My teenager, 14 times around the sun.

Sophie turned 14 last Friday. Holy smokes!! I feel it wasn't too long ago I was her age. I am thankful for this blog because I can go back through the years and see her grow up all over again. I miss my little Sophie sometimes because childhood is so precious and they grow up so darn fast. But now that she is a teenager we can do fun things together and spending time with her is like spending time with a friend. Time really does fly, as any parent of grown children already know, hold them tight and cherish every age, they are all precious.

Three times around the sun!

Nalah is turning three today. She is a little ray of sunshine and I can't imagine my world without her.

We will be celebrating her Birthday as a family today and then having a bigger party with friends on Sunday. I went a little overboard with decorating this year. Including sewing a giant Jellyfish. I look forward to sharing her party pictures.

Two was so much fun and I will miss it. I wish I could pause her and keep her little and sweet forever. She is my last child and I am sentimental. I am not pushing her to grow up quickly, I am savoring every last bit of little kid hood. She is so special, I am one lucky Mama.

The annual sidewalk cake, a family tradition that started with Sophie. There have many sidewalk cake posts on this blog. Our cat Milo used to roll around in the chalk and turn his white fur rainbow colored, these days he is happy with making little rainbow kitty footprints.

A Belated Birthday Post

Where does a rockhound Pisces go for her Birthday? 

One guess.

My Birthday presents from the Ocean.

We had amazing weather this year.

Nothing like being barefoot on a beach for my Birthday in February!!

Papa's Beach Birthday

 

We went to the coast last weekend for Papa's Birthday. It was one of the most beautiful days I have ever seen at the ocean. Simply stunning, take your breath away kind of beautiful. Best part was we had Nana there to share it with too.

Six times around the sun(continued)....

 This was the best I could do trying to write Solomon backwards ;)

Solomon had a fun day involving doughnuts for breakfast, a trip to the Science Museum, birthday cake and a firework show. He is having a Birthday party at the Arcade with friends from school this weekend. This is the first year we didn't host a party at home for him. I am usually frantically crafting and cleaning the entire week after Christmas trying to get ready for it, it was so calm and relaxing this year! He even decorated his own cake which was quite the change (see his past cakes here, and here and here.)Since he was a holiday baby his parties began as a New Year's pot luck sort of gathering with our adult friends. This year most of his buddies were out of town for the day of his actual birthday so we switched it up a bit. He was okay with that, now that he gets two parties out of it! I am a little sad that maybe he has outgrown the house parties, but it is a lot less work his Mama, and it wont matter a bit how messy my house is the day of his party. Hurray for that!

My beautiful boy, six times around the sun!

 

Sweet Solomon,your not my first child so I know all too well how fast times goes. Every milestone has been a bit bittersweet for your Mama because I don't want you to grow up too fast. You are an ever curious, compassionate, funny, thoughtful and creative little boy.These day you love to build forts of all kinds and write little notes(a new skill picked up in Kindergarten).
Every New Year you give me something wonderful to celebrate! I love you more than you will ever know, your happy personality lights up my world.
Six is going to be awesome!

Still waiting....

Well my due date has come and gone and I am still here waiting for baby. Yesterday was my Birthday and I was really hoping I would be holding our baby in my arms by then. I am getting very tired emotionally and physically, although I prepared myself for another past due baby just in case, but it is still kind of hard. My days have been packed with lots of walking and pineapple and knitting baby socks while watching Downton Abbey.
Send me laboring vibes today!
Please come soon baby we are so eager to meet you!


My Midwife Joy drew this on my belly during our appointment this week. Baby looks tatooed with the henna underneath :) Fun! My February sun baby!


A little Birthday hike with my boys :)


Sweet Birthday gifts...and sunshine.

Homemade Monkey Birthday!

Solomon has always picked his Birthday cake every year. This year he said monkey and I went a little nuts with the monkey theme. I found a monkey finger puppet pattern on Ravelry and decided to make monkey puppets and masks for Solomon and his buddies. Although it turns out only half the kids showed up for the party so I could have saved myself a lot of time had I known, lesson learned.

So not only did we have monkey cake we had monkey puppets, monkey masks, monkey paper chains, monkey balloon animals and by the time it came to make monkey face shaped pizzas I was just too tired, and the kids could have really cared less about the shape of their pizza. I think they were more focused on the monkey cake.

My sweet little monkey loving 4 year old was quite the happy boy!

Lellow choc-lick duck cake

(Got to try out the frosting)

(although he looks disgusted in this photo, I assure you,he thoroughly enjoyed his cake)

When I asked Solomon what kind of cake he wanted for his Birthday, he though about it for a little while and said,"Lellow, is my favorite......a Lellow Duck Cake!". The I asked him what flavor and he rolled his eyes and said "Choc-lick" like, duh, mama, do you really need to ask.
So I looked around on-line and found this one. Ours is based off of it's design, but with marshmallow, and chocolate chip eyes and we added little feet using the little orange candies that they suggested for the mouth.
We served Sollie the head which was a separate tiny cake. I am all about healthy eating choices for my kids most of the time with the exception of the Birthday cake, we tend to forget about healthy choices for fun, sugary ones. It was hard to top last years dragon cake but this year was special because Solomon came up with the idea himself.
I look forward to sharing more birthday photos, just though this funny duck deserved his own post.

Three times around the sun....

Happy Birthday to my sweet boy! WE love you so so much! Thank you for coming into my life, you bring me sunshine every day with your happy little face!

9 times around the sun...

Happy Birthday to a wonderful, not-so-little girl!

Birthday trip (warning photo overload!)

We spent the weekend on the coast for a little early birthday celebration. Ben is stuck doing jury duty today(my actual b-day).There was a special treasure hunt going on, glass sand dollars were hidden on the beach. We didn't find any but Sophie and I gave it a good shot(there was quite a bit of competition. We walked ...and walked, and walked, and we couldn't have had better weather. Sunshine is the best treasure for us Oregonians in my opinion...... and we found a lot of that.

Solomon was happy with the room, or at least happy to get out of the car.

A little bit of knitting was done...

Now that is a piece of driftwood!


Sophie enjoying the sand with bare toes.Sidewalk art...

Waiting for dinner at Humble Pie pizzeria.

More sidewalk art...(sollie calls them "Mangoes")


a beach dwelling?...

Searching for hidden treasure ...

Yes, barefoot in February!

Effortless kite flying weather!

P.S. I got a camera too! case you didn't notice...he..he