Anna in Wonderland

welcome to Anna's 3rd birthday party. She is in love with an Alice in Wonderland pop up book given to her as a gift by uncle Peter and Aunt Brooke and so a tea party was in the making.
TICK

TOCK
I made her dress about 1 month early but it was so easy. I got the pattern and material from Etsy and it totally cut out all the preparation time and I could just get straight to sewing it. I love how it turned out. She even wore it to church on sunday.

A tea pot I usually put out at Easter. I put a few removable stickers on it to add some color.
I just used some good old Elmers glue for the eyes. It didn't seem to hurt the flowers and they have stayed beautiful for a long time.
The tea table was set with the awesome melamine cups that I got from Etsy vintage for $12 for a set of 12. I absolutely loved the colors. The paper plates have flamingoes which happen to be in season this year.

I was going to have bakery do all the cupcakes but ended up doing them myself.
Deviled eggs, an array of fresh fruit and tea sandwiches were on the menu.
THere was also some BLT sandwiches. I made them all the night before with a tip from the net that said to spreading them with butter would keep the fillings from making the bread soggy in the fridge overnight. It totally worked. Good tip.

Sitting down for tea. We all drank sherbet with sprite (a wedding classic) for tea and gave a cheers to Anna.

Anna hounded me for 2 hours straight to have a cupcake before the party. she ended up eating 4 of them and licked the icing off of each one before devouring the chocolate cake.

Move down, move down. No room.
We played a little game of musical chairs and the kids watched Alice in wonderland while the grown ups chatted. We did have a game of croquet to play but the weather did not permit it. All in all it was good fun and Anna was the perfect Alice. We're so happy to have a 3 year old girl.

Rainy day cookies

with all the rain lately we have spent a lot of time doing some baking. Chocolate marshmellow cookies with toffe sprinkles were on the dockit today. I call them sugar bombs, but Liam calls them cho cho's.

As

hummmmmmmm......

"Mom, come take a picture of me and Anna"

"Okay"

Mother's Day

I neglected to mention that I had a fabulous Mothers Day, complete with homemade gifts and lot's of loves. This is my card. Sorry Mr. Kinkade, life is not a perfectly quaint and peaceful cottage in the woods.

Happy Birthday!

That is my mom down in front in her Easter best. She looks as curious and thoughtful and playful as she does now.

I love you, mom.

Happy birthday!

Anna had a dance all prepared but opted out when she discovered she could spin on the floor. Ilove that she talks about you like she sees you everyday and that she wanted to make you smile with this card.

This is a funny face to make you laugh on your birthday. The mouth is purposefully off to the right side so it will be funny. She insisted on the red pen and no crayons and was really excited to show you on camera.

Liam's birthday wishes for you.....

If you didn't hear, this is an illustration of 'Hey Diddle Diddle' with a few balloons for your birthday. He worked very patiently and knew just what he thought you would like. This is his favorite nursery rhyme in the Mother Goose book you gave him a few years ago.

Happy Birthday Mom! we love you. Liam and Anna made up that song all on their own by the way. We looked at pictures of you and talked about all the things that we remember about you. Liam said his favorite thing was the visit to the dinosaur museum and Anna said that you had a cute smile at Christmas time.

Cousin visit

Cousin Maren came to visit. She got a tour of Bungie and we went on a stroll to the Lake in Kirkland where we had lunch and fed the ducks.

Liam did a little climbing around on the rocks....

We also went to The Country Village for lunch and some fun play time.

The Pirate ship was a big hit.

Maren gets a ride on the train with the kids.

We couldn't let Maren leave Seattle with out a tour to the underground and visiting the Space Needle.

It was right at sunset and we got to watch the sun go down. We ate seattle fudge on theway home while the kids fell asleep.

The first sprinklers of summer

The first running of the sprinklers was finished off with spongebob icecream from the icecream truck. What a perfect ending to a sunny day.

School performance

Every Thursday Liam goes to Music class. They put on a concert for their parents to show us a little about what they've learned. I have to say I was so impressed with the program and it made me really happy to see a good music teacher in his curriculum. Liam always cracks me up because he gets very serious on stage and tries so hard to get everything right that he starts to forget to sing and just concentrates. Funny Boy. I was really proud of him.

swimming lessons

Anna had her first lesson the other day. She is so comfortable in the water and was chatting away with the teacher and wanted to try everything. She was so excited that she had her swimsuit on 1 hour before lessons and kept trying to go out the door.