Oh Christmas Tree Oh Christmas Tree

So now I have five birthday cakes to make each year, and I have been seeing so many others do wonders with their cake decorating, I decided I needed to learn how too. So this week I had my very first experience decorating a cake with fondant.

I had the master cake decorator Sara come and show me how. She walked me through how to make the fondant, after showing me how the mixer worked :) Then she showed me how to smooth it, store it, flatten it, color it, and shape it. After that she said 'Now it's all up to you and your imagination' Great! I don't think of myself as having a great imagination, but I reminded myself this is only practice so it doesn't matter. After having a whole night time full of cake decorating dreams this is what I came up with.

Thanks again Sara for all your help. My next birthday to prepare for is in January so I'll have you on speed dial *smile*

Decorating For Christmas

Once we got back from Pocatello we started to get ready for Christmas. Daddy pulled out all the boxes of decorations and Oscar and Zachary hauled them downstairs. I had a bunch of helpers with the Christmas Tree. When it was time to decorate the tree it felt like a race!! The boys wanted to put up the ornaments but they all wanted to do the same ones. Once we got a routine down it turned out pretty good.







Daddy's contribution *wink* See the cell phone? I wonder who he is texting, while Lily is choking herself with beads?



Here is Lily's contribution *smile*



Tah Dah!! Lights on......



Lights Off.....



It feels much more like Christmas with the tree up, snow on the ground, and the smell of goodies coming from the kitchen. The boys are already counting down. *smile*

Thankgiving in Pocatello

This holiday weekend we were fortunate to travel to Pocatello and visit my side of the family. We have been looking forward to this trip for a long time, since we still had not met Conor my newest nephew, and see family.

Well I happened to forget my camera so I don't have a lot of pictures, but I still have the memories :) We first stopped by my sisters house and we were able to meet Conor!! Oh how I love this little one, or should I say big one. He is 3 weeks younger than Lily and out weighs her by about 5 pounds and his head is much larger than hers. My brother Michael (Conors daddy) jokes that he has a toddler, but Conor is soooo sweet you just want to love him all the time. What makes it more amazing is that Conor was born weighing 6 lbs 9 oz!!

Here is Conor and Lily, I think they hit it off really good *smile*

Here is Michael (my brother) with Conor and Oscar with Lily - Proud Daddys

We stuffed ourselves silly on Thanksgiving and watched a TON of football. I always forget how much by brothers and dad love sports, Zachary of course was on Cloud 9 all weekend. He got to watch a Nortre Dame football game, play football, and play video games all with his idol 'Uncle Michael'! He has such a loving heart and would play with all his cousins who are quite a bit younger than he is. Here he is feeding Conor.

It was also my very first experience shopping on Black Friday, what an experience that was! It was funny, crazy, scary, and frustrating all at the same time. You can tell who the pros are and I for one am NOT. My sister had her game plan and I was just the player told what to do. For the most part it was fine, my sister is the only one who encountered the really grouchy ones. *smile*

We went to the annual Parade of Lights in Poky. I remember when I was in high school being a part of this parade, it has evolved into a much bigger production since then. All the boys were excited to get Candy (like they needed anymore) and see the lights. Here are all the grandkids waiting for the parade to start...

Here is me with Lily and Conor with his mommy Krysten, Conor slept the WHOLE time even through all the sirens and loud motorcycles!! Lily feel asleep right at the end.

Here is what I got to collect at the parade.

A lady was walking along a float wanting to give away these wreaths. Zachary started making a scence to be noticed and she walked past him, but when she saw me holding Lily and waving my arm she came straight to me handed it to me as she says 'Merry Christmas' and was off. How sweet, it smells really nice too.

Since all of the siblings were together we had family pictures done. We FROZE our rearends off, but I think maybe one turned out (pictures coming later). We were going to go to the Lights in the Sky, which is a firework show, but we were all tired, grouchy, and cold, so we passed.

Here is Lily and Conor, they were pooped too from pictures *smile*

The weekend was very relaxing and busy, and I'm so happy we got to go down and see all the family. Thanks Mom and Dad you're the best.

Any a very special thank you to some wonderful friends for helping us too. (you know who you are *smile*)

Realitives Visit From Switzerland

During November we had some special visitors. Manuela and her mom Mina (my mother-in-law Leonie's twin sister) came to visit. They came to visit Oscar's mom mostly, but on the last night of their stay we got together for some dinner. My parents were up visiting for the night as well so we all had an enjoyable evening together.

Here is Mina and her twin sister Leonie (Oscar's mom)



Manuela (Oscar's cousin)

Leonie sportin her new hat. :)



Here we are eating some yummy KFC! :)



Daddy decided that Lily wanted to eat with us. He first introduced her to pop, much to my disappointment!! I don't think she liked it much though.





Daddy acting all innocent *wink*



So I gave him some Lily food, and apparently he got tired of using a spoon and wanted to use his own method!

I'm pretty sure Lily likes mom's method best. I mean how could she not, mommy is her favorite!! *smile* It was so fun to have Manuela and Mina at our home. Manuela is a kid magnet and Lily took to her right away :) We miss your smilin faces already. Thanks for stoppin by!

Lily Update

Our sweet Lily is so fun to have around, I love watching her discover her world around her. The funniest one is watching her all of a sudden notice her hands going across her face. She will hold her hand there, fan out her fingers, twist her hand back and forth, and then 'talk' to her hand. I need to get a picture of this (mental note).

At her last doctors visit for 4 month checkup she weighted 13lbs 4oz (50%) and 26" long (90%) her head measured in the 50%. She is tall and skinny, and still my littlest, too cute :) At this visit she had to have some more shots :( She did okay the first day, but the next day she wasn't very comfortable. We had to give her tylenol all day, because if we accidently touched her legs she would SCREAM, poor baby :( I thought her bandaids were pretty cute so we took a picture to remember.

We also started rice cereal after her doctors visit. She has been watching us (like a baby bird) while we eat and can sit up pretty good when in her chair, so we decided to try some. Here is her first taste.

She wasn't too sure about it.....

A couple weeks later we added some bananas, and then some pears, since then she is LOVIN solids.

She loves this new chair that our great friend Sara let us borrow. She can sit with us at the table and feel like she's a big girl. :)

This little girl loves looking at things that 'light' up. I'll put her by her brothers playing on the computer and this is what she does.

She will also stare at the TV (has to be PBS) usually when she is tired, she'll hug her blanky, suck her thumb, and fall asleep!! She has been the easiest baby to put to sleep, or at least to figure out some tricks (*wink*)

She has also figured out how to get something into her hands and insert it into her mouth!! So everything within her reach ends up there. She found her brothers earphones the other night.

These are just some extra pictures of our sweet Lily doing what she does best, being sweet!!

We love you so much Lily!