Lily turns 4 – the last part of the day

For the last part of Lily’s birthday we did do something very slightly Christmasy. Well maybe more wintery with a slight Christmas bend to it. Anyway we went to the Boise Botanical Garden Winter Garden aGlow event. I had seen a few commercials for this event last year, but didn’t even know where the Botanical Garden was so we didn’t go. I also saw the little brochure they sent us and it had a few nice pictures on it. Between these two things we decided it would be fun and we were so right. I could never have imagined what we would find and we were so happy with it all. My pictures will not do this wonderland any kind of justice, but I had to share them.

Almost every available surface had lights on them.

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

They had a awesome toy train display setup. We went once and then again before we left. Lil loved it.

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

We were freezing our butts off. They had fires in cans setup all over the place, it was a very welcome addition. They also had Santa that you could take pictures with, but Lil totally has no interest in taking a picture with a strange man. Even better than Santa, they had a real live reindeer. That was pretty cool.

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

After hanging out with Dancer for a bit we decided it was time to leave. I grabbed a few more shots before we headed to the trains and then our car.

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

At one point we ran into a Garden employee and she informed us it take something like 6 of them working 40 hour weeks from September to November, plus a few volunteers to get all of the lights set up. I say it was worth it.

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

4th Birthday at the Idaho Botanical Garden lights

We loved this so much. I’m going to try to make this a yearly tradition. So much fun! I’d say that Lily’s 4th birthday was a smash hit.

Lily turned 4

I seriously can’t believe that Lily is 4. I swear that it was just yesterday that I was in the hospital having her. I don’t know where the time goes, but I’m totally scared that I’m going to blink and she’s going to be all grown up. So I guess it’s good to remember to make as many memories as possible.

Since Lily’s birthday is 3 days before Christmas I try to make sure her birthday is totally separate from Christmas. I mean we do have a Christmas tree and decorations all over the place and there’s just nothing I can do about that, but for her birthday celebration I try to keep it separate. Since Lil’s birthday was a Saturday this year I wanted to make a day of it so started planning a few months ago. Not that I spent every waking minute thinking about this one day, but there’s a cake to decided on, tiny bits of decorating to think about and fun things to do to pick out. All year Lil tells me what kind of cake she wants and it changes all the time. At some point in November I told her she had to decide for sure and she knew without a doubt she wanted chocolate cake. She also said she wanted Minnie Mouse decorations, this surprised me since my Girl loves Hello Kitty like nobody’s business. But whatever, Minnie is a new find and so I ran with it. AT the end of the day my Girl had a wonderful time and I’m super happy with how everything worked out.

The day started out with balloons strung from the ceiling. I wouldn’t have done it again since we did it last year, but Lily insisted that is how birthdays are suppose to start.

Running through her birthday balloons

Lily was thrilled with her hanging balloons. I missed her first opening the door because I got up earlier than her to do my makeup so I’d be ready to go, but she was a good sport and ran through them for me again.

Once it was time to get ready to start getting ready for our day she was very excited to put on the special birthday outfit I put together for her. Lily and I went to Target and found a cute pink shirt that I could decorate and she picked out the perfect black pants with a skirt attached which her new uniform these days so they were perfect. She loved her special birthday outfit.

Finished 4th birthday shirt for Lil

To go with the Minnie Mouse theme I ordered Lil some amazing Minnie ears.

Admiring her birthday outfit

Lily loves the mall escalators and asks to go there all the time. We don’t shop at the mall that often for a multitude of reasons so I figured we’d go and ride the escalators a bunch for her birthday. We also decided to go to build-a-bear for the first time for Lily’s main birthday present. Two birds, 1 stone and all.

At Build-a-bear Lily picked a cat to make; which really didn’t surprise us at all.

Making Lily Kitty for Lily's 4th birthday

4th Birthday

We made it in and out of the mall before 10 in the morning. Even the weekend before Christmas it was just starting to get crazy right before we left, it was prefect.

I had originally planned to start Lil’s birthday with donuts for breakfast, but we decided to do a good diner lunch after the mall instead. And it was delicious and Lily was very happy with the food. After eating we went home so I could finish getting ready for Lily’s little party. I did everything I could before went to bed the night before, I just had to do the last few final things.

For almost the whole week before her birthday I spent night after night making Minnie Mouse heads for a birthday banner. I’m really happy with how it turned out. It just had to get hung up behind the table once we got home.

4th Birthday

I made the cake and cupcakes the day before and put a crumb coat on them to keep them from drying out and to seal the crumbs. I also made the buttercream the night before. The recipe I found for the buttercream said I could refrigerate it without any problems. That was a LIE! When I got the buttercream out it was hard as a stinking rock. I thought I’d put the Minnie Mouse banner up and let the frosting come to room temp and everything would be fine. I was wrong. It refused to soften up so I put it in the mixer and thought I’d whip it up a bit and we’d be good to go. Boy howdy I was fricking wrong. I have never seen a frosting (or anything other than a glass) break so fast. The butter separated out and it quickly went into the trash.

I ran upstairs and looked up a super quick frosting recipe to replace the broken buttercream and Waldo ran to the store and got me the things I needed. When he got home I had just enough time to whip the frosting together, but it worked out great. While he was gone I convinced Lil to let me take some pictures of her and I’m so glad I had the time to do it.

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Another thing I made the week before were little chocolate Minnie Mouse heads for the cupcakes. They were very easy to make and super cute. Once the cake and cupcakes were frosted I grabbed the Minnie heads from the freezer. They started to melt almost immediately, but they were tasty.

Chocolate accents for Lily's birthday cupcakes

Chocolate accents for Lily's birthday cupcakes

Finished chocolate accent for Lily's birthday cupcakes

Then I grabbed some pictures of Lily with her cake and cupcakes before Waldo’s brother and his family showed up.

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

This next picture is a face that Lily was doing for a while. It was an adorable face and I’m glad I got a picture of it before it went away.

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

Lily's 4th birthday party

After Waldo’s brother and his family showed up we did gifts and then cake. I really went back and forth over singing happy birthday or not and in the end we sang and it nearly killed Lily. Unless she’s hates the spotlight less next year I think we are going to skip it.

Lily's 4th birthday

Lily's 4th birthday

Oh and then there’s the whole stress of blowing out the candle.

Lily's 4th birthday

Thankfully Daddy’s are great helpers.

Lily's 4th birthday

Lily's 4th birthday

After hanging out with Waldo’s brother’s family for a while we got ready to do our last birthday celebration thing. That will be a separate post though because it’s going to be very picture heavy.

Our Thanksgiving trip

A few weeks before Thanksgiving I got a text from my sister Jolene (who lives in CA) asking if we were coming home to visit for Thanksgiving. I told her no immediately, because well, we’re broke. She responded that I could at least talk to Waldo about it before I shoot the idea down and that it would be really cool if I came because Jody (our other sister and Jolene’s twin, who lives in OK) and her kids were going to be there too.

So Waldo and I talked about it and after he said no (because we think very much alike), we started looking at how much it would really cost. After all of the figuring we realized it wouldn’t be THAT much money since we could stay at my Dad’s house and most of our food would be taken care of because of the holiday. So I texted Jolene and told her that as long as there were no major blizzards on the mountain passes we had to cross, we’d be there.

A week or so later we found out that Jody bailed on us, something about needing to work. We forgave her, but it would have been so much more fun if she’d have been there.  Jolene figured that since Jody decided to stay home we wouldn’t take the trip either, but Lily was so fricking excited that we couldn’t change our mind even if we had wanted too.

We, or I should say Waldo and his Dad, kept a close eye on the weather reports for the week leading up to our leaving. Everything looked good so we headed out Wednesday morning. The drive went great surprisingly well.  We got rained on a tiny bit, but the only snow we saw was way off in the mountains no where near us. Then we got to Donner Pass and hit some rain and a lot of fog.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

You should be able to see a whole lot further then you can here.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

We got out of the fog fairly quickly and then it looked like smooth sailing. Boy were we silly to think that driving to California the day before Thanksgiving would be a good idea. Right outside of Sacramento we hit the bumper to bumper holiday traffic. It sucked! It was also the point where I took over driving, Waldo finally wanted a break. He says it was a coincidence, but I’m still not sure.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

We finally got out of the crazy traffic about an hour or so outside of my Dad’s house. Thank goodness we finally got to my Dad’s and out of the car. We took Lily in the house and sat her down and told her to tell my Dad about her trip and we went out to the car to get our stuff. I know this doesn’t sound like anything worth mentioning, but for Lily this is a first and is totally amazing. We felt this was a good sign as to what was to come on our trip. I’m going to spare you the suspense and tell you that Lily got totally overwhelmed by half way through Thanksgiving day and went back to her standard shy self. But she still had a great time.

We went to my Aunt KK’s house for Thanksgiving dinner.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

My Memaw and Pop were already there when we arrived, along with Kk and her husband Dixon. My sister Jolene and Olivia were suppose to be meeting us there, her son Max was already there too.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

KK and Pop

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me and Uncle Dixon

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me and KK

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Memaw and Pop at Thanksgiving dinner

Olivia was the only one that Lily cared about seeing so the fact that Jolene was taking her time was killing her. Finally we got ahold of Jolene and I told her I was coming to get Olivia and then she could take her time. Max went with me and it was very nice to get some alone time with him. I can’t believe he’s 16. It’s true what they say, kids grow up way too fast.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Olivia

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Pop, Olivia and Lily

Very quickly Lily and Olivia were off to play in the playroom. It was so cute, seeing them together again.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily and Olivia

Olivia spent the night with us at my Dad’s, in fact she stayed with us almost the whole time we were there. The girls loved it.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily and Olivia accidentally sort of matchy matchy

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Sleeping princesses

It works out great that Lily’s carseat is still backwards because it made it easy for them to talk and share tablets. This was how they spent all of their time in the car.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Happy travelers

Friday morning we went to Memaw and Pop’s for chocolate gravy (a huge tradition for our family). My Mom met us there.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Olivia and GG (my Mom)

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Olivia

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

My Mom, KK and Memaw

Jolene did some Black Friday shopping so when she got to Memaw’s she tried to get some shut eye. HAHA, silly girl.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Sleepy Jolene

Lily got super overwhelmed during breakfast because of all the noise so Waldo had to take her outside for a little while to relax. The family on my Mom’s side is very loud when we get together, well some of them are anyway.   After breakfast we took a bunch of pictures.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me, our Mom and Jolene

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me, Memaw, Mom and Jolene

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me, Memaw, Mom, Pop and Jolene

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Me, Lily, Memaw, Max, Olivia, Mom, Pop and Jolene

Olivia stayed with us the rest of the day and the girls couldn’t have been happier. After we left my Grandparents we went to visit my cousin Melissa and her family for a few hours. I realized when we got home that I didn’t take a single picture of Melissa and her family and I was so mad at myself I could have spit.

Saturday we decided to take Lily and Olivia to the zoo. Jolene, Max and KK met us there and we had a blast. The weather was perfect, the zoo wasn’t that busy and we had good company. What more could we have asked for?

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily and Olivia

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Waldo and Lily

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily, Waldo and Olivia

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Olivia, Jolene, Max and Me

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily feeding her old friend

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lil

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Olivia and Lil

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Max and Olivia, such sweetness

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Max and Olivia

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily and Nosey

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Max

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily and Olivia

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Waldo and Lily

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Jolene and Me

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily and Olivia

Right before we moved to Idaho the Zoo had just started working on a new Sea Lion enclosure. We finally got to see it all finished and I have to say that it was awesome. You could see the tank from above, level with it and below the water line. We got there right at feeding time and we probably could have spent a lot more time than we did, but Lily had to potty and we all wanted lunch.

Fresno Zoo 11-24-12

Fresno Zoo 11-24-12

Fresno Zoo 11-24-12

Fresno Zoo 11-24-12

After the zoo we went to lunch and then to my Grandparents to tell them goodbye. It’s so hard to say bye to everyone and especially them.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Pop, Me and Memaw photo-bombing us.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Memaw and Me

Back at my Dad’s Lily and Olivia helped get the Christmas tree decorating started.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Lily, Olivia and my Dad

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Oh pretty

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

Little Christmas Elfs

I loved how much fun the girls had together, and we hated saying goodbye to Olivia. I’m so glad my sister was ok with giving her to us for a few days. I hated saying goodbye to the rest of my family too, but Olivia was the hardest.

California Thanksgiving trip 2012

My Dad and Me

We did finally say goodbye and headed out for home. The drive home was a lot better than the drive in. There was some fog in central California which didn’t surprise us at all. We did have to make a stop at a Target in a small town an hour or two from my Dad’s house. We left Lily’s Hello Kitty cup at my Dad’s and so we had to get her a new one. Otherwise it was smooth sailing all the way home.

I can’t wait to see my family again, but for now I’m so glad that we are home.

Random shots from the Zoo

I have started using our nice point and shoot lately so I don’t have any mobile shots to post today (not that I’m really good about doing a random shots post every Friday, but I try), but I liked these so I thought I’d post them.

Lily looking at the lions.

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

The Fam.

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

Lily and Waldo looking at the giraffes.

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

Lily doing her witch face.

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

Cutie.

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

Lily on a tiger.

Zoo Boise 11-4-12

My sweet girl

Today we went to the local library’s music and movement program and had a little fun time together. After the music and movement we stay for story time. To go along with Lily’s new found chattiness (which has continued to hold up) she’s venturing out from me a little. She sat on the story time carpet with the other kids (this is a major first) and I got to sit fairly comfortably on the little chairs all by myself.  By the last book Lil was in a chair right next to me, but this was a huge first step and I’m very proud of my girl.

Anyway, the librarian read the kids a book and then they did a felt board activity together and I noticed that there was one felt piece left in the bucket. I got up and handed it to the librarian. She thanked me and as I sat down Lily looked up at me and said “That was very nice of you Mama, thank you”.  All of the women in the story room awed and oohed at her and I just glowed with pride at my sweet girl.

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