Turning the BIG 30

I turned 30 on April 17 of this year. I had a nice little celebration with my family here at home. My older brother and his wife were able to come, too. We celebrated by going to see RIO the day before, which was a really cute movie. And the day of we celebrated with a huge BBQ complete with smoked brisket, sausage, potatoe salad, beans, bread, and of course cake and ice cream. We had one of my favorite cakes, Italian Creme Cake. I got lots of nice gifts and enjoyed the time with my family. Thank you all for celebrating with me :)

Birthday Get-togther

About 2 weeks ago, we went to Tyler for Troy's birthday. We haven't been there in a while and the boys have been asking about each other, so we decided to go celebrate with him. The boys always have a great time together. Here they are sitting outside on the back porch together. A pretty cute looking bunch, if you ask me :)...

I was trying to get them all to look at me, so I asked them to find the dinosaur in my camera lens. This are the looks they gave me. They weren't sure whether to believe me or not.

We all played outside in the backyard all afternoon after eating some hamburgers, Sean's specialty. It was pretty late when we came in, so they kids had baths and than we ate some pizza and cake.

Here is Troy with his birthday cupcake.

Zander being a silly guy, like always :)

After eating, the boys all settled in on the couch with Mimi to watch Yogi Bear the movie. It was cute and they stayed there for a while. I think Zander & Paul were they only one's to actually finish the movie, though.

Paul's 4th Birthday

My nephew, Paul's, birthday was on a Saturday this year, so we were all able to celebrate with him that day. The boys had a lot of fun playing together. Paul got lots of cool new toys and had a delicious cake. After celebrating the boys sat down to watch TV together and share some goldfish crackers. A little while later, we all went outside and played some ladderball. It was our 1st time playing that game and we all really enjoyed it. We can't wait for the next opportunity we have to gather with family and have some more fun!

4 Years Old

My little Zander turned 4 years old last Thursday. We celebrated by having pizza, cake, and presents with family on Thursday evening. He wanted a "Thomas Birthday," so I made a cake and topped it with a candy railroad track and placed his trains on top. When he saw it, he asked why are my toys on the cake and where is my number 4. Once I told him I had made a track for the trains to sit on he was ok with that, but he pointed to the corner of the cake and said, "the 4 goes right here." So that's where I put it.

He had a great day, and loved all his presents. Happy, Happy Birthday, Zander!!! I LOVE YOU!

Dining Room to Scraproom

This is what my dining room looked like before I cleaned it out and officially changed it to my scraproom. I did all my scrapbooking on this table and rarely cleaned it up. So as you can see, it was always pretty messy. In November, my husband built some really nice shelves with storage bins in my laundry room. I cleaned out a lot of junk and organized it in the new bins. It worked great, but it was still a pain to get everything out to scrapbook.

So, I asked Jason if he would mind turning the dining room into a scraproom and putting some shelves up for me to keep my scrapbooking supplies in. He agreed that would be ok. When my birthday started getting closer, he kept asking me what I wanted for my birthday. I told him the only thing I wanted was for him to put doors up on the dining room and build me some shelved to store my paper and scrapbook tools in. He went right to it. The doors went up fairly easily and he decided he would rather buy shelves than build them. We spent one Saturday hunting for the perfect shelves at IKEA, and this is what we came up with. I wasn't thinking of shelves this big, but I LOVE them!! & I love my new room!!

My 29th Birthday....

was a great one! I got to spend the whole day with people I love. Jason had a service call to go do in the morning, but was home before we knew he was gone & he came home with breakfast. I spent a little while scrapbooking in my new scrapbook room and than we went to Toys R Us to look around and let Zander check out the Thomas Day stuff. We ate lunch together at the new Billy Bob's Burgers, a little hometown burger place. Then we headed home for the boys to take naps. Mom & Taylor came over around 3 pm and I opened presents. Of course I got some really cool stuff :) And then, we all loaded up in the car to head out to the Cheesecake Factory in Austin. My brother, Steve, his fiance, and my Grandparents met us there. We had a great dinner and I enjoyed spending time with everyone! Thank you all for my gifts and the great memories!! I love you ALL!!

Jason & I at Billy Bob's (photo taken by Zander)

My birthday cheesecake, Brownie Sundae! Isn't it just so cute??! It was delicious, too!

The Birthday party group at Cheesecake Factory
Mason, Jason, Zander, Bethany, Steve, Taylor, Mom, Grandma, Grandpa & Me

Happy Birthday, Mimi!

Yesterday was Mimi's birthday. We took her out to dinner and came home to open presents and have cake!

Daddy's Birthday

Zander was excited to make Daddy a cake for his birthday. Jason doesn't really like cake, so I don't usually make a cake. I've always done some other kind of dessert, like cheesecake, pie, or banana splits. But since Zander insisted on making Daddy an "M&Ms Cake," I made one. I think it turned out pretty cute. I just used our M&Ms Christmas train and a bag of M&Ms to decorate it. I think Daddy liked it, too!! (Good thing, since it was his birthday!)

Shout Hooray!

Paul had a Birthday
Shout Hooray!
We want to sing to you today!
One year older & wiser, too!
Haaapppy Birthday,
TO YOU!

Here are some fun pictures of my family, well the kids, together for Paul's Birthday Celebration.



Pauly Boo :)

Zander and Paul playing Memory together. (Isn't that so cute!!)

Mason chasing Paul's roaring, moving Dragon.

Paul opening presents, with the help of Zander (of course)!

The boys and Steve playing with Paul's new Matchbox Cars.

Troy, Paul, and Zander waiting for cake and ice cream! YUMMY :)

A Birthday Full of Fun

Zander loves to play in the water! As I'm sure almost every kid does. We hadn't yet pulled our water toys out until yesterday, Zander's actual birthday. I thought it would be fun for him to play in the water after his nap. It was also good bribery to get him to take his nap. So, as I promised him, we went to the backyard for some fun in the water when he woke up. He really enjoyed himself.

After about an hour of playing, I went in the house to make dinner. We had his favorite, soft tacos. All that water must of made him hungry, cause he had 3 1/2 tacos! If you know Zander, you know how little he eats, so I was very surprised that he had that many tacos. He really wanted to go back out and play some more, but by the time we finished dinner, it was pretty late, so I told him no. Daddy was outside fixing a cage for my garden, so he went out to play while Daddy finished up. Before Daddy knew it, he had jumped back in the water with his clothes on. I couldn't help but laugh. Since he was already all wet, and it was bath time, I took him in for his bath. When he was all clean and dressed for bed, I gave him a surprise cupcake and Daddy and I sang Happy Birthday to him. He loved it, his cake and the song. I'm really glad he enjoyed his day!

3 Years Ago

Three years ago today, I became a Mom. I vividly remember the first time I laid eyes on my precious new baby. I was overwhelmed with great joy and love. It's hard to find the words to describe exactly how I felt, there were so many emotions. I remember feeling like the luckiest girl on earth. It was one of the happiest days of my life! I will never forget how I felt and how grateful I was to be this little person's Mother. I am literally brought to tears as I think of how thankful I am that he was sent to earth to be my son.

Happy Birthday, Zander! I love you!

Signed, Your "Monnie"

Party Time!

Zander turns 3 this Wednesday. Like I've said before, kids grow up way too fast. I need to remember to cherish these times I have with my kids while they are little!

Anyway, he wanted a Wall-E birthday party. He has been really excited about it for a long time. I started making his cake on Friday and he couldn't wait to see it Saturday morning when he woke up. It was sure fun to see his face as he was inspecting it. He had a fun time at his party! Thank you to everyone who came and celebrated with us. He really did enjoy it and loved all the gifts. In fact, when everyone left, we had to open each new toy one by one and play with them.

Enjoy the slide show of his pictures!

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Yum, Yum!

Doesn't that look delicious??!!? It was! It was featured on my friend, Andrea's blog and I requested it for my birthday. Being such a great friend, she came through and made one for me. This was my birthday dessert, and it was super yummy! Thank you guys for celebrating me. I loved my scrapbook stuff & I enjoyed visiting with you.

28 Years

Friday, the 17th, I turned 28 years old. Yep, I'm a young one. :) I had a great birthday!! All my family was here, which was a treat because it doesn't happen too frequently. (Especially for my birthday.) I got plenty of cool gifts and really enjoyed out little celebration. We had a Texas style BBQ for dinner and then opened presents and had cake and ice cream. Thank you everyone for making my b-day special!