Reliving My Childhood

I never had an Easy-Bake Oven as a kid but I always wanted one. Lorelai got one from Santa last year, but she hasn't gotten around to cooking anything with it until recently. We decided on S'mores.

This year is the 45th anniversary of the Easy-Bake Oven and with her retro outfit it almost looks like she could be in an ad for the original.

The chef, preparing the ingredients for the oven's debut.


Putting the cookies in the oven. (I love Miller's expression in this one.)

Checking on her progress.

I'm sad to say I have no pictures to show for all of our efforts. As I stated previously, I never had an Easy-Bake Oven so I had no idea how long one little dessert would take to make. She lost interest after the first cookie started baking. I guess that's because she's used to putting normal baked goods into the oven and letting them bake and going back for them later while with these you have to change them out every 8 minutes and you have to let the ones that just baked sit in the colling chamber for 10 minutes. (It's quite a sophisticated science!) Anyway, by the time they were all finished she had forgotten about them so we didn't bother finishing them. Maybe next time we'll make something less complicated!!

Better Belated Than Never

My birthday was a month ago, but I never posted pictures and I'm not quite sure why I never got around to it. I didn't really have much of a celebration, but the pictures are cute anyway, so here goes.

The "party" basically consisted of my mom, the kids, and me going to Johnny Rockets for lunch. It was pretty tough to get them to sit still with the music playing non-stop, so I just let them dance to the jukebox until lunch arrived.

Chic Chapeaus

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a sucker for hats, so I couldn't help dedicating an entire post to them.

Since our blond-haired, blue-eyed boy is so sensitive to the sun, Ma CJ and I thought it was pretty imperative for him to have a hat since he was going to be spending two weeks at the beach.

Of course his sister, who gets a tan almost instantly when she steps out into the sun, just had to have one too.

While we were down at The Harborwalk for Miller's birthday, there was a live band playing and as soon as Lorelai heard the music playing she just had to go dance. The band had a trunk of random props for the audience to rifle through and Lorelai was immediately drawn to this very ostentatious hat.

One of the crafts "Aunt Lucy" planned was making crowns.


Bella was kind enough to loan hers to Miller so he would have one to model. Sadly, I think one of the monkeys fell off during the exchange.



Miller and Lorelai wore these wedge caps when we celebrated my birthday at Johnny Rockets.

Miller's Birthday at The Harborwalk

This year we were in Florida for Miller's 2nd birthday. We went down to The Harborwalk to have dinner with my parents, Caroline & Bella, and their special friend, Jeannette. It was a small, intimate gathering but it was the perfect way to celebrate the very special little man that God has blessed us with. Happy Birthday, Miller Man ~ We love you!!

The handsome birthday boy.



Those crazy girls showing their inner wild sides.

Time to blow out the candles.

The restaurant provided this sweet treat ~ a brownie covered in a giant scoop of ice cream and whipped cream, complete with its own decorations.

This cake was great because it had a nice beachy feel to it.

While the cake decorator was putting Miller's name on his cake, I saw this adorable cupcake in the display case. She overheard me saying that I wish I had seen it earlier because it would have been perfect for Miller. She gave it to us free of charge.

Miller started to dive into the Nemo cake, but decided he didn't like it.

Lorelai devoured the Nemo cupcake ~ or at least all of the icing off of it.


Bella ate the brownie swimming in ice cream.

After a taste test or two Miller finally decided the chocolate cake was a keeper!

Sweet Sensations

After pizza it was time to make dessert. Yesuly made the cupcake batter and once the cupcakes had cooked and cooled we let the kids decorate them with all kinds of sprinkles, flowers, and even Princess crowns!



Miller wasn't really interested in decorating the cupcakes, but he sure did enjoy eating them.





Time to dig in ~ YUM!!!


Their colorful confectionary creations.

When the Moon Hits Your Eye

Our first culinary activity was making pizza ~ including dough from scratch. Way to go, Aunt Lucy!!



While in Florida, Lorelai discovered her nowfound love for pepperoni and she just couldn't stop eating them!!!