs just keep on going.....