Riley's Bake Shoppe

For Riley's 9th birthday party, she decided she wanted to do a cake decorating party. I had SO much fun working on it and getting it together. She invited about 8 girls. They all showed up except for one. I got them all little chefs hats and aprons (although they were a little small). But they liked them anyway. I used my cricut and put their names on their hats...

 and then we used cupcake liners to make little flowers to glue onto their chefs hats. They had so much fun making those, they decided to make one for their apron's too.



 After we decorated our hats/apron's it was time to decorate the cakes. I went ahead and make the cakes ahead of time so they would be cooled and frosted with a crumb coat. I made about 4 different colors for each girl to use.

I think they did a great job:) And I have to say, I LOVE the little banners I made for each child with their names on it. They put it on their cakes after they were done.

I found this AWESOME Pink-Raspberry Lemonade on line. It was SO good. I got ordered these cute retro straws from a Etsy shop and decorated the jars after this website.

And here is my new FAVORITE Chocolate Cake. Have I told you how much I love the Pioneer Woman???



After cake and ice cream we did presents. Riley got spoiled!!!

And of course I had to get pictures of Riley with each of the girls!

Lilli and Riley

Riley and Lauren



Riley and Ashlee

Riley and Samantha

Riley and Emma

Ashlynne and Riley

Samantha and Riley being silly

After everybody left, Samantha and Lauren stayed . We had planned for Samantha to stay for a sleepover and then we ended up having Lauren and Lilli stay for a sleepover too. 

At bed time, they went downstairs to the play room and got their "beds" together and watched "Bedtime Stories". They had a blast.

In the morning, we decided to stay home from church and terry went ahead and made breakfast (pancakes and sausage) for the girls.

I think (or hope) they all had a great time. 

I can't wait to see what we will be doing NEXT YEAR for her birthday!!!

This is the website where I got most of my ideas. I LOVE GOOGLE:)

Gone Bowling...

So Friday was our last "official" day of Spring Break and I had to make it a good one. Thursday we stayed at home but the Fontana kids all came over to play, so that was a pretty good day for the kids. They got to play together and Mari and I got to work on a birthday party for Donovan. I think we got a lot done.
So today we decided to go bowling.They were so excited. We met Mrs. Stacey Strock and her son Jonathan there too. Jesse and Jonathan were in kindergarten together but now he is at a different school. I am not sure if they really remembered each other. But they had fun together anyway.

Go Mrs. Stacey!!!!

Another gutter ball!!!

Both Riley and Joel kept fighting over who was going to help Josiah. We have such little helpers:)

I guess this time around it was Joel's turn:)

I think you got it, Mrs. Stacey:)

YES???

AW MAN, ONE LEFT STANDING!!!

I LOVE Jonathan's form..

Just throw it up in the air and it will hit something!!!

I love this little man:)

And these two also:)

 And this little girl:)

The Bowling Team

Our Final Scores. Jonathan and I were the BIG winners with 100 points!!!

Thanks Mrs.Strock and Jonathan for joining us. I hope we can do it again really soon.

Spring Break...Day Number 3

OK, Monday was Strawberry picking and playing at Gibson Pond Park. Tuesday we got to take our neighbor to her doctor's appointment:) and watch a movie in the afternoon at home. Wednesday was another big day...we went to the zoo. Since we just got our membership renewed we thought it would be fun to go-and we had to pick up our membership card at the zoo. So we met some friends from church, Leigh and her boys Luke and Colt and Holly and her 2 year old daughter, Ross. Holly has her own blog, "The Life as a Thrifter" blog. Holly is one amazing lady. So crafty, so thrifty and an awesome mom. I have to say, Ross is one of the most adorable little girls I have ever seen (besides Riley, of course). 

Joel was the official photographer at the zoo today. He took some very good pictures. Here are the Kangaroo's hanging out in the grass and enjoying a beautiful day in South Carolina.

The elephants were all hanging out in one spot. And one of them was really close. The kids were so excited to see them up close. I mean, we could see the eyelashes of the elephants:)

They just opened this new exhibit called "Sky High Safari". Joel was dying to do it but we had to say no this time. There were so many people there and the line was pretty long too AND of course it cost more money and I didn't bring my wallet. So we walked passed it and walked to the giraffes. That is always fun because they got to feed them.

This is Holly and Ross. They are both so cute. Ross is such a girly-girl...very cute:)

We had to get a group picture (minus Joel).

And then of course when we got to the barn, everybody had to milk the cow again. I think its so funny how this wooden cut-out always is the BIG hit for our kids at the zoo:) and evidently Leigh's kids too:)

Leigh also has a pass to get the free train rides. So the kids had a blast with that. Of course Josiah and Luke got into one car. Colt went into another one. And Riley, Jesse and Ross stock together in another car. Riley was the "care taker" of Ross. She did an awesome job. She is going to be a wonderful mommy one day.

Finally, while the little kids were playing on the playground, the big kids (Joel, Riley and Jesse) got to climb the "wall". Joel loves doing this. I think he got up that wall in about 30 seconds. And then slid down even faster.

Both Riley and Jesse are good at it too. They are just not very excited about going all the way to the top. So they stayed pretty close to the ground. But they still had fun:)

Another Group picture (with Joel but without Ross). Although Joel got kicked in the head by JoJo. (This is the reason for Joel's funny face).

We (Leigh and I) were ready to go home but the kids really wanted to go see the pinguins and the snake and fish aquarium. There were SO many people there. And if you have been to this zoo, you know what I'm talking about. These rooms are crazy. So we told the kids to grab a buddy and stay with them. Jesse got Colt (which worked awesome!!! They have the same personallity.

Riley and Luke were partners. Evidently loves girls:) so that was the perfect match too. And Riley likes to be the "mommy" so that worked for her too. She would take him to the different exibits and read that the little plaques said. I think she will be a great teacher one day:)

And then Joel had Josiah. Those two have become pretty close over the past few months. Joel is very protective of his little brother. Its really nice to see.

I had to include this picture..although you can't see it as good. Its a snake with a VERY big belly. I think they must have fed him earlier that morning and we are thinking it might have been a bunny or something like that.

And Finally... the picture I ALWAYS have to take when we are at the zoo. The kids standing befind the fish tank and pretending to be swimming with the fishes. I think the first time Terry did this, was BEFORE Joel was born. He would do it when we were at the zoo with Christopher and Emily.

 I'm so glad we have memories like this:)