the Tractor Party

So yes it was over 2 months ago and I'm just now posting it.  I wish I could say I'm catching up on pictures, but that's SO not true.  For now here's Kye's 3rd birthday party with what else but a John Deere tractor theme.  To say the child is obsessed is such an understatement.  I mean he sometimes gets excited and just blurts out the first thing that comes to his mind...and guess what? it's always "John Deere tractor".  Really. 

Of course he got a new tractor shirt for the party courtesy of etsy.  He only wore it for a few minutes though.  He changes his clothes about 10 times a day now.  And he has to pick out what he wears which gets very interesting.

A party around here is not complete without a piñata.  My kids flip out over these things...

His party was pretty small.  We just had a few friends over to swim.  I found the tire floats online, perfect favor for a tractor swim birthday party.

The cake was my first attempt at decorating with fondant.  It was actually a little easier than I expected.  Kye loved it.  Really all he wanted at his birthday party was a "green tractor cake" so it was a pretty important part of the day.

 

More Happiness

I hope you can stand to see a little more from this happy family.  After 2 vacations and being sick in between I am finally getting to do this last post, yay!  I had so much fun taking pictures of these guys.  These are some of my neighbors and yes they always seem to be this happy.  Even though the little one missed her nap and was quite tired she still gave me so many fabulous smiles.  Take a look..

Happy...a Sneak Peek

I was hoping to get these done by now, but it didn't happen probably because I tagged so many pictures to edit.  I got tons of great shots.  This is just a few from one location in the park and there were 3.  I wish everyone was so easy.  So instead of a full session look here's a preview from location 1.

 

My April Babies

I took my 2 April babies out to do their official 5 and 3 year old pictures.  I am liking this age already.  It's funny how much they have changed over just the last few weeks.

My big 5 year old...

Looks...just like a Worden.  Still can't find any of myself in her no matter how hard I try.  And as she gets older I see more and more of Mark's dad's family in her.  The shape of her face, her eyes, ears, nose all Worden.  And there's no doubt she is built like a Worden, little petite thing (I was never close to petite a day in my life).  All her friends are starting to tower over her.

Acts...just like a Worden, seriously I just don't think our genes mixed much on this one at all. 

Just informed me she is too old for cartoons and toys.  She only wants to watch the science channel, space shows and animal specials.  Only wants to play with "science stuff", and I should only buy her math games and science books.

Does math problems in the car and at the kitchen table for fun. (she can even multiply now).

Still loves horses.

Loves to watch the Star Wars and Lord of the Rings movies with her daddy (not animated versions, the real movies).

Has changed her mind from wanting to be a cowgirl when she grows up to wanting to be an animal doctor.

LOVES to sing along to pop songs in the car, especially Lady Gaga and Train.

Has a pretty impressive golf swing for a 5 year old.

Has an incredible imagination and tells the best stories.

Is a great student.  Her teacher just loves her.

My 3 year old BOY

And when I say boy, I mean B-O-Y.

Is super energetic and aggressive.

Looks, like me (I don't care how many people say he looks like Mark).  He does have Mark's mouth and smile which is why I think people say he looks like him.  Pretty much every other feature of his comes from my family, his hair, eyes, ears, nose, shape of his face, and definitely his frame (since he's projected to be over 6ft.) all from me.

And as much as I hate to admit is since he is a handful... acts... like a Rippy, that's my dad's family.  He acts so much like my dad it's scary. 

Spends most of his days at school in time out or in the office. (some of this could also come from his daddy :)  I never spent a day in detention or the office in my life, true story.

Carrys around a blanket for security (his "star" blanket)

Could drink at least a gallon of milk a day if we let him.  Could eat his weight in shrimp and crawfish, but hardly eats anything else.

Is super rigid, can't stand change, likes things to be comfortable and familiar (sorry Kye, this comes from me and your Poppa).

Still LOVES any and everything tractor.

Is starting to love golf now too.

Can be the sweetest little boy on the planet when he wants to be and gives the best kisses and hugs.  Tells me every night he loves me "too much".

For those that are curious, Kye is "reading" some sort of religious text that he found on the ground.  It was completely written in Spanish.  He wouldn't put it down so it must have been interesting.

a Very Girly Birthday Party

I suggested Celia do an all girls party this year for the first time ever.  She has so many friends that the invite list was starting to get insane with both boys and girls.  And I really wanted to keep it smaller this year.  She loved the idea of doing a girly party, but was a little bummed at first that her "boyfriends" would not be there.  She keeps telling me she has 6 boyfriends :)  But they would have been a little out of their element at this party. 

First she told me she wanted My Little Pony.  To which I replied "really, hmmm, let's think about that" as I was gagging.  I know, she loves My Little Pony, but she already had one pony party and I'm sorry, but I just really can't bring myself to do "a party in a box" type stuff.  I just can't.  And let's face it,  I am the one that does the parties around here.  So I said why not Hello Kitty (she loves Hello Kitty too).  She loved that idea.  So I tried to come up with a way to do Hello Kitty that did not look like "a party in a box".  There are tons of Hello Kitty party supplies out there.  You'll notice I used none for this party :)  Celia has some little Hello Kitty Flower Shop toy so that's where I got my inspiration to a Flower Shop party with a little Hello Kitty mixed in. 

What could be girlier than making flowers bouquets? so that's what we did with the over 200 fresh flowers I had delivered to the house.  

Celia requested 2 things for her party... a Hello Kitty pinata and Hello Kitty cake pops.

I had the cake pops made by Tres Lollicakes in Kingwood and they were delish and super cute.  I didn't feel like tackling those.  The pinata I made myself from a tutorial I saw on where else, but pinterest.  It cost me about $1 to make and looked better than any of the ones I could find online.

First some Hello Kitty coloring...

Then on to decorating the cans I spray painted for them to put their bouquets in.

Some flower fun...

Every birthday I ask Celia what her favorite part of the party was and it always seems to be the pinata.  For some reason she really digs these things.

Time for Cake.  I also made the cake from one I saw on Pinterest.  The flowers on the cake are crape and tissue paper flowers.  The tutorials for those also came from Pinterest.  Ok, so not everything came from ideas on Pinterest, (the flower cookies are from Etsy).

Paper flowers in theory seemed like a good idea for a cake and I see them on all sorts of wedding cakes on Pinterest.  But just fyi paper flowers and fire don't go so well together.  If you look at the earlier pics of the cake you'll notice a big gold flower that's not there in the candle pics.  I kind of caught it on fire while lighting her candles.  It wasn't entirely my fault.  I didn't realize I had a torch lighter instead of regular one, oops.  I was super quick in putting out the fire though and no children were harmed.  In fact, I'm pretty sure most of the guests didn't even notice.

Last year after the kids' party I realized that I had not gotten in one picture so I had to stage pictures of me with Celia the next day, seriously.  This year I was not going to let that happen again.  I made my mom snap a few of me and my big 5-year-old.

Then on to presents.  We are so lucky to have such great friends.

She tells me she had a great time and that's what matters right?  Happy #5 to my favorite girl!!

Now on to the John Deere tractor party.  Ugh, how am I going to make that one cool? 

I'm up for the challenge ;)

 

Girls Day Out

I haven't blogged since February, oops.  Oh well, this is my picture season so I promise to be better.  Celia turned 5 on Monday.  FIVE!  crazy.  Of course I threw her a fabulous party.  More to come on that.  But I'm working on ALL those pictures so for now here's some of our girl's day out.  Since having Kye, Celia and I just don't get any time alone together.  When Kye is in school so is she so I thought, what would be a better birthday present than to surprise her with a special girls day.  First I went to her school for her "Celebration of Life".  At Montessori schools they celebrate your birthday with a little ceremony where the birthday boy or girl carries the Earth around the sun a time for each year they have been on the planet and they stop after each year to talk about what they were doing then and show pictures of that year.  I spent about 30 minutes on Celia's poster this year as opposed to last year where I did this elaborate photoshop project that turned out super cute.  I just couldn't find the time with her birthday party stuff taking up all my free time.  But it worked :)

Then when we were done I told her she was coming with me for some surprise fun.  We headed up to Kingwood, first to meet her bff for lunch, then over to Mudpie to paint some pottery.  She, of course, chose a unicorn to paint.  She's having a hard time waiting on it to get back from the kiln. 

After painting we went next door to have some major sugar...

The icing on that thing was about as big as her head.  Finally, since we have a few more minutes before we had to pick her brother up from school we stopped by target for one more birthday present.  I had so much fun with my 5-year-old.  I'm going to have to make this a tradition.

And here's just a little sneak peek of the birthday party fun...