Once upon a Time Princess Baby girl shower

 My friend recently adopted a baby, which we are all so happy  for her!  To celebrate her finally finding her princess, we threw her a Princess baby shower.  I recruited my SIL Sallie, of course, who did an amazing job pulling everything together!  You're a pro, Sallie!  This is the front hall table

 I wanted to write a cute "once upon a time" poem about finding a princess, but writing original poetry is definitely not within my talent range, so I framed this adoption quote for her instead.

 Do you love Pinterest?  I LOVE Pinterest!  I found this idea for hanging lanterns and pom poms with tulle like a Princess bassinet and adapted it.  I LOVE how it turned out!

 We had a veggie tray, spinach dip with sourdough bread, fudge, caramel, candied almonds, Princess punch, chocolate-dipped strawberries, and cookies and cream cupcakes.

 My friend Lisa made these cute little chocolate crowns for the cupcakes.

Knights and Superheroes

 The boys got some fun dress-ups from Grandma and Grandpa Henry when they came back from their mission recently to England.  Keaton got a knight's costume and Brighton a cop hat.  They combined efforts, and the knight now has chain mail, a helmet, and a sword.

 Not to mention this stately steed!

 And a princess to rescue!

 And then some days we have superheroes in disguise.

Share and share alike

 The three little ones got a Valentine's party at the church while the moms exercised, thanks to one of the moms.  The twins were so excited to have a party, just like their older siblings.  They all 3 got a ring pop.  Keaton ate half his, and upon coming back to it, found that Waverly had gotten to it first.  Big tears were the result.  Brighton ran and got his ring pop, and insisted they'd share it, taking turns licking it.  And if that wasn't generous enough, he even let Keaton be the holder, which is HUGE when you're 5.  It was endearing to my Mother's Heart to watch my 2 little sons in this tender moment.  I hope Brighton is always there for his little brother like he was today.

Sugar Cookies

 Making sugar cookies is one of those iconic things to me.  I haven't done it yet with the twins, so we had to include it in our Valentine's line-up of activities.  Ok, so it happened the day after, but we did still enjoy our sugar fest!

 I love the look of pride on his face for frosting and decorating his own cookie, without any help from me.

 I'm not sure which got more frosting: the cookie or Wavery's mouth.

 Look how intent she is. 

Valentine's Day 2012

 Just a few highlights from the big Love Day.  Brighton's preschool party got to feed their Valentines into the mouth of this guy.  He was very excited for his first Valentines party, and proudly brought home all his Valentines to show me after school.

I found this garland on Pinterest and finally finished it...the night before Valentine's.  Oh well, I'll enjoy using it next year.  It was really easy to make out of leftover white and red felt, and Dollar Store pink pom poms.  The threading was the trickiest part, but still easy peasy.

 We had heart shaped pizzas, salad, and fondue for dinner/dessert.

This year I got fancy and cut the pepperoni into hearts.  They were cute.

Meet Mr and Mr and Mrs Heart

I had plans for so many cute crafts I've pinned on Pinterest, but this is the only one we got to before the holiday passed.  Why must these little ones grow up so fast!??

Nature's Beauty

We watched the full moon rise one night, as it came up over the mountain.  I tried to capture it prior to its full emergence, but didn't make it in time.  I thought it was beautiful, nonetheless.

Fun Lunch Fridays

 More Fun Lunch Fridays.  A traffic light, car, and policeman (with a sailor hat!  Brighton made sure I added a badge.)

Groundhog Day

 Ok, celebrating this holiday makes me seem a little nuts, but I saw this cute family tradition on Secrets of a Super Mommy and wanted to implement it.  Depending on whether the groundhog sees his shadow or not, we eat with white or green utinsels, etc.  In this case, Phil saw his shadow, so there are 6 more weeks of winter, hence the white stuff.  Also, we ate on the "ground", and, I promise I didn't plan it, but we had Potatoes and Ham:  potatoes come from the ground, and ham comes from the hog!  The kids were excited to add another new tradition that was something out of the ordinary.

For dessert, we had pudding cups with this scary-looking little guy popping out.  Hey, that's the best I could do on short time!

Anniversary gift

This is a late posting for this, as we celebrated our anniversary in August, but I copied this cute idea from mymixofsix.  I cut hearts out of an old almanac of various places that have meaning to us.  A few on there are Provo, where we met, San Diego, a family vacation a few years ago, and Orlando, where we went on a trip to Disney World for Savannah's Make-a-Wish trip in 05.  Someday I hope to make one with Paris, Tuscany and Ireland on it....

New photos part 2

 Here are Irelynd's and Savannah's

 The one below was the winner.  I love how blue her eyes are.  She is so photogenic.

 Savannah has the fewest because I already had these from last fall and knew which one I was going to use.  The one above was our winner.