Princess For a Day

Brinley has been talking about her birthday party for the past six months.  She wanted a princess party then she wanted a tinker bell party so... we threw her a fairy tale party.

 

Crowns and jewels were a must!

 

 

 

I absolutely LOVE these pictures of Brinley.  Look how happy she is.  There is no greater joy in life than seeing your children this happy.

 

 Ok, she doesn't look so happy in this next picture, but she sure does make a cute little princess.  I didn't realize until the day before her birthday that she thought a "real princess" was going to be at her party.  I had to explain to her that she got to be the princess at the party and she said, "No mom I want a real princess, one with those crown things."

 

 

 

The kids had so much fun with the pinata.  When I bought it I didn't think about hanging it or having something to hit it with so we had to get creative and Dustin tied a roap to it and held it from the roof.  Then he created our own candy machine by dropping candy down the rain gutter to the kids. 

 

They all had a blast!  Can't believe my baby is three.

 

 

Happy Birthday little princess!

Brinley's First Job

The cutest Lemonade Stand EVER is officially open for business.

Brinley is having a Lemonade Stand this summer.  She sells lemonade and baked goods.  As you can see, this is not your ordinary Lemonade Stand.  She has honestly put so much work into this.  We have spent weeks and weeks planning and preparing for this.  She has been measuring ingredients, setting the timer on the over, freezing ice cubes, making signs and even helped her dad make her very own Lemonade Stand.

 

 

She has had two successful Lemonade Stands so far.  She sent a letter to all of her family inviting them to the first one.  Everyone was so supportive of her!  It ended up being a cold day and even started to rain, but she was so excited and had put so much work into this that we just had to have it and we knew that our family would be here rain or shine.  What we didn't know was that other people would be interested on such a gloomy day.  She sold out in less than an hour and some of the family she had invited missed out because she had to close earlier than planned.  My mom brought back everything she had purchased so Brinley could re-sell it.  Thanks everyone for supporting her. 

 

 

She had so much fun and did such a great job!  We do need to work on her customer service a little bit (ha ha)  and maybe a little less eating on the job.

 

Overall everything turned out pretty good

 

And it looks like her customers are enjoying her products.

The money she makes just goes into her savings account and will help pay for her college years from now.  She has already learned some valuable lessons from this.  Thanks again for supporting her. 

Karate Kid and Did that really just happen?

Brax invited Brinley to go to karate with him for buddy week. It was a little bit over her head, but they had so much fun together.

 

 

We went to leave and my car wouldn’t start. I just thought, you have got to be kidding me.

Let me bring you up to date on our car situation. We have 2 cars, one is ok and the other one is far less than ok. It’s pretty much where we donate all of our money to.  It’s not even worth anything. We have had nothing but problems with this car. Luckily I married someone that knows a lot about cars (obviously not too much or we wouldn’t have bought the car – just kidding), but he is always fixing something. In the short time we have owned it we have fixed a window, control arm bushings, strut mount, tirod ends, the ignition, the starter, replaced a battery, bought new tires and got an alignment… twice… yes, on the same car… in a three moth period. And then there is all the stuff that still needs to be fixed. And then there have been a few repairs to the ok car, the one that I drive.

So… it feels like we have spent most of the year with one car. Back to my story… Dustin took most of the day off of work just the day before so he could fix our ‘piece’ car. It still has problems, but it was at least drivable. So, when our good car wouldn’t start I of course called him. And he of course said he would be right there. Good thing he had gotten our other car fixed just the day before. My sister said she would wait and make sure everything was ok, but I assured her it would be. My husband knows cars and he would be here to pick us up in a minute so I assured her it was fine for her to leave.

Dustin arrived and tried to jump start the car, but it didn’t work. We moved Brinley’s car seat and all the other junk that goes along with having a baby into our ‘piece’ car. I had somewhere to be so Dustin said he would drop me off, but I just told him he could take us home and I would cancel what I had going so he could work on the car. He was pretty sure it was just that battery, but we had decided we bought a new battery 3 years ago. Aren’t they supposed to last longer than that?

After we had transferred all of our junk into the other car, we got in, buckled Brinley and… nothing. The car wouldn’t start.. the first time, but then it started and we were on our way and we pulled out onto the highway and made it to the middle of the road and that’s when it quit. Not only did it quit, but he electric locks wouldn’t work. We were locked in the car, in the middle of the road, cars were piling up behind us getting frustrated at us (like we were just sitting there for fun) and Brinley kept saying, “I have to go potty, I have to go potty” so I took her clothes off of her and helped her put a pull-up on so she could go potty. Dustin had his window down enough that he was able to crawl out. Not sure what he did, but he was able to get the car unlocked so Brinley and I could get out. We drug her car seat across traffic, scrounged up enough change to buy her a snow cone (we never carry cash) and she sat in her car seat in the parking lot to eat it.

Called someone to tow the car that was sitting in the middle of the road and called Dustin’s dad to help rescue us and the other car. A few hours, one battery and some cuss words later we are back to being our happy little one car family.

I would have gladly went car shopping that night...if I had a way to get there.

It's a Hard Knock Life

When Dustin and I were in Hawaii Brinley fell in love with the movie Annie, so my sister let her borrow it. Brinley can’t entertain herself for more than two seconds so I usually let her choose a movie to watch while I do my hair. She has been picking Annie every time. She has watched it so much that she now calls me Miss Hannigan. I asked her if Miss Hannigan was nice or mean and she said, “she’s mean.” And sometime when we are in the most random places she will break out in song and start singing, “The sun will come out tomorrow...” I was trying to sing it with her the other day, but apparently I don’t know it very well since she usually just watches bits and pieces while I’m getting ready, but when I was singing with her she said, “Mom, you forgot to sing stick out your chin.”  What????

A Memorial Weekend to Remember

We really wanted to do something fun with Brinley over Memorial weekend.  So, we planned on going to Salt Lake, eating at the Cheesecake Factory, staying in a hotel, shopping and doing some fun things with Brinley.  We left Friday night and made a few unplanned stops along the way.  For some reason Brinley kept saying she had to go potty, but when we stopped she would just throw a fit and say she was going to wait until we got home.  Then she would beg for a treat.  She loves treats!  I finally decided this was her way of getting out of her car seat and maybe she did think if she got us into the gas station we would buy her a treat.  She pretty much cried and threw fits most of the way to Salt Lake.

When we finally made it to the Cheesecake Factory they had a 45 minute wait.  We decided to walk down to Carter's while we waited.  We bought Brinley some new clothes and let her pick out a pair of Pajamas.  Then we walked back to the Cheesecake Factory to wait for our table.  Brinley was especially grumpy  and kept wanting to be held.  I could only assume she was starving since she didn't eat any lunch (Our crazy day is a whole different story).  She wanted me to hold her then she wanted Dustin to hold her and she wanted her baby out of the car so, I walked to the car to get her baby.  Dustin was holding her and talking to her and all of the sudden she puked all over him!  And it didn't stop.  It just kept coming and coming.  He was covered and she was covered.  You would think someone would offer to help.  I didn't expect them to clean it up or anything, but maybe run to the bathroom and grab some paper towels, but no one offered to help so I went to the bathroom and grabbed a stack of paper towels.  Dustin did so great!  I first tried to help him since it was all over his face and even in his mouth.  He said, "Don't worry about me, just get her."  Needless to say, we didn't end up eating at the Cheesecake Factory.  Both Brinley and Dustin had to strip their first layer of clothes and we headed back to the hotel to change.

I felt horrible.  Why didn't I know that my baby was sick?  This explains why she was not acting like herself.  I felt so bad for getting frustrated over all the fits and stops earlier.  I had asked her if she felt sick and she said no, but this was the first time Brinley had ever thrown up so she didn't know what was going on.

We got to the hotel, so embarrassed that we all smelt like puke and were half undressed.  We gave Brinley a bath then had to rinse the clothes out in the sink.  Not fun, but what else do you do?

Brinley was feeling much better and it's a good thing we bought her some new clothes.  She was so excited to wear them.  Meanwhile, we still haven't had dinner or even lunch so we are all hungry so we decide to go get some dinner. 

 

We couldn't find any restaurants near out hotel so we finally ended up eating at Wendy's at about 9:00.  We wanted to hurry and eat because we promised this little girl swimming and she was already getting exhausted.

After dinner we swam for a while and Brinley had a blast, we all did.

 

 

We finally got her to bed at about 11:30

 

She was so happy to be wearing her new jammies. 

Unfortunately, the story doesn't end there.  We woke up at 1:30 in the morning to... you guessed it, more puking.  And the worst part was, Brinley cried and cried because she couldn't wear her new jammies.  So, we rinsed out more clothes and all the bedding and put Brinley in bed with us.  She threw up again, but this time managed to get it in the garbage can.  We seriously contemplated taking her home, but what is worse, a sick baby in a hotel room or a sick baby in a car?  We decided to stay, but didn't sleep at all.  Every time she moved we prepared ourselves for the worst. 

We just headed home the next morning.  We didn't want to be hauling her around Salt Lake and we didn't know if she was really feeling better or not so we just went home.  I laughed about it, a lot.  Every time I pictured Dustin's face covered in puke I would just laugh and laugh. 

Here we are one week later and she just puked on me the other day.  Serves me right for laughing huh?

Bread Anyone?

My birthday was on Mother’s Day this year and although I have had my eye on a new Bosch AND a wheat grinder for YEARS, they are pretty pricey so I told Dustin I not to buy them for me. So… he bought me both of them. I felt guilty for receiving such a expensive gifts so I set a goal to make 1,000 loaves of bread (or dozens of rolls) by the time I turn 30. This way I can ensure to get my (Dustin’s) money worth.  Loaves 1-6... check.   Anyone have any good bread recipes?