Have a Wild Birth, Dean!

We're a good team, her and I. Did you know she is a professional clown by the name of "Scrappy?" Or that she is the most wicked face painter I have ever seen? (Seriously.) Or that she was homecoming queen, her high school school mascot (her mother made the Ram costume she used to run around in to entertain the crowds), an Emergency Room nurse for 30 years, a Nurse Practitioner, a quilter, and probably the world's greatest grandma EVER. Love ya, Mom!

My mom and I threw a baby shower for my nephew this Saturday. What fun we had planning! Who knew that I would stress out even more than she does when planning? ;0)

We used a "Where the Wild Things Are" theme and built the party around that. I think everything turned out really well. One thing I was especially proud of was the diaper cake:




And the blue and green tissue paper poms (marthastewart.com):



For the guest book we bought a hardcover book and had people sign the inside white pages with a note to Dean. They can keep this forever! I still have the hardcover book from my own childhood!

And then I saw this awesome picture on flickr of these cute little puppets out of toilet paper rolls!

The boat was $1 at Michael's. I just used the paints it came with and added the flag on top and painted Dean's name...

Party favors were blue organza bags with peanut m&m's and pails with shovels. Although, it was raining so nobody got to use the sandbox outside! Oh well!

Party was held at the clubhouse in my mom's condo association. We added the blue tablecloths and centerpieces were flowers from Costco inside short rectangular glass vases.

Have I told you how much I LOVE these poms??

Diaper cake says, "Wild Thing."



Guests of honor (with my son, Brandon) Shelly & Derek...

Cute couple!


The cake was from Costco and we added a cake topper we found on ebay:



Everyone loved playing with Kendalls toys at the party. Kendall enjoyed practicing her (assisted) walking skills...

My good friend, Anna. Friends since junior high school! We won't talk about how long ago that was...


My nephew, Chris. So handsome and such a great guy. I just love this kid!

My dad and Brandon, giving each other an evil look. The competition for those baby bottle necklaces (you can see each of them have some around their necks) was cut-throat!

Here is Brandon at a happier moment when he had a lot of necklaces...

My lovely niece, Eden, showing off her collection of necklaces! I just love this girl, too! She was such a help at the shower. What would I have done without her?

Kendall had a good time!


Shelly is so cute!! (Chris, get out of the picture! LOL)

Opening some of their loot...

Don't you love pregnant women!! They are so adorable!


The end. What fun we had celebrating the impending arrival of Baby Dean! And as his balloons said, "Have a Wild Birth, Dean!" ;0)

Look out, ladies-this Guy knows how to cook!

First let me start by saying that sometimes it is very hard to get dinner cooked unless the littlest member of the family is occupied...


And sometimes the only thing that will occupy her is something very yummy and very messy...

Something that she can smear all over her face, her hair, and her highchair...

Mmmmm...that's good!

Meanwhile...
Brandon is helping me cook dinner. He is very happy to be helping. And I am beyond happy to have the help. I am all set to pass the dinner-making torch on to him, haha!

There was, however, one thing that he wasn't too thrilled about...

Can you guess what it is?

My oldest gives a huge thumbs-down to the peas in the food he is helping to cook! He is at the age where he doesn't like most veggies. At least, those veggies that I cook. What can you do, right? I can't understand why when his Vegan aunt (Hi, Aunt Kat!) visits and cooks all sorts of wonderful, healthy vegan food, he happily eats it! He LOVES her cooking!

Maybe I really stink at cooking veggies... :(

His sister, however, absolutely couldn't get enough of the steamed peas I put on her plate!

She literally ate about 1/2 cup of them. Let's hope she continues to be this good at eating healthy!

Finally, I couldn't resist taking some pictures of the gorgeous cherry blossoms on our neighbor's tree. They peek right over our fence and make the most beautiful backyard scenery. I know how awful my point-and-shoot camera is, but even so I had to try and capture the beauty of nature! (I really hope to get a better camera sometime this year).

Don King called...he wants his hair back.

Let's start with the "after" picture. Here is Kendall after a healthy dose of Geri-curl was applied to her hair (just kidding. It's water).

Wanna see the before pictures ?? (**note to teen Kendall. Your mom loves you, please don't hate me for posting these...)


"Is that a stuffed animal on my forehead?"

"Maybe I can blow it off my face. Ptftftftf..."

Hahaha! I love Kendalls hair, but sometimes it is just kah-ra-zee! She really likes to sleep with her head wedged against the crib bumper, and when she wakes up from her nap it looks like a stuffed animal exploded on her head.

On another note, here are some pics from my friend Amy's little boys bday party last weekend. It was so much fun to see how little Jason has grown. He is absolutely a gorgeous little boy! The kids aren't yet at the age where they are playing with each other so much as playing near each other, but Kendall had a blast playing with all of Jason's toys!

Amy made that cute little hat he's wearing!


Birthday boy Jason with his gorgeous mama, Amy (a very talented photographer, I might add!) Could you just die for those blue eyes?!

Kendall, scoping out the toy scene...

Grandma and Kendall. She is wearing a dress and hairbow made by me!


And finally, BabyDaddy has been gone for 5 days...he comes back tonight and I cannot wait! It's funny how you don't fully appreciate someone until they are gone sometimes. I have been reminded over the past days how much I rely on Chris for moral, emotional, and physical support. Raising kids isn't easy, and it sure helps to have a team-mate.


And he is a great team-mate. Love you, honey!

Aaaaaand, she walks. Kind of.

I still haven't gotten my camera back from my friend, so I have no images to go along with this post, but...

Tonight whilest Gammy (my mom) and I were playing with Kendall, she took a step on her own. One step. Yeesh, she is growing extremely fast. She just recently started standing for short periods of time on her own, and she's already ready to venture taking a step? Wow. Go, girl!

On another (freaky) note, I was just skimming my favorite internet gossip site (Perezhilton.com) and came a cross a story about Deadliest Catch's Captain Phil Harris' (RIP) son getting a DUI recently. I look up from my laptop and immediately see his son on the TV- I happened to be watching Deadliest Catch right at that moment. Weird. The show rox, though, don't it?
Son Of emDeadliest Catch/em Star Crashes Car While Intoxicated

On a side note: I love it when the D.C. Narrator says, "Greenhorn." As in, "the greenhorn almost lost his leg," or, "the Captain couldn't resist messing with the Greenhorn."

That would be a great drinking game (for those into that sort of thing). Every time they say greenhorn you have to take a drink. Let me know if any of you try this. :D

Aaaaaand, she stands.

I was laying on the floor. I like to lay on the floor in her room while she plays, especially in the wee early morning hours. She was hovering over me, holding on, alternating giving me hickeys and blowing raspberries on my arm. Then. She stood up and let go. She stood there. By herself. For about 5 seconds (I may be exaggerating by a few seconds here).

We looked at each other. What was that? What just happened? We were both thinking the same thing (yes, I can read her mind).

"Gah!" Exclamation of wonder, surprise, joy... Gah, indeed. She stood. She stood! Pretty soon she will be off to college.

She stands. February 17, 2010.

My Husband- the Baby Whisperer

That is one seriously lethargic baby. I have never seen her so out of it. That blank stare. Those limp limbs. How did this happen?

Oh yeah. The baby whisperer was carrying her!

That is Chris '(aka BabyDaddy) new nickname. So given for his unmatchable ability to put babies (well, this baby at least) into an advanced state of lethargy the likes of which nobody else I know can (without a bottle or boob).

She had just woken up from a nap when the Baby Whisperer got ahold of her and began working his magic...

Man, doesn't she look comfortable? Move over, Kendall and give Mommy a try!

On another note, I have been frantically sewing around here, trying my hand at various things with the help of some awesome tutorials found on some really great blogs. For instance, I have been enamored with some vintage retro roackabilly aprons I have been seeing online here.
Here is my apron made with help from this tutorial over at lululollylegs
and another random message board that I stupidly forgot to bookmark.

So retro. Doncha love the ric rac?? It makes me feel like baking. Or cooking dinner. Or pouring a martini.

Mostly the martini thing.

Either way, cooking is much more fun with this new apron!

Does evil (not pure evil) run in our family?

Can I just say that now that I have had two kids I only seem to gain weight in my muffin-top? Why is that? I lose weight, my muffin top shrinks. Gain it, and I am suddenly the Pillsbury dough boy around my love handles. Makes wearing form-fitting tops extra sexy. ;0)

OK, thanks for letting me get that off my chest...er...sides.



Hey! It's not funny! It's your fault, you know!

Evil baby.

Now we know where she gets it from.




Don't worry- when I say evil, I don't mean "pure evil."

Alright, down to business...

First I would like to start by showing you all what I have been dealing with...Kendall is crawling and pulling up. She is getting really good at it. The other night when I went in her room to check on her, she heard me! Her little head whipped around, I hit the floor like a ninja, but then she crawled over to the side of the bed and pulled herself up faster than I could say, "DangitwhydidIcomeinhere!" So there I am, on the floor, and there she is looking at me from over her crib rails like, what the h#ll are you doing, freak?

Oh, you know...just crawling around on your floor while you sleep, apparently.

I know, this kid should be scared that she is related to me, right?

Anyhow, here are some pictures demonstrating her ever-sharpening skills of pulling up:















































She looks like she is ready to take a leap of faith and try to walk! Noooo! You are SO not ready for that. I am so not ready for that!

Time to confine her and save my sanity for the day...lunchtime!





Ah yes, lunchtime. And a new bib!

I just can't stop making bibs. Two of my favorite fabrics went into this one. And I am now in love with bias tape. I will never make another bib without bias tape- it just looks so...classy! And we take all the classy we can get around here.


Hee-hee- She just has such a sassy expression on her face.





Pears and cereal- oh, yeah!











And because I am evil (not pure evil, so don't worry), I couldn't resist giving her some mandarin oranges in her Nibbler just to watch her mouth pucker.

The Nibbler (in case you are out of the loop, lol) is a mesh feeding device whereby babies can chew on and suck the nutrients out of fruits and veggies without fear of choking. Great idea, right? Hardest thing in the world to clean, especially after bananas.

Anyways, enjoy the video of Kendall (not) enjoying her oranges. Yeah, she wasn't too big a fan. And please, try not to be jealous of my fashionable dirty-robe ensemble. Stay classy, Aly!

A votre sante!