Party Pics

Hi everyone,  I'm sick :-(  Urghhhh, just what I don't need at this time of year! (who does?!). I started getting a scratchy throat after my book club party last Thursday night, then the next day I didn't feel too bad. Thought it might just be allergies, I was a little congested but that was about it. On Saturday my throat was a little scratchy again but by the afternoon it seemed fine. By that night though it was feeling a little 'raw', but I thought it was because I'd been talking all night!  Well Sunday found me feeling worse, really bad cough, very sore throat and my face and nose were really  hurting. I think I've got a sinus infection too.

Anyway, hopefully I will feel ok in a day or so. I wanted to share some pictures from last weekend, when we were over at Cheryl's celebrating her 9 yr old's birthday ;-)  Later this week I'll share the pictures from this past weekend when we were celebrating her mom's 65th Birthday.

Unfortunately the only one of me and Jason turned out blurry! But the rest came out well . . .

These girls are the best of friends.... and growing up so fast too!

I'll be back soon with more pictures from last weekend. Jason left today to go to Denver for the week. It means I can rest up for a few days not having to have dinner made for him when he comes home from work ;-) It might be just chicken noodle soup for me and Kristen tonight!

Birthday Girl . . . and Bella!

Hi everyone, hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving Day yesterday. We had a lovely time at my inlaws, it was a quiet afternoon, just the 5 of us (plus Boo!). I made two desserts to take over, but I'll show you those later this week.

Today is Kristen's actual birthday! Yes, 11 years ago today I had just gotten through 46 hours of labor (seriously! it started on Thanksgiving day which was of course a Thursday, but Kristen didn't arrive until Saturday morning!) . . .  and you can BET I'm having a glass of champagne tonight to celebrate that victory, lol :-)  That is my yearly tradition, every year on Kristen's birthday I open a bottle of bubbly. I'm hoping one day she'll share a glass with me on this special day.  So, here's a few pictures of the birthday girl today . . . .

opening cards from the family back home

always filled with the 'green stuff'! THANK YOU Uncle Michael.

and many thanks to Nana and Aunty Brenda and Uncle George.

Mommy and Daddy bought her a Kinect for Xbox this year, and yesterday she got some games for it too from Grandma and Papa

she also got the new Justin Bieber Christmas CD

And finally . . . . 

Meet Bella!

Kristen wanted another hamster for her birthday, but this time a teddy bear hamster, not a dwarf one like she had before. I must admit I prefer the look of these ones, they are so cute and much easier to handle too. We went out this morning to Petco (they are the only ones that carry them around here, Petsmart only have the dwarf ones) and we brought this little cutie home with us. Kristen named her Bella  :-)

she is very calm and easy to handle. Kristen has picked her up easily today but we've left her in her cage for a bit to get settled . I think she's going to be a cute little addition to the family.

Boo was certainly fascinated with her!

Party pictures . . .

After more help from Becky at CBOTB, I've changed the template back to 'Picture Window' and still managed to add one of her wonderful seasonal backgrounds, AND center my header. I used to have 3 columns but I actually like this two column look, so I'm leaving it like this for a while. It all looks good to me now, please let me know if that's not the case, and you're not seeing the Christmas background.

We had Kristen's birthday party here on Saturday, with our neighbor friends, inlaws and a couple of Kristen's 'girl' friends from school (and their moms). We all had a great time, the kids just entertained themselves either running around the back yard (in the pitch black) with flashlights - who knew that could be so much fun!!! and playing upstairs on the Wii. We had pizza and cake, and I also borrowed Cheryl's chocolate fountain :-)

We didn't start the party til 5pm, so I could serve the adults 'seasonal cocktails'. Cheryl found us a cocktail to try called a B28 which was Baileys, Kahlua, Amaretto and Butterscotch Schnapps! We changed the name of it (to go with our seasonal cocktail theme) to B-Thankful :-)  I also served Pomegranate Fizz, which was pomegranate schnapps and champagne, and fresh pomegranate seeds. I wish I'd remembered to take pictures of them! 

Jason took a lot of the photos of Kristen blowing out her candles and opening gifts but unfortunately I had the camera on the wrong setting (again!) and a lot of the pictures turned out blurry :( Here's a few of the 'not so blurry' ones. . . .

friends (I forgot to take another picture when the rest turned up!)

Pizza 'al fresco' - it was such a warm night, the kids sat outside to eat.

 

she blew all 11 candles out in one go :-)

Boo loves to help open pressies!

Our last guests didn't leave til after midnight!! Thankfully they only had to stagger walk next door to get home! I'd say that was a great party, wouldn't you ;-)

Not bad for 48!

Yesterday I turned 48! I honestly don't know where the years have gone. I don't feel 48, I'm told I don't look 48, but I AM 48. . . . .

48?!!! how? when? It's like you blink and your 30's disappear, then your 40's go even faster. I know many of you know what I'm talking about. And if you're like me, you get to this age and you really start thinking about yourself, and you wonder how long this 'ole body' will keep going? 

 

 I joined the gym again a few weeks ago, I'm trying to watch what I eat so the pounds don't keep creeping up and up and up. I got my yearly 'well woman' check up yesterday (can you believe I scheduled that for my actual birthday! that's what happens when you get old, you forget what day your birthday even falls on). I will schedule my mamogram for next week, go to see my ENT for more allergy drops - all in the hopes I can keep myself in the best shape possible as I head toward 50. . . . and beyond! 

My birthday was a quiet day, but I had a fun couple of hours last night when Jason got home from work and then we all popped next door to Cheryl's :-) On Sunday we went to the Melting Pot with my inlaws (their birthday treat to me), and I got to open my pressie from them - wanna see what I got?

 The UGGS from my wish list :-)

I was SO surprised when I opened the box - what a HUGE treat. We joked that I should put them on with my dress to go out to dinner, but I didn't actually do it :-) I just had to put them on and pose for a picture though.  Here's some more pics from Sunday night (a little blurry cos I had the camera on the wrong setting!)

 the best 'inlaws' a girl could ever wish for!

We love Fondue!

the waiter fetched us glasses of champagne after our meal 'on the house' to celebrate my special day, even Kristen got a glass of (non-alcoholic) strawberry bubbly so she could join in the toast :-)

a little blurry, but we're all in it!

I realize why I haven't been blogging so much. I was telling my sister yesterday when she was asking where my posts were. It's ever since I got my Ipad!!! I don't really come upstairs to use my computer much but typing on my ipad isn't that great, so I just don't get around to posting, and one day passes and then the next and I realize over a week has gone by without any entries. I will try to do better and make an effort to sit here and write something, even if it is just a couple of times a week.

Thank you all for the lovely birthday wishes (most of them on FB), you all made me feel so special. 

All about the boy!

Wow, midweek already and I haven't been here since Friday! As you saw from my last post, Friday was Jason's 40th Birthday!!! He took the day off work, but it was just a quiet day of relaxing at home. Saturday was the day we celebrated, with our friends/neighbors and my inlaws, over at Cheryl's house! You're probably wondering why not our house? Well, Cheryl has the pool, remember, and it has still been over 100 degrees every day, so we knew her place would be best, so the kids (and anyone else that wanted to) could get outside and play. Believe me, if there's no pool to keep cool, there's no way you want to be out in this heat!

Here's Kristen and Jason in the pool on Friday night - Kristen is holding up 4 fingers and making a '0' to show her Daddy is 40 :-) Here's a few more pictures from the afternoon and evening. . . . 

 Birthday boy and Mama! She said this was harder on her than it was on him! I'm sure she's still wondering where the last 40 years went!!

For the record I think the camera added about 20lb to me in this picture!!!

I forgot to get a close up picture of the cupcakes I made. I put pictures of Jason when he was about 7 on top of them!

Our gracious host Cheryl :-)

The days are flying by, next week is our last week before school starts! I wish that would indicate the weather will be turning cooler, but usually it doesn't. The lowest temps in the 10 day forecast is 103! (the lows at night are 75!). I am so ready for the heat to be over.

In the meantime, I am gathering my supplies to redo my dining room, based on Susan's Inspiration Board :-)  So far I have an orchid plant from Target, a burlap runner from Etsy, I've ordered chair covers from Target online, bought the Annie Sloane Chalk Paint for the buffet and ordered that gorgeous chandelier (which unfortunately is on back order, but only for 2 weeks). I can't wait to start pulling it all together, but probably won't make a start on it til Kristen goes back to school. 

Hope you're all having a great week so far. I'll be back soon with more posts before the weekend!

Last weekend!

Goodness, this week got away with me (as most of them seem to do), I agree with Darylynn - “what happened, where did it go"?” And if I think back I can’t really say there was much I did other than the usual housework, laundry, running to the store, taking Kiki to piano lesson and a trip to Whole Foods with my friend Cindy yesterday!

With all that said, I must get on and start my day, make the beds, load the dishwasher etc, so I will leave you with some photos from last weekend, when we celebrated mom-in-law’s birthday:

I made a wonderful carrot cake, (I’ll have to share the recipe another time) with cream cheese frosting. Honestly, this is so good I could eat all of these pieces!

Kristen doesn’t like carrot cake so I helped her make cupcakes, and showed her how my Mam used to decorate them with me. We called them butterfly cakes :-) Simply cut a little circle out of the top of the cake, put in some frosting, cut the little circle piece of cake you have in half , then add them back to the top of the cake (with the straight cut sides facing out) so it looks like butterfly wings. I added antenna with bits of orange peel – sprinkle with icing sugar. Look at that crazy Kiki, she can’t wait to eat this!!!

The table was set for a simple pasta lunch. Penne pasta with a choice of marina sauce w/ground turkey and turkey Italian sausage in it, or creamy alfredo with onions, peas, bacon and mushrooms in it. Side salad and fresh baked bread. Simple but satisfying (sorry I didn’t get pics).

Flowers and pressies await!

And Kristen makes Boo look all pretty for Grandma arriving!

Birthday kisses from Boo (notice he has his little blue shirt on too!)

Recognize the green top I’m wearing? It looked like this the last time you saw it!!

Yep, I finished my pretty Garden Spring Tee… I’ll share more photos next time. Have a great weekend!