Recap.....

What a wonderful weekend we had at our house! Here's what we did....

We avoided baths:

We played/watched baseball:

We fished and ate Gummi Worms:

We caught fish:

We took in the Twins vs. Red Sox game:

We made friends with the lady sitting next to us so that when somebody (aka Brett) got antsy in the 7th inning, she took over and entertained him.

A HUGE thank you to all those that have served and are serving our Country! God Bless!

Life's Lessons.....

This past week has been a bit challenging. See, we have this seven year old boy that has been forgetting a lot of the rules around this place. You know, don't lie, don't hit your brother, you don't get to tell your mom or dad "no" when asked/told to do something. Nor do you get to make a barbaric grunt and huff off when told to go clean your room or wash your hands. Seriously. I have no idea what is going on. The kid is so smart, but man!
This brings me to this evening. It was a baseball practice night. I read the schedule wrong thinking that he had practice at 6:00. So, Mike and Colton took off and then Brett and I were going to walk there since it was so nice out and heck, I could use the physical activity. Well, I get a call at 5:50 by my dear husband asking if I read the schedule correctly. What? Of course I did! Well, turns out I didn't. He didn't practice until 7:15. I felt just a little bad since I rushed everybody through dinner, but whatever. I make a deal with Mike and I end up bringing both boys to practice because of a couple factors with one main one being that Mike had about had it up to here with Colton's antics for the day.
At 7:00 we leave the house. Get a mile down the road and Colton realizes he forgot his hat. It's sunny out and a hat is pretty much a neccessity. The following conversation occurs:
Me: Seriously Colton, you are 7 years old - you know what you need for baseball practice, that is your responsibility. (Now if you didn't read that in an annoyed voice with a hint of anger to it, go back and reread it that way to get the full effect.)
Colton: Geez Mom. Sorry. Um, I think my hat is in dad's truck.
Me: Well you have 206 other hats, run inside grab the first one you see and let's go.
Colton: Will you?
Me: Thinking silently - are you freaking nuts kid? Said out loud - No, you are the one who forgot it, you go in and get it.
Colton got a hat and we were off. I start driving to the field that they have practiced at for the past 4 weeks knowing earlier that they were at a different field tonight. We get close to said field and the conversation picks back up:
Colton: Uh mom, we're not at this field tonight.
Me: Oh, that's right. I totally forgot.
Colton: You know, you shouldn't get mad at people for forgetting things.
Me: What do you mean?
Colton: You got mad at me for forgetting my hat and I'm not mad at you for forgetting what field I'm supposed to be at.

And to that I say....touche my dear child. Touche.

Mother's Day.....

I received my Mother's Day gift on Wednesday. What can I say, my oldest is just like me. As soon as I have a gift for somebody, I want them to open it immediately! He made me this sweet card.... and he also made me this sign. It's on ready to hang canvas so I told him I would put it up at work for everybody to see. Here's how our conversation went:
C: Mom, don't you want to open your gift?
M: Right now? Don't you want me to wait until Mother's Day?
C: No.
M: Ok.
C: See how it says "mommy" I know you always tell me that you want me to stay your little boy forever, so I left it "mommy". I could have cut off the last M and Y, but I knew you would like it this way.
He's so sweet!

Moment of Panic.....

Friday night...approximately 6:20pm. Mike is on his way home from work, Colton is playing with the neighborhood kids who all are next door and I just pulled Brett out of the bathtub when the doorbell rings. My first thought is that it's Colton, trying to get into the house to grab something. I tell B to stay put and I leave him wrapped in his towel. I get to the door and it's not Colton, but our neighbor (who happens to also be a babysitter of ours). She looks at me and says....Colton's head is bleeding do you want me to stay with Brett. What happened? So I say to the neighbor as I run out the door, "Brett is upstairs, there's a diaper right next to him."
I get about 8 steps out the door and here comes Colton - hand on his head and his two best buds walking right next to him with their arms around his shoulder. I see blood all over his shoulder and dripping down his wrist. I think to myself - oh, shit (sorry about the expletive, but we're talking my kid and blood here people) which hospital is the closest. He's crying, but not hysterical. I bring him up to the bathroom to get an assessment. Side note - I don't do well with blood, let alone my one children's blood. I grab a washcloth and start blotting as I'm calling Mike's cell phone to get his exact location.
The more I blot, the better things look. I figure it's not squirting out, so we should be okay. There's a nice gash, but nothing that required a trip to the emergency room thankfully.
I made him sit on the couch for about 30 minutes before I set him loose again in the front yard.
Thank goodness everything turned out fine! Oh, I didn't mention that it was a trampoline accident....I haven't figured out exactly what happened, but he hit his head on one of the padded posts.

True Confessions.....

Both my boys love cinnamon bread. Last night when I went to the grocery store, it was on sale so I picked up a loaf. This morning when I was getting their fruit filled pancakes ready, I thought I'd give them a piece of cinnamon bread and be the best mom of the day.
Well, I went to cupboard where we keep such items and it wasn't there. Bummer. I figured I must have left it at the store at the check out -you know how the cashier keeps your bread and eggs at the top of the conveyor belt until the end so they don't get squished. Oh, well, it was only $1.98 so not worth going back for.
As I was getting my lunch ready to take to work I went to grab the pickles in the refrigerator. Nope. Not there. I quickly remembered that Brett helped put the groceries away and if I'm not paying attention, the ice cream ends up in the pantry so I thought maybe he just stuck them somewhere else. Nope. Can't find them anywhere. Then I thought, huh....I don't remember putting away the green olives either. They are nowhere. Ugh.
I grabbed my receipt and started noting all the other things that were "missing" - tomotoes, cream of mushroom soup, mandrain oranges....I went out to the car hoping that I left a bag in the trunk. Not so much. I called the grocery store and sure enough, my missing items where logged in their "paid but not taken" book. I stopped there on my way into work and had to go gather all the items that I forgot, bring them to the counter and then sign that I picked them up. I felt like such an idiot! The cute, young gal working made me feel better by stating, "oh, don't worry, it happens multiple times everyday where people leave their stuff." Oh, good.

Cake - Part Deux

Colton's kid birthday party is tomorrow. He really wanted a Star Wars cake that was blue, so I accepted the challenge. I learned a lot from my first attempt to work with fondant and I wanted to give it a try again. Here's how it all went down.
I made 2 cakes on Thursday night and cut the marble cake into two squares and left the chocolate one as is. Next comes the thin layer of buttercream frosting. After my first cake I realized that you need to frost the sides too - not just the top. Lesson 1 learned.

In the bag is the colored fondant. My hands looked like I was turning into a smurf as I worked the color into the white substance. Lesson 2 not learned - wear plastic gloves. The beds of my fingernails are still blue.

Lesson 3 learned - Measure, measure and measure. Last time I just thought I could eyeball the size that I was rolling out. It works so much better to actually know how big you need it to be.

Lesson 4 learned - don't be skimpy on the amount of fondant you use. I had no tears this time since I used more fondant than I needed, but it was better than not having quite enough.

Here it is after I moved it from the table to the cake.

Then you need to trim the excess off. See - there's proof that I measured!

Remember the marble squares? Here they are stacked and frosted, waiting for the fondant.

Much better.

The stacking process....see that little hole on the top of the white cake? That's a wooden dowel you need to use to keep the cakes together.

Oops, not sure what happened to this picture - it's vertical vs. horizontal. Anyhow, you have to do something to cover up the hideous look of the space where cake one meets cake two. This time I opted for little balls.

And the moment you've all been waiting for....the final product. Colton placed all the little action figures where the need to go. They all have frosting on their feet and then are stuck to little fondant circles which in turn are stuck to the cake.

The cake was a lot of fun to make. Nothing spectacular and I have no plans of quitting my day job. Colton was grinning ear to ear when it was all done and that's all that really matters.

What We've Been Up To.....

It's been a busy week. Thursday my mom and step-dad came down to spend the weekend with us to help celebrate Colton's birthday and Easter. Since Colton didn't have school on Friday, I took the day off to be with him. He wanted to go mini-golfing, so that morning we dropped of his little brother at daycare and we were off to the MOA for 18 holes. We all had a great time. I think our scores were 56, 57, 58, and 60 - it was a close one!

Once we got home, I worked on Colton's cake. Since he requested a Star Wars cake for his kid party, I was able to talk him into letting me do what ever I wanted for his family party. I made a big old birthday cake and for the first time used fondant. Whew. It looks a lot easier than it really is. I had a heck of time rolling it out into a circle shape. I got it a little thin in parts so it did tear a bit when I put it on the cake. I tried my best to cover my errors with the circles.

We had all the family over for dinner. It was a great time. Colton received so many wonderful gifts!

Saturday was our 2nd annual neighborhood egg hunt. Here is Colton with a couple of his best buds before we let them loose.And they're off....

Once all the eggs are found, it gets serious. They wheelin and dealin - trading this for that.

Here are the boys with their loot from the Easter Bunny. Brett got busted a few times throughout the day sneaking candy. We knew what he was up to every time it got quiet!