Happy 3rd Birthday Serenity

It's so hard to believe that she is just three years old with the year we have had. Seems has if a whole life time of stuff has happen to her in the three short years she has been with us.

We had real reason to celebrate this year and real reason to be grateful for all that has happen and all that we can slowly put behind us. Just two short days before her birthday we were told by her GI doctors that she looked great. That her labs had come back all in healthy range and that she was finally right at the correct weight for her age and height. She was no longer showing signs of flair ups and she seems for once to have her colitis and crohn's disease under control. That was like music to my ears, it had to be right up there with the day she was born and we heard her first cry.

I made a huge cake for a big BBQ and we had tons of family over for her big day. She loved every minute of the all the attention she got. She loves to be the center of the attention. She got tons of barbie's and dress up stuff, a tea party set and clothes. Everything a little girl could ever want.

The BOSTON CREAM PIE is Rob's Birthday cake. He turned 39 this past week as well.

Cake Baking crazy

Here lately I have been so busy baking cakes. I keep improving my skills and it's really starting to show in the cakes I am making. I have even started to make a little money now off of them. I never charge what they are worth but that is ok. I enjoy it and it's never been about the money anyways.

This cake was a Pirate/Princess Birthday party. It was for a great little girl name Jacalyn. Her mom is my son's Kindergarten teacher.







This is my first attempts at making roses. I can't being to tell you how many went in back in the bowl before I had some really great ones.



This is the cake that all the flowers went on. My niece need a large cake and cupcakes for her baby shower. She came to me with an idea for a black and white cake with small hints of pink. It wasn't much to go off but I knew she was counting on my to have an amazing cake for her. So I had to come through. I decided that I wanted to play around with fondant. I made a batch of Marshmallow fondant and colored it pink. I made the ribbons around the bottom of each layer in fondant. The frosting was a simple decorators frosting.

How with the old and in with the new

Seems like 2009 just drug and drug right along. I can't say I have ever been so happy to see a year over with as I was last year. It's seemed there were more things wrong with last year then there was right.

This year I am hoping to have a better year. I have never been good at making resolutions for what I want out of the new year. I have always felt those are just huge promises you make to yourself that you never really keep and then at the end of the year you are let down again. So instead of lying to myself from the get go, I just take each day as the come and embrace whatever happens and keep on moving. I can't say that I don't get down or get mad about things because that would be huge lie. I just try not to dwell on it.

I am hoping to get better at baking this year. I really want to start making better quality cakes. I also want to make more from scratch and stop using so many store bought items. I have been working on cutting our budget down at the grocery store. I don't know that I am really making head way there but I am truly trying.

I do need to work on me but I am not going to get hung up on that or worry about it if it doesn't happen. I need to loose weight. I have needed to do that for years. Sometimes I lose a little and then I stay there but for the most part I have stayed the same weight for 4 yrs. So I am pretty comfortable with the weight I am. Not that it's a healthy weight or that it's something I want to stay at. I just don't worry about it or get all hung up on exercising or eating things that taste like cardboard. We eat pretty healthy and I don't over eat and I try hard not to stress eat. I drink lots of sweet tea and diet Dr. pepper and very little water. So I am sure if I cut those things out and maybe walk a mile or two I would be fine. I'll just play by ear and see what happens.

So far this year in the baking department I am off to a busy start.

January 6th- I am making a cake for Logan's teacher. It's her birthday and she loves Chocolate,cheesecake,strawberries. So she will get my Cheesecake stuff chocolate cake with butter cream frosting and chocolate covered strawberries on top.

January 9th- I am making a ton of cupcakes for my niece's baby shower. She is doing a black and white theme for her shower. I will be adding a little pink since her baby is a girl. We are super excited for her arrival and I can't wait to make the cup cakes.

February 1st- Is Logan's birthday. I have not clue on the cake as of yet but it will be fun. Also cupcakes for his class.
February 1st- Is my mom's birthday. I want to make her a nice cake and have her over for dinner. She rarely does anything on that day and her husband doesn't push her to do stuff. So I am wanting to do something great for them.
February- My Mom and Step dad both turn 50 this year. We are having a big party for them. So that is another cake.

March 14th is my Anniversary and I will make some kind of fun cake for that.

April 4th Easter and I am hoping to host an Easter egg hunt and make a ham and cake and some other great goodies for that.
April 14th- Rob's birthday and I am going to make him a boston cream pie(cake)
April 17th- Serenity will be turning 3. So that is another cake with lots of pink.

May 9th- I will host my mom and my MIL over for a brunch. I am hoping to do a small desert of some sort for them.

June 20th- Father's day. Not to sure if anything will happen that day.

July 4th- I am sure we will cook out and I'll make a flag cake or something like that.
July 27th- Jordan's 14th birthday. WOW (tear tears and more tears) I have no clue on the type of cake or if she will even want one. Teenagers are so funny.

That is as far as I have gotten with my baking and party plans. I am sure the details and plans will all fall into place and things will work out nicely.

Hope everyone has a Happy and healthy and a blessed 2010.

Princess Crown Cake

Made simple..

After a day of looking around on how to make a princess crown cake, I couldn't find one that I loved or even would think about making. They were either to complicated or just plain boring. (nothing against the great bakers out there) I need something that a average baker could do and one that would be perfect for a little girl. So I am making it up as I go.

Here is what I have so far.

I took 2 cake recipes for chocolate cake. Just your basic cake recipe nothing over the top or fancy.
I poured one into a 9x9 square pan.
Next I poured one a bunt pan.

I am going to make the square pan the pillow and the bunt pan will be transformed into a crown. I will place the bunt pan on top of the square pan and decorate it.

What's been going on..

Well the last past 2 months have been super busy for us. Everyone has had some kind of sickness and we have been running like crazy..

February was lots of fun. We moved after 8 years of being in the same place. We moved in the same town. The very first day of our move was crazy. Logan woke up and couldn't not bare any weight on his leg. He looked like a flamingo. So I thought maybe he had some kind of serve leg cramp that need a good day of rest and a good day of rubbing and he would be good as new. Well that night he was just in pain and crying. We were carrying him every where. So I decided the next day he was going to the children's hospital to find out what was going on. They put him through the mill that day and I was there for 10 hours to only be sent back home and told that I need to see an orthopedic specialist that they had found a pocket of fluid on his hip. Not a good feeling to leave the ER and not know what all that meant or what was going on. So we waited on the Doctor to set the appointment up for us. Well after waiting for a little over a week and carrying my son around. I called to find out what was going on. The Doctor still had no clue why we hadn't been contacted by the ortho's office and he said he would check into it. (you are the mercy of all these doctor's who claim to know what they are doing.) Well Rob had started to notice that Logan was trying to use his leg some and had him try to walk on it. He got up and walked with a limp for about 3 days and by the time we got the word to meet the Ortho doctor at the ER he could walk and run on his own. He was released from medical care and able to go back to school. And we were told it was viral and it attacked his joints and now he is better. The very next day after one whole day of school he broke out into a rash. Which turned out to be just the virus leaving his body completely.

Now on to Serenity.. (these two together are trouble I tell you!!) During the move we were eating when we could and eating fast food a lot. (something we don't do, I don't like it and I cook as much as I can so I know what's going into my kids) Day 2 of the move I ran to the store to get some milk for the kids so they could eat some cereal the next day for breakfast. While I was there my husband calls and says Serenity had a poopy diaper. Ok I know what you are thinking, what the heck change it and why do I need to know this. Well I thought the same thing and said the same things to him. He then tells me it had blood in it.. I was like get her cleaned up and ready to leave when I get there. Well in the time it took me to get from the store to my house (which is less then 1/2 a mile) she had two more bowel movements. All of them had blood in them. Off to the ER we went,got asked tons of questions and had to explain that she hadn't had good meals for the last 2 days and that we were moving. They checked her over and realized she was dehydrated. So they gave her fluids and sent us home. Told us that it may take a couple of days but she should be fine and to keep pouring fluid into her and if she got worse to take her to the ped's office. Well we all got the stomach bug shortly after that and things got better.

Fast forward to the last week in 2 weeks in March. Once again we changed her diaper and she had blood in it again. I was able to take the diaper and her to the ped's office and they did samples to test for any bacteria that they could think of. Those test came back a week later negative. Then they sent us to lab to get blood work and test for allergies and anything else they may have missed. Once again we waited and listen to our sweet baby complain of her belly hurting and not knowing what was going on. Well I go the results back yesterday afternoon and it turns out the little stinker is ALLERGIC to MILK.. So we changed her to Soy last night add some chocolate to it and she loves it and tells everyone that it's her special milk.

Jordan has had some exciting stuff as well but nothing like the other two.. She made Junior National Honor Society this year and we are so VERY PROUD of her.. She works her butt of at school and makes great grades with out much effort. She is in all honor classes this year and loves being involved in everything. She is doing volunteer work now and seems to enjoy that. She is getting ready to turn 13 and boy have we noticed that she is almost a teenager.. UGHH the attitude, but all in all she is just a good girl...

Rob and I celebrated our anniversary in March and we were both sick with the some kind of stomach bug. So we didn't do much other then watch TV and sleep. It was perfect.

Rob and Serenity are getting ready for their birthday's this month. He is on the 14th and he will be 38 and Serenity's is on the 17th and she will be 2. He wants a big bowl of banana pudding and Serenity wants either a princess cake or elmo. So we will see what I can pull out of my hat for that one. Maybe do princess crown with little elmo faces as the jewels. Who knows..

That is our update.. Sorry it's a book..

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DR SEUSS!!

Today is my favorites authors birthday. My kids and I will read his books tonight at bedtime and celebrate that way. My son's class is having green eggs and ham for in honor and reading the book.

My favorite book by Dr Seuss is Oh The places you'll go.. It has got to be the greatest motivational book for any kid graduating school. We give that book to everyone we know who is graduating. Here is a link to read it if you have never read the book Oh The places you'll go by Dr. Seuss.