Vacation Day 1

Yesterday, we made the drive to Aunt Katie's house!  We left around 8:40 a.m. and made it to the outskirts of St. Louis before Momma stopped for a bathroom break.  A few minutes back on the road, and Julianne was out for her first nap!  We had packed lunch meat sandwiches (lunchables for the kiddos), so we kept right on rolling through the lunch hour and nap time.  We made another stop in Mt. Pleasant, IA; and as luck would have it, there were many trailer loads of tractors leaving town.  The boys were in heaven getting to see so many antiques while pumping gas!  By the time we reached Waterloo, all three kiddos were sleeping.  They all slept for a little over an hour, talk about a quite van ride!  We were so extremely pleased with how well everyone did...especially Julianne.  She has never been a good traveler, but she rocked this trip.  The last 20 minutes, she was pretty unhappy, but we could handle 20 minutes of a 10 hour trip!

While we were driving, Pa-paw, Ma-maw and Aunt Lisa (they drove out on Tuesday), we running errors for Aunt Katie.  One of which included picking up drinks for the reception...

Today was spent making the cakes for the reception.  Aunt Katie baked some of them last week, and Ma-maw finished baking the others yesterday.  After an extra trip to the grocery for more icing coloring and supplies, we were able to get the 6 sheet cakes and the tiered cake decorated by mid-afternoon!

Those are (peppermint) snowflake candies on the sheet cakes that I had made last week!  I also made some smaller ones in red and white to have on the dessert table at the reception.

The bottom two tiers are styrofoam, the top tier is a real cake for the bride and groom to cut at the reception.

After finishing the cakes, and cleaning up a bit, us girls headed to the "city" to have a little pampering!  We went to the beauty college as the other places in town seemed to be highway robbery for the price to get your nails done.  Ma-maw, Aunt Lisa, and Aunt Katie had both manis and pedis, while I went for just a pedi and Reba got her fingernails polished.  In the end, we all had a good chuckle about the gals that did our nails.  Let's just say my pedi and polish took the same amount of time as the other's manis and pedis!  Either my gal was really slow, or their's were really fast!

A few before shots...

Then, Little Miss got bored and started using my camera...

She was pretty excited to spend the evening with the girls and to get her nails done.

Until next time...

Chuck E Cheese Party

After the toy show yesterday, we stopped at Chuck E Cheese for a birthday party the kiddos were invited to.  Thankfully, they all grabbed a nap on drive back from Taylorsville.

When we arrived, Dallas and Reba each got a cup of coins, so they were off to play games!

After 45 minutes or so, it was back to the table for pizza...

...and then back to the games before cake.

I think it is pretty safe to say they all had a great time, and they all slept like rocks last night!

Until next time...

Happy 1st Birthday Julianne!

Today our Sugar-babe turned 1 year old!  The weather wasn't completely opposite as it was a year ago, as there was no snow on the ground.  We enjoyed the our morning at a toy show in southern Kentucky, and then came home to have our friends (and Julianne's godparents) the Schenks over for supper, gift opening and cake.

Julianne's cake looked almost identical to the one I made her last weekend...and she loved it once again!

Our birthday girl - not wanting to sit still to have her picture taken!

Present time!

You might say she had a few extra helpers willing to lend a hand getting the paper off the packages...

...and willing to help test the new toys!

Matt and Carla recorded a story for her - such a neat idea!

She's ready for the cold weather - if it ever decides to show up

Julianne wasn't too happy that I was holding the cake too far away; she couldn't pet the kitty!

I had been working with her on blowing, but she wasn't able to muster up enough wind to get the candle out

It didn't take her any time at all to dive into the cake this time!

I thought I would be nice and share some ice cream, but Sugar made such a face when she took a bite.  I thought she didn't like it, but she turned back for more and made the face again and again!

Until next time...

Julianne's {first} 1st Birthday Party

We were able to celebrate Julianne's (upcoming) birthday with my side of the family while up north this past weekend.  Thankfully, Aunt Katie and Uncle Brian were back for the holiday and join, too!  Sugar wasn't too sure about the hoop-la of opening presents, but she gradually figured it out.

Julianne loves cats, and will screech "tit-ty" when she sees one, so it was only fitting to put a kitty on her cake.

This is probably my favorite picture, I just wish it wasn't so dark (I've already lightened it the best I could).  Julianne saw the kitty on her cake and tried to pet it.  Of course, she ended up with a handful of icing!

Yep, she's still licking the icing off her fingers

Since Reba's party was just last week, this was not Julianne's first time having cake.  It was though, the first time I was letting her do it on her own!  She didn't know what to think about that.

No fear, she figured out what to do!

Until next time...