My Birthday

I bet you are all wanting to hear all about it! Well, Jimmy surprised me with a red velvet cake and my favorite chocolate covered caramel marshmallows from Vosges Haute Chocolate. It was delicious!!! The red velvet reminded me of the ones you would get down south, moist cake with creamy not too sweet cream cheese and nut filling...mmmm..yum!

The surprises continued with a babysitter for the kids and dinner at Charlie Trotter's restaurant! Holy cow! I've been wanting to go to that restaurant for over ten years and I finally got to go! Thanks for taking me Jimmy. We had a fabulous eight course meal with extra desserts. I had the non-alcoholic beverage pairings with my meal and it was phenomenal! How clever of them to match vegetable and fruit juices perfectly with every dish! (Now I want a juicer!) The restaurant was comfortable, not too flashy, I felt like I was in someone's home having a lovely dinner with my husband. It did feel a bit awkward at first because we didn't have the children with us, but once the meal started it felt like we were dating again.

The portions appear small, but were perfect in my opinion, because after all the courses (it took three hours for dinner) I was stuffed and amazingly energized! I couldn't go to sleep after we got home, I'm guessing it was the juices and infusions! (I really have to get a juicer!) After the meal, we were given a tour of the restaurant and given a little box of pastries for our 'take-away'. Overall, the food was star and fabulous! The service was a little off and that is all I'm going to say about it right now. I'm still debating weather I should write a letter to Mr. Trotter about my experience since I have been wanting to dine at his restaurant for over a decade! You're suppose to want to go back to a fantastic restaurant like that right? Well, let's just say I would for the phenomenal food but not for the service.

Well, other than the goodies and dinner, Jimmy surprised me with my own photo printer! It's like I have a mini version of those photo printers you see at the photo developers! Yay! No more trips to CVS for me. I had so much fun editing and adding extras to the pictures, I'm all out of ink from printing so much I have to run to Best Buy for more this week.

My best girlfriend sent me a dvd about lattes...he..he.he. She knows me well and I love coffee! She is such a good listener (that's why she's my best girl). I mentioned that I've been wanting the instructional d.v.d. about latte art for some time now and she listened. Just like she did many many many Christmas's ago (before Jimmy) when on my wish list I had asked for practical things like flashlights and tool kits, she was the only one who took it seriously. Really, lotions and potions are great, but I'm a crafter so I love tools of all kinds. Thank you Keilani and I love you girl!

My sister sent me a set of demi spoons and cocktail forks...soo cute, and a sweet book about sisters ^_^ She went through the book and added little comments to personalize it for me. Thanks Viv, I'll keep it forever, and thanks to Gabbie and Lawrence for the cute handmade cards.

My mom made me my favorite goodies and I received a sweet card from my mom and dad in-law. Thank you to all my wonderful parents.

Also, thanks to all of my wonderful friends who wished me a happy birthday. I absolutely had a wonderful one.

I wish you all a wonderful day. Love to all. Hugs and kisses.

Diaper Cake

Jimmy has a co-worker who recently had a baby girl, so I got to make another diaper cake! This time I took a photo. Yea, diapers are a little boring for a gift, but essential! Plus the fun presentation makes it fun to receive, besides the way I make them, there is a little surprise in each layer! The bottom layer has a hand puppet hidden in the center of the cake, the middle layer has onsies, and the top (if it's not too tight) I usually try to add something for the mom like a nursing bracelet or a little picture frame. You could fill the center with endless baby things like travel sized baby toiletries, a baby bottle, bibs, wash clothes, toys, burp clothes and tiny books.

I've researched how much they cost at the store and let me tell you that with everything pictured, it was not even close to the $80 price tag you find at baby boutiques! Plus, the ones you buy from the store is only diapers and whatever it is decorated with. Making them myself is more fun because I can add my little surprises.
The directions on making these can be found by looking up diaper cakes, but since I didn't like the idea of having to individually wrap them with a rubber band I actually lined a cake pan with them. Then used kitchen twine to tie around the diapers to give the cake shape and covered the twine with pretty ribbon. Stack the layers on a cake circle or make your own (a platter would be cute too) insert cake dowels or chopsticks or skewers (whatever you have) in the center to prevent layers from toppling and top with a plushie. Voila your own custom made diaper cake at a fraction of the retail price. These cakes can be further embellished with baby bottles, pacifiers, or silk flowers!

Fun at the museum

I took the kiddos on another play date on Thursday to the Kohl's Children's Museum and they had a blast! It was great, I got in free with the kids thanks to my new friend and the parking was also free because it was out of the city. I loved it so much I'm going to become a member so that we could go often! There was so much to do and it was very clean. We stayed for four hours and still didn't get to do everything! It's not as big as the children's museum in Indianapolis, but so much to do that the kids were happy to play with what was there.

I discovered little Cassia's love for music at the museum. Here favorite rooms were the music room where she was rockin' and dancing, and the water works room where she loved pushing buttons to get the water flowing.

Look at all those teeth!

Kai was a master at the pretend grocery store and spent about an hour playing with the kid sized digger. He wouldn't stop telling me how much he loved me...I take it he loved the museum!




We took a break at the Kim & Scott's pretzel cafe in the museum. I got Kai to twist and decorate his own pretzel. He did an excellent job decorating with marshmallows, sprinkles, chocolate chips and cinnamon.




On the ride home the kids crashed hard while I spent an hour and a half in rainy traffic. By the time I was almost home, Jimmy was clocking out so I went to pick him up from work. Then we all went out to our favorite local pizzeria and had a delicious meal.

Taking the kids out this week has me too busy to tackle my business plan, but Jimmy is off tomorrow so maybe I'll get a few hours in tomorrow.

A new friend

Finally, after complaining endlessly to my husband about not having any friends here, I forced myself to make a mommy friend who also has a three year old boy. Yesterday we had our first 'play date' thing. We took the kids to the zoo and I had a great time! It was different having a new adult friend that is not a coworker. You really have to work hard at trying to keep the conversation going! You don't know anything about this person except that they too have a child. So the work begins of asking the basic questions....oh so tiresome, but necessary. It's not like when you're a kid all you had to do was play, now you actually have to plan things in advance and communicate. The friendship is still so new that you just can't spring outings up with a phone call or just 'pop in' for a chat.

It was the first time for me going to the nearby zoo and I would definitely go again, besides it is free except for the parking, but that's not too bad at $14 for three hours. Kai loved the mini train ride, indoor climbing maze and ice cream. He's not too into the animals yet, just kept saying 'like in my book' every time we see an animal. Cassia had a fun time too, except for when it got too hot and close to nap time.

Tomorrow I might join my new friend and her son at a new children's museum. Today I started on our business plan with the help of Jimmy (dragging me out of bed at sunrise and making me coffee ^_^). I was so motivated a few months back about starting a business and getting things up and running before turning 30, well, that is about a week away and I haven't even finished a business plan. So 42 steps in nine days, lets hope I can accomplish that task. I would feel a sense of some sort of accomplishment.

Write the plan, write the recipes, test the recipes, test the products on people, find a location, find the financing, convince the husband to quit his job to help start business, work endlessly to get shop open, open shop and live happily ever after, or something like that; but first I must write the plan!

So why am I stalling? I'm not fully awake yet. I have writer's block. Kai just woke up....ummm, I haven't updated my blog in a while....hmmm. Out of excuses, ok so back to work I go.

Did I tell you about wanting to start a new blog about my opinions on new products, but someone is already doing that and using the name I wanted to use, but I guess that's what happens when I don't jump on an idea when it occurs......so back to my business plan I go---really.