Party Like it's Nineteen Ninety... uhhmmm, Seven

This week will be the 10th anniversary of when Blake and I got married.... so we're ditching the kids with grandparents and going to relive our 1997 honeymoon in Vegas. Don't expect too full of a report when we get back, because you know, what happens in Vegas.............

Micah & Mommy

Gabi as GiGi

We have this adorable series of books by Sheila Walsh, GiGi, God's Little Princess. The title character always wears a tutu, even with her pajamas. So, it should have come as no surprise to us when Gabi emerged from bed this morning as GiGi herself, with Micah meowing along as Lord Fluffy, GiGi's royal cat. And if any of you have a girl between the ages of 3-8 who likes all things pink and princessish, you need these books!

Jessie's Home Run Birthday Party!

My favorite niece, Jessie, is the coolest seven-year old on the planet. She just turned seven, and had a really cool game of birthday wiffle ball in Grams & PaPaJack's backyard. Micah, Gabi, and I all went and had lots of fun. (It was on Sunday, so you all know where Blake was. Although that guess is safe for most other days, too, of course.) Micah stomped in a puddle, ate pretzels, hit some t-ball, and played in the sand box.
Gabi went over early with me to help get ready, and she made this boquet of flowers from Grandma's garden to decorate the table. She was really proud of it and proud of helping make Jessie's party look pretty.


Then came the wiffle ball, and Gabi got a few hits and tried her best, but ended up being pretty frustrated that it didn't come naturally to her. But even with parties full of mud and wiffle ball, Gabi still knows Jessie is one cool chica, and the best cousin ever! Notice, Gabi even wore shorts (a rarity in our house!) so she could be a "sports girl."
Here is the birthday girl, seven year old Jessie! Gabi took this picture of Jessie and was sure to get the flowers in the shot. BTW- the game was girls vs boys.... and girls totally rule wiffle ball!

Duff Sent Gabi a Card

Remember the post about the fan letter that Gabi sent to Duff, the awesome chef at Charm City Cakes in Baltimore and star of FoodTV's Ace of Cakes? And of course our recent attempt to "play Duff" with the StarTrek cake for Blake? Guess what?! Today Gabi got this card in the mail, signed to Gabi by Chef Duff! How cool is that?

Pink Ladybug on the Lilies

There was the prettiest pink ladybug on the lily when I was watering, so I ran in and grabbed my camera.




And here's a pic of our tomatoes growing, just for good measure. Gabi feels like a real farmer and can't wait to eat them.

Van View

Gabi took this pic of Micah when we picked him up from Summer Day Out. Notice he still has the one-eye camera face.

Happy Trails

We went wandering around on some local trails this morning. Here's the pictures from The Pink Camera.

"Hmmmm.... Which way should we go?"

"Whoa...." an exact quote from Micah when he saw how tall the tree is.

May Blake Live Long & Prosper!

Gabi and I know how to really surprise dad: make him a Father's Day cake a full 10 days before the actual holiday! Gabi has been planning this a while. As I mentioned in a previous post, Gabi is a big fan of Ace of Cakes on FoodTV, and Blake is of course a Sci-Fi fanatic..... a Trekkie just this side of wearing pointy ears. Put those 2 together and you get a little girl deciding to make her dad an awesome starship cake! I did help in the execution of the plan, but the cake was really her idea! It's a chocolate surprise cake (chocolate cake with chocolate chip cookies hidden inside!).... an 8x8 square frosted blue w/ stars, plus some cake baked in a bowl for the star ship and a cupcake cut in half for the nacelles. And Gabi drew on some more details with a toothpick.

Mackie's Close-Up

Play-Doh

Gabi made a volcano, and Micah made blue snakes. Are you scared yet?

A Rare Pictureless Post

I was an irresponsible photog.... Gabi performed with the church liturgical dance troupe Sunday morning. Sounds like a perfect photo op, right? I pulled out The Pink Camera just as they were coming out... red light, batteries nearly dead. I had a choice-- watch the whole thing or change the camera batteries during the performance and miss half of it. I chose to watch. It was very good... the 2 little girls (Gabi & Elizabeth) were so cute and the bigger girls did a great job!

Other photo-less happenings of recent days:
MiMi took Gabi to see her first real live ballet, at the Arkansas Children's Theatre... Cinderella. She was delighted!

Jack took Micah on his first boat ride. I asked him about it, but all he would say was "sllloooooooow, fast! fast Jack's boat lake!" If you speak toddler, then you can decipher the meaning there.

Micah has his first day of Summer Day Out today and he had a grand time; he's especially talking about Benjamin and Merek.

While Micah was at SDO, Gabi had the one and only Evan over for a play date. It took a few minutes to warm up and find something they both wanted to play together, but they ended up having a blast. Gabi definitely wants Evan to come again soon, but she also wants to still have girls over, because girls like to play Barbies and dress-up.

Weekend with Grandparents

We gave our kids away! Just for the weekend. Micah spent last night with Grandma and PaPa Jack, while Gabi had a girls-only Barbie sleepover with MiMi. You can see that Micah and Jack have a good time hanging out together. This evening both of the kiddos are going to sleep over at MiMi and Poppy's house (Poppy is home from driving the "big bus" so boys are allowed now) then come back for church tomorrow. Gabi will be doing liturgical dance in the service. And she knows why.... she can quote Psalm 149:3 (look it up!).