Birthday Fun!!

On my birthday, Annabelle decorated a cake for me. It's hard to see in this picture the amount of icing on top but let me reassure you...IT WAS A TON! My dear friend Angela got me a set of icing tips for my birthday along with a cupcake stand, fancy food coloring and a family recipe for homemade frosting. The theme was, 'The tools I would need as a stay at home mom!' From the moment I opened the package Annabelle was excited to use the icing tools for my birthday cake.

Here she is going to town on my cake. What you see here already on the cake times 1,000 is the amount of icing she piled on top!!! AB emptied the tube!

To make sure it was safe after adding the food coloring, Annabelle did a taste test! Birthdays are so much more special when you have a peanut as sweet as mine to spend them with. For my gift from Annabelle I got a pair of the coziest jammy pants EVER and a shirt daddy says she picked out that simply states "I LOVE ME" on the front! I think her daddy may have helped with this one! He believes he's extremely funny... The best part of Annabelle's gift was the card. It was a Cinderella card which sang 'bibbadi bobbadi boo!' and inside it was signed 'AB' by none other than AB! I will treasure it forever... The very first card to me signed my AB.

My lovely husband, along with the input on pj top gave me a gift certificate to Kenneth's Salon! I am very excited to use that for some pampering and fun. He also gave me the sweetest card. I feel very lucky to have shared my birthday with my amazing family.

Speaking of AMAZING! The weekend before our birthday (Liam and I share the same birthday!!!) we were in Maryland celebrating my nephew's 1st birthday! There couldn't be a better birthday buddy! Our visit started with a surprise... LIAM WAS WALKING! When we were down in July he was so very close. It was so much fun to watch him tottle around.

Liam's birthday was Army themed and was it ever so cute! He wore the cutest army get up and had American flags, camo stars and goodie bags, with his pictures all over and a tank cake which his mommy made to perfection! It literally was the cutest 1st birthday cake I've ever seen!!

Family makes everything better! Even birthdays after 30!!!

The Bangs are Staying!

And they had a very very busy day!!! These pictures are from The Taste of UA. It was a fun afternoon, with beautiful weather and lots of fun activities!

I had my camera out and ready today. It's terrible, but since I've started taking pictures for others, I sometimes forget to bring it to document what we're doing as a family. I guess I like to just soak it all in. I also feel that with a camera always out things aren't always as free and easy as they are without it. Today things were free and easy, and I caught a few shots along the way. AB with bangs does keep her more toddler sweet. Most of us agree on that one. From a Mommy's perspective keeping her my little girl-little- for as long as I can is my hearts desire.

As the summer continues I'm really excited to still be -just hangin with AB- and not thinking about how many folders and markers I need to pick up or who has the cheapest glue sticks-

Wal-Mart or Target...

It is faces like this one that makes me so very excited to -just- be AB's Mommy! I can't wait to find this enthusiastic, spunky, spunk on a daily basis!

She's just too much fun and sweeter than candy, which AB will tell you is pretty sweet.

A sweet tooth is something she shares with her Daddy! Here they are nibbling on a funnel cake. Yummy!

Bangs or No Bangs??? That is the question~

So I need some help deciding... Should we grow AB's bangs out or keep them trimmed. They are to the point where something must be done. I am on the fence and seriously can't decide. So here are two pics of AB. One with bangs and one without bangs. I am taking a poll and want your opinion! Thanks for your help!

Grow Garden, Grow!

Annabelle noticed the corn was taller than she was! After weeks of worry that it would all die, I'm cautiously optimistic. Annabelle and I have had a lot of fun this summer digging around in the garden. It's been an adventure. Some things have grown and some have not. It's really a game of trail and error, growing things from a seed. We found out that sunflowers are IMPOSSIBLE in our garden due to the pesty squirrels! We tried to sprout them in a pot and then transfer them... Nothing seemed to work. They would always come and did them up.

We planted everything a lot later than most because are garden needed a lot of TLC before we could even think about putting a seed in the ground. Nick tilled it up and I spent lots of time weeding (in between the rainy spring days we had.) Finally, in June we got our seeds in the ground. We are hoping for a harvest in September. We will see!

It's a good thing the sunflowers didn't take off because our pumpkin plant is taking over!! Mimzey got AB a little kit for planting a pumpkin seed. It came with a tiny little pot and two pumpkin seeds. We planted it late February and put it in the window. It sprouted and started to grow. We moved it into a larger pot and set it on the front porch once the fear of frost was over and then in June we planted it in our garden! Each step made, AB was there helping. I know she'll enjoy seeing a pumpkin grow! Keep your fingers crossed!!!