Princess Painting Party!!!

This year Kassidy's birthday fell on President's Day which meant no school!!! She was super excited to sleep in (and she did!). She woke up to pink and purple streamers decorating her room and breakfast in bed:)

Her favorite breakfast in bed...toedenholes and hot chocolate! (sorry, I have no idea how to spell that)

For the past 3 years we have had Kassidy's birthday party at our house. We kept it fairly simple and easy. This year we decided to do something different. In August we took the kids to paint some pottery for Mama's birthday and she just loved it! Since then that's all she's wanted to do for her birthday. Affter lunch we went to The Glazing Pot. Kassidy invited her 3 cousins and 3 friends. The girls dressed up as princesses and painted princess banks. The boys got to choose what they painted and each chose something different.

Our big 7 yr old as the Little Mermaid

Kassidy with cousin Sara...the fairy princess cowgirl:) Adorable!

The SC cousins crew (minus Karson who was napping at my friends house)...Evan, Kassidy, Kaleb, Sara, and Alex.

Kaleb busy painting his car which was even personalized with a Kaleb license plate.

All the kids did such a great job painting! Such concentration!

Kaleb's car and Evan's monkey

Alex's dragon

Addie (friend from school), Kassidy, and Sara with their princess banks

Erika (friend from the sitters) with her Belle

Miss South Carolina 2010 was there for a special event but took time out to take a picture with our princesses!

Autumn (friend from school) with her Belle...I can't wait to see the finished products after they've been glazed and fired.

Cake time:) Believe it or not the kids ate this whole cookie cake except for 1 piece!!!

They all had so much fun at the party!

Time to open gifts from the family now.

Is it ok if my 7 yr old daughter has cuter sandals than I do???

She got some great new books! She also got Silverlicious...such cute stories:)

Kaleb picked out this gift for his big sis. He knew she needed more of these...

Yea! Glow in the dark beads:) You probably know what this is...you get a shape to put the beads onto then iron it so they all melt and stick together. They've probably made about 20 of them lately!

Here she thought she was actually getting an iPad...she just said, "Is it daddy?" Sorry baby...

Clothes from Justice are always a hit!

Dance outfit

For dinner she chose Stevie B's Pizza...always yummy:) Bonus: the kids even got balloons to take home!

One more cake for our family celebration! (Kassidy was very into picking out her party cakes this year...how nice I didn't have to make any!)

It took a few tries, but she finally managed to blow out all 7 candles:)

Fun with frosting:)

Sucking the frosting off of the butterfly ring...looks like a paci doesn't it?

All 3 kids LOVED these cupcakes!!!

That was our super fun birthday day:) Kassidy loved every minute of it! She was so happy to be able to spend time with her friends and family and she loved opening all the gifts. Thank you to everyone for the happy birthday wishes, phone calls, skypes, cards, and gifts!!! We love you all!

Snow days!!!

Growing up in Ohio, snow here in South Carolina doesn't usually excite me very much. It's usually just a dusting and melted within a day. But...this year we had a good 6 or so inches! It was so soft and powdery and so much fun to play in! We all went outside and had a great time playing Fox and the Hound (mom taught me that one), trying to throw snowballs (even though it wouldn't stick together), making snow angels, etc. Keith even took Kassidy and Kaleb for their first sledding experience:) I stayed home with Karson so unfortunately I don't have any pictures of that. Keith said they had a blast! Kaleb wanted to go faster and faster!

Here's Karson checking out the snow. Notice how the snow just sticks like crazy to his gloves? Probably because they're not snow gloves. Funny how I had similar gloves on and within minutes my hands were wet, a few more minutes my hands were freezing, a few more and they were painfully numb. But could I figure out that's why our 1 yr old was crying so much??? Nope. The poor little thing just balled his eyes out! We finally did think oh my gosh I bet his hands are cold and sure enough, they were bright red. Don't worry though, after a few minutes inside wrapped up in a blanket and nice warm gloves he was happy again:) No permanent damage done...to him. My heart of course was shattered!

Daddy and the kiddos

The next day it rained and then froze so everything had a very thick layer of ice over it. We pulled up huge chunks of ice from our yard and driveway and had fun throwing it and watching it slide all the way down the yard and driveway. Unfortunately, this made it very difficult to build a snowman. Some of our friends managed to make these huge snowmen...I still don't know how...but I just could not manage. This is what I made. I know, pretty pathetic! Good thing the kids didn't mind a very small ice woman:)

We had a great week off of school and work and enjoyed some play time outside in the snow and ice and hot chocolate and movies inside. What more could you ask for?

FYI...we really need to invest in some SNOW attire next year:)