Kids

Where to Stay/Coffee – Denison, Texas

It’s been a week since we got back from vacation. A WEEK. How on earth did time fly so fast? Seriously. So much has happened in this past week. We finally, thank the good Lord, got Rain! We needed it. Our AC went on the fritz and came back again. Don’t know, don’t ask :). Hubby got home with us only to turn around Monday and head back to Boston, more on that later. Tbug started School. My parents left on vacation. It’s just been a whirlwind of things.

p.s. I might have been dragging my feet about packing myself after packing 3 other people for our trip…

The leading up story

Hubby’s work took him out of town to Boston the week before we were to leave on vacation. Our scheduled departure date was Sunday, August 5, 2018. Hubby’s work trip was supposed to bring him home on August 3, 2018. Supposed to…

Hubby was supposed to board a Delta flight in Boston in the evening on Friday, get into Kansas City late, and potentially drive home to be home around Midnight. A storm threatened the Eastern Seaboard and all Delta flights were canceled in a 150-mile radius around Boston, although hubby said no storm ever hit where they were. All of his co-workers who flew on Southwest Airlines, their flight was delayed, but they got out.

His travel partner and he jumped on trying to scurry and find flights home. The earliest they could get home was Sunday. His travel partner wound up getting home around 4 pm into Kansas City on Sunday. He got rerouted finally through Northwest Arkansas and got home around noon on Sunday. No flights were to be found for Saturday. Oy! (more…)

Trying to Keep it Together

 

I’m sitting here having what can only be termed as anxiety or panic attacks. It’s already back to school time. No, no, I’m not going back to school. Whew, for now, that’s over… I mean I could always get my Ph.D. but I truly don’t see that happening anytime soon. I’m having these feelings because I’m going to have a pre-schooler and a 10th grader.

Gosh, just typing that makes me want to go crawl in a hole, curl up in the fetal position, and cry. Last year Tbug had a t-shirt on that said class of 2021. What. the. heck!?!? That’s exactly 20 years after I graduated. I was class of 2001 which there was a huge debate if we were the first class of the new millennium or if the class of 2000 was. But that’s another debate for another day.

Exactly 20 years. Gosh, am I that old? I’ll be having my 20th class reunion the same year she’ll be graduating. {rocking back and forth in that fetal position… breathe, just breathe}

At my 10-year class reunion, hubby and I had been married a year. We had just gotten back from our 1 year Anniversary in Hawaii in fact. I had a former classmate ask me what it felt like to do things in the right order. Her definition of the right order was graduate high school, graduate college, get married, and then potentially have a kid. Remember, I didn’t have a kid until 3 years after that reunion. I laughed. Apparently, she did it in a different order. She did the graduate high school first. (more…)

Family Fourth of July

I’ve talked about our Family Fourth of July quite a bit this week between the Spumoni Cake, the Wacky Cake, and the Chocolate Chip Cookie Ice Cream Sandwiches. A lot of food talk huh? I also made a Greek Pasta Salad. Holy Yum! But hello, where are the pictures of the fireworks? I’m so glad you asked!

I spent quite a bit of time coming up with what desserts we were going to take. Then making sure I had all the ingredients. Finally, the execution.

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Chocolate Chip Cookie Ice Cream Sandwiches

It seems like most years Tbug doesn’t get to be around for my husband’s families Fourth of July party. This year was different though, yey! That means she was in case you didn’t catch that. haha. One of the things the family does is whoever hosts provides the meat usually and everyone else brings a side or dessert.

Since I knew Tbug would be able to make it, I shot her a text and asked if she’d like to make something. She said yes. I then asked if she had any ideas? She said let me think about it. I told her just let me know so I can have all the ingredients needed.

She sent me 4 options…

I told her all were good options, she had to choose which one. She finally decided on the Chocolate Chip Ice Cream Sandwiches. I then proceeded to click on link after link without really finding the recipe I was looking for, So I went to the drawing board and said, we’ll do our own. (more…)

Wacky Cake with Perfect Party Icing

I really think people don’t believe my now 4-year-old can actually cook. There are some kids I’m sure their parents say can cook and maybe they can, maybe they can’t, but my kids, both of them have grown up in the kitchen with me. I started Tbug helping me as early as I could… she came into my life at 6-years-old. And Abug has done nothing but live in the kitchen with me because as a baby I wasn’t sure what to do with her while I cooked.

And yes, there are some people who give women in the kitchen a bad rap because of all the feminism/sexism mumbo jumbo, but I personally LOVE to cook. I haven’t always… but I have since my late teens/early 20’s. When I was a kid, I had better things to do with my time I guess. I wish I’d have started earlier.

But this is a post about Wacky Cake… not me. I’ll try to remember that…

So when we were getting ready for my husband’s family shindig, I asked Tbug what she was going to make for the party. I didn’t quite give Abug such an option because, well she’s 4 and may not know what all there is. She’d have probably told me Mac and Cheese or something like that. Truth be told… maybe I should have let her take that as her contribution. There were few sides it felt like, maybe because I didn’t care for most of them… but there were lots of desserts. (more…)

Cherry Cheesecake French Macarons

Saturday night we had my husband’s families Fourth of July Party. Lately, I’ve been on the kick to make French Macarons. It might be because my aunt stroked my ego and said that I made restaurant style French Macarons. We’ll blame it on her… lol.

I had egg whites that had been sitting out aging like they say that they need to do for French Macarons. I actually had other plans for them but wasn’t going to be able to do that for a while and didn’t want these to go bad. So I convinced Tbug to make the French Macarons. I thought she might enjoy making something different… Eventually, I had to take over because it was getting late at night and she still had her cookies to make… but she stuck it out to that point I took over. (more…)

For Her Birthday

I think I want to be everyone else in my little family. They get birthday celebrations that last a week long or longer. Last year was the first time that happened to me…

But anyway, enough about me… So baby girl loves Unicorns these days. Obviously. We had a Unicorn themed birthday party complete with unicorn cake, unicorn macarons, and unicorn cupcakes (but don’t forget the Ultimate Birthday Cake too!). Plus unicorn toys, including the one above. That is a Barbie with a Unicorn. I should mention, she also likes Barbie!

Let’s not forget that she also got a bicycle. We held some of her birthday presents from her party just for her to open on her birthday. She also got a sewing machine and a Unicorn Blowup pool toy.

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Memorial Day Weekend 2018

Better late than never, right? I guess taking a week off from blogging last month didn’t help and then needing to blog like 5 times per day to either keep up or get caught up… whew! So we’re going to learn about Memorial Day Weekend today, the first day of July because that’s how I roll. I also woke up this morning to thunder and rain. OMG, we sooooooooo need the rain!

Memorial Day Weekend 2018

Going into Memorial Day Weekend, we weren’t sure where we’d sleep. Maybe the bed of my truck. Seriously, no idea, but then Jared bought a horse trailer with living quarters and BAM! he let us borrow it and we got to sleep in a bed. Whew!

Like most of our Memorial Day Weekends since 2014, we’ve spent them at the lake. This year was a bit different because Tbug didn’t get to go with us. Bummer! This is our first MDW without her since 2014. She started working on her SCUBA certifications that year. And prior to that year, we were elsewhere. (more…)

The Ultimate Birthday Cake

It seems like a lifetime ago, but I took cake decorating classes. They were the Wilton ones through Michael’s Craft Stores. And I loved them all at the same time they felt overwhelming. Almost to the point, I really didn’t do cakes for a long time. Every now and then, the special occasion I could be talked into it, but for the most part, I avoided it like the plague.

A year ago, I got convinced to do a birthday cake for a friend’s friend. Gosh, I was so stressed out I thought I was going to cry. Then… something changed. I can’t explain it, but I made my dad a birthday cake with the help of my girls. Then we made my mom a birthday cake. Then Abug and I made my aunt a birthday cake. And slowly cakes started coming back into my life.

And then one day in May, I decided I was going to make birthday cakes to take to the lake for Memorial Day Weekend. Somehow, somewhere I got hooked on a blog called Liv for Cake. Her cakes really and truly impressed me. And that passion, that desire to decorate cakes just came back. Sure, I can buy icing in a jar (although I don’t) and a box cake mix and make a cake. But there was something about her website that drew me in. It was nuts!

I knew there would be a lot of kids at the lake, so I was afraid that they may not like the Chocolate Dulce de Leche, and that’s when I also found a funfetti cake recipe to try… but I was all the sudden hooked. Even with the few mishaps that happened.

And lately, my husband has been feeding this “addiction” for lack of better word. I upgrade my cake turntable to the above picture. I got some 6″ cake pans along with a few more 9″ and bam, I’m cooking up a storm, mistakes included. (more…)

Unicorn Cupcakes

At our house, it seems like birthdays just go on and on. That is no different for the Abug. She had her birthday party, we took birthday cupcakes to the lake (here), and then she got to go out to lunch and dinner on her birthday. And since you need a birthday cake on your birthday, she got one of those too.

We learned early on that going to the lake with birthday cake, cupcakes are easier. You don’t have to have a knife and plates to cut up and serve birthday goodies. Now… earlier this year, we actually had cake at the lake (Funfetti & Chocolate Dulce de Leche), but for her birthday it’s a little different. Why? Well, usually we are celebrating it at the lake during the Underwater Safari Hunt. That is just a crazy day anyway, so cupcakes are definitely the way to go.

Initially, I wanted to do the horse/unicorn head cupcake I saw on Facebook earlier this year for our cupcake, but since I decorated on Friday, I was afraid that heading to the lake with it already decorated, they could potentially move and that would be sad. Then I ran across Cupcake Jemma’s YouTube video on Unicorn cupcakes and I was sold on that idea. I already had some fondant at the house for the Unicorn Cake horn and ears that needed to be used up. Easy Peasy! (more…)