Signs of Spring

Warm weather, sunshine, playing outside, and daffodils all say spring to me. We got to enjoy all of these things today and it was wonderful! I really hope it's here to stay!

Tyler's Birthday Festivities

Since over a month has past since Tyler's birthday and party at the Bounce House, I decided it was time to report. Honestly, I have just been so drained lately. But there's no surprise there. I'm just glad the first trimester will be over in a week! After going through this twice already I realize how fast pregnancy really does go by, so in no way am I trying to rush it along. I am really blessed with great pregnancies, but I am just ready to have some of my energy back!

Tyler's actual birthday fell on a Monday this year, so we did the traditional birthday dinner with family that night and then planned his party with friends for the first Saturday in February. One of Tyler's favorite foods is meatloaf, so that's what we had for dinner on his birthday. He wanted to have cupcakes to celebrate, so he got to help make and decorate them. He decided on a color of sprinkles for each person's cupcake and then wrote their initial with icing. Notice that his is the ONLY green one!

We decided to avoid all the chaos and clean-up of a party at our house this year, so we opted for a party at The Bounce House. Tyler was very entusiastic about the idea and he had a blast! Here he is having a great time with his friends.

And one of Daddy and Allison taking a breather.

After an hour of playtime, we headed to the party room for pizza, cake, and presents! They really do take all the hassle out of it for you. I was able to pretty much just sit back, enjoy myself, and do some video taping. (Luckily, Auntie Vanessa was very willing to take pictures with her spiffy, new, high-tech camera so that I wasn't doing double camera duty!)

Time to sing "Happy Birthday" and blow out the candle!

Tyler was more than lucky when it came to presents. He really racked up this year! Here is just a sampling of what he got.

We attempted a picture of the whole group. Here's take 1:

And take 5:

It's tricky to get 10 kids to smile and look in the same direction all at once!

Another Cake

My nephew, Kayden, turned 2 in February. To celebrate his birthday, he had a Cars themed party and this is the cake I made for him. My sister wanted the cake to be low in sugar, so it is made with a natural sweetener called Agave nectar. The frosting was also to be low sugar, so it was made from cream cheese and Agave nectar. This made it a little more difficult to work with since it got soft rather quickly, but all-in-all, I think it turned out pretty cute!

Even MORE Big News!

Haha, just kidding!

This post is not related to big news at all. It's actually just a post about cakes. When Tyler's 1st birthday rolled around, I decided that I wanted to try my hand at creating his cake. I decided to do an Ocean Life themed party and this is the cake I created as a result. The only downfall to the cake was the fact that it was a bit tippy and had to be propped up in back...not too shabby for my first attempt, if I do say so myself.

Then for his second birthday, I decided to keep the tradition going. Tyler wanted to have a Dinosaur party, so I thought a volcano cake would be a great addition to the theme. Here's the end result that year.

During Tyler's 3rd year, he discovered the movie Cars and became a big fan. So, needless to say, he wanted a Cars themed party that year. Since Allison was just 6-months-old at the time, I was feeling a bit more stressed than usual and didn't get as elaborate as I had the past 2 years. I was still pleased with the end result and Tyler absolutely loved it. As people arrived at his party that day, he would lead them to the cake and excitedly ask, "Do you want to see my party?!"

Another funny story about this cake: To make the cactuses, I cut shapes from a green sponge and just stuck them in the cake. When it was time to light the candles, Billy thought it would be a grand idea to use a blow torch to get the job done (go figure). Well, that poor little cactus on the left side of the cake caught on fire and had to quickly be extinguished! Tyler didn't let him live it down for quite some time after that. "Remember when Daddy caught my cake on fire?!" he would say.

Six months later, Allison's first birthday rolled around. After much deliberation, I came to the consensus that she would have a Garden Party theme. So why not create a garden cake complete with gumdrop flowers and a sugar wafer picket fence?!

So up until that point, I had only created cakes for my own children (other than assisting Vanessa in creating a castle cake last year for Lana's 3rd birthday). This year, Lana wanted to have another Princess party. I had seen these adorable doll cakes and decided I could create a princess one for Miss Lana. Plus there was an added bonus - her birthday gift was right in the cake! No wrapping necessary!

That brings me to my most recent creation. Tyler still has a great love of dinosaurs, and everyone knows his favorite is T-Rex. So this year, he requested to have a T-Rex themed birthday party and a green stand-up T-Rex cake. So yeah, the stand-up part didn't happen. I made an attempt at it, but really there was no way! So I explained to Tyler the difficulty in making a T-Rex cake that could stand and the liklyhood of it falling over and breaking. I told him if that happened that Mommy would be very sad and that I would cry. He replied, "Really? How bad?" "REALLY bad," I told him. I guess that was good enough, because he was very understanding and decided a lying-down T-Rex would be just fine. Just for the record, this cake took me FOREVER! But it was worth it for my Tylerman!

(Just in case you're wondering, the head, tail, arms, and legs are sugar cookie cut-outs.)

Clearing Up Some Confusion

I am so sorry to everyone who got the impression that all three of the choices in the "More Big News" post were true. It was intended to be a multiple choice quiz to get everyone anxious and guessing what our big news could be. So to prevent any further confusion, I have deleted that post and am now setting the record straight!
The truth is that we will NOT be moving to Arizona. Billy would absolutely LOVE to live there, and will keep hoping that one day we will, but for now this Georgia Peach is firmly planted on southern soil!
As far as Family Fued goes, it has always been a dream of mine to go on that game show. Maybe one day I'll get around to actually trying to make it happen. I think it would be a blast! But currently, that is NOT true either.
So, through process of elimination, our ONLY big news is...

P.S.

This is for anyone who reads our blog, but doesn't have a blogger I.D. (mostly family members).

I did not realize that I had my comment options set to where anonymous readers were not able to leave a comment. That has been CHANGED and you may now leave all the comments you wish! I know that you are all busting out of your skin to leave one RIGHT NOW, so just log in under "Anonymous." Don't forget to sign your name so we know who you are! Thanks!

Big News!

Our Tylerman turned 4 today!

We fell in love with this little man the moment he came into the world and joined our family. We adored every thing about him and were very eager for the joys we would experience with him in the years ahead.

The first year brought all the traditional milestones along with it - smiling, laughing, crawling, walking, talking and all the other little things he did to make us feel like the luckiest and proudest parents on earth!
And then he turned ONE...

The second year seemed to creep by a bit faster than the first. Tyler got to go on some fun trips during his 2nd year, including a Caribbean cruise! He managed to steal the spotlight with his charming personality and adorable tuxes while aboard the ship.
And then he turned TWO...

Our sweet baby was slowly transforming into a fun little boy! Each day brought something new with Tylerman. His intelligence amazed us on a daily basis, and he impressed us with the things he could bring out of that little memory bank of his. His wisdom far surpassed his years, and once again, we felt like the luckiest and proudest parents on earth!
And then he turned THREE...

In Tyler's third year, he became quite an adventurous little guy. His many experiences included climbing ladders and trees, meeting a police officer, going to the races, learning to swim, searching for wildlife (specifically turtles), getting to be a ring bearer, getting to ride a horse, driving a bulldozer, and going to Sunbeams. What a big boy he was becoming!
And then he turned FOUR...

I'm not sure where the time went, but what I DO know is that we have had a fun-filled four years with this little guy! He fills each of our days with happiness and brightens up each moment with his captivating smile. He is amazing in every way. Our lives wouldn't be the same without him! We are so eager to see what adventures this next year will bring!

We love you so much Tyler!

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY!!!

Lists of 4 about Tylerman:

4 things Tyler loves
1. The color green
2. Lightning McQueen
3. T-Rex
4. His family

4 things Tyler loves to do
1. Ride his tricycle and Pooh Jeep
2. Play with his toys (especially his dinosaurs and cars)
3. Play games (from Hungry, Hungry Hippos, to HotWheels.com, to old school Duck Hunt on Nintendo, the kid LOVES games)
4. Be creative (crayons, markers, paint, scissors, Play Dough, you name it!)

4 of Tyler's favorite foods
1. Waffles
2. Meat Loaf
3. Chocolate
4. Chicken Nuggets and "Chicken Bone"

4 of Tyler's favorte things to watch
1. Little Einsteins
2. Cars
3. Monster's Inc.
4. Toy Story

4 of Tyler's favorite places
1. His Home
2. The Cabin
3. California
4. Wendy's (because they have Frosties)