Happy New Month!

The holiday season was a very sick one in Virginia. I had a cold and a sore throat lasting 6 weeks, Jessica was sick for a month, and several families were ill too with colds or strep or the flu. It ruined our plans to party hard during the holiday break. So on Dec 31, 2012, after the kids went to bed, our neighbors Dacy & Ryan Ayres snuck over for a few games & a "Happy New Years" at midnight. On New Year's Day we just watched movies as a family:

And a month later on February 1, when everyone was healthier, we invited friends over. We told the kids we were celebrating New Years and they didn't know it was a month late and only 9:00 pm. Ian & Madison Shorter are on the ends; Jessica is in the middle, pouting for some reason; and Savannah, RJ, and Zachary Wight pose here.

Jared & Jennifer Wight, Clay & Jessica Shorter, Michelle and Ryan Samples, and Dave and I all laughed and played games and drank our non-alcoholic sparkling juice to ring in...February.

There's a Triceratops Prowling Around Our House!

We had a lot of fun for Halloween this year. One week before Halloween we went to the  church Trunk-or-Treat. Jessica and I made these crow and acorn treats (from Oreos & Hershey Kisses) for it.  I have to say the crows look more like crazy birds, but they were easy to make.

 

(Story: I saw a picture of the crow cookies online, but I wasn't going to do them. I thought "those eyes are too much work, and where would I find black thin licorice?"........But then I was in Walmart buying favor bags in the cake decorating isle, and there they were in 2 neat packages: edible candy eyes and black candy whips. It was destiny, so I gave in. And bonus: the candy whips taste like fruit punch, not black licorice.)

We choose zookeeper outfits to match Jessica's dinosaur costume, which she sorta picked out. I already love sky blue, (it's the color I bought for her to wear on her first day out of the hospital.) She likes dinosaurs. She loved the tail and it fit like a glove. Lions & tigers & sharks were "too scary" she said; other cute costumes she liked didn't fit. She was more interested in the nearby toys anyway.

She was tired at the beginning, but perked up soon, and showed her disappointment when she saw cars leaving.

(We also bought a rocket costume---she knew exactly what to do when I counted down: took off running on a circle tour of the toy section. I didn't show her any princess, pumpkin, witch or cat costumes---she'll probably pick those herself someday. I think next year she'll understand she can ask me to be something specific.)

All we had to do for our costume was buy Dave a two-pocket khaki shirt and make labels. Dave quickly rigged up some bars for our trunk, and we brought the stuffed animal zoo we made for Jessica's new toy room. And I couldn't resist the giant plastic shackles from the Halloween store. My mommy-alarm went off when I saw them: I could see my future children having a blast with them!

Dave passed out candy from behind bars and told the trick-or-treaters that the little Triceratops put him in there.  They thought that was funny. Jessica loved her triceratops costume. She kept the hat on, ran around, barred her teeth, and cat-hissed at people. 

We fully understand the symbolism of parents who want to play "lock up the child" for Halloween. It could be a disturbing sign of psychologically tormented parents that fantasize about doing this to their toddler, bwa - ah- ah - aaaaaah!

A few days later, Dave helped me make some fake bones. He made the economical version using watered-down glue to adhere white paper napkins to taped newspaper; (after they dry for 2 days, you have to paint them white). I tried the more expensive version with cardboard tubes, paper & masking tape, and plaster wrap (from Michael's craft store). I just dipped strips of it in warm water, and smoothed it on, and it dried in 1 day: white & hard as a rock. Now we have some cool homemade decorations!

We carved pumpkins the night before Halloween. Jessica used the little carving kit tools to pock mark our pumpkin while Dave scooped and carved.

Then I tried to light it and get a good picture, while Jessica thought it was funnier to keep blowing out the flame. So I pretended I was very offended and she just giggled more and kept huffing and puffing.

We started Halloween with my Mom's cheddar holiday soup. We had a great time trick-or-treating with two other families from church in their neighborhood. 

Julia, Jessica, and Nolan are all the same age and brought up the slower tail of the group. It was frigid.

I loved seeing that gaggle of kids waiting on doors! Last year Jessica was just learning to say "Ween!" This year she said "Whick or Wheat!" "Fank you" and "Happy Hawoween".

We also trick-or-treated in our old neighborhood a bit. Dave wanted to leave after an hour, when it got dark. Jessica during the second hour spent more time admiring carved pumpkins and petting dogs, rather than running around for candy. Only I wanted to keep going. We imposed a heavy parent tax on her Halloween candy, but she still got a big pile.

We were supposed to have our Joy School party the day before Halloween, but Hurricane Sandy, a.k.a. Frankenstorm came through and we decided to hold it the day after.  With nine preschoolers, nine moms, and four extra kids, we were squished in our new house, but it was jam-packed fun.

Our local mother-taught Joy School is awesome: reliable fun women, smart little kids, and a pre-made curriculum. It's split into 2 groups. Our group includes Jessica & I; ladybug Julia on Kristina's lap; Melissa behind Kristina and her mom Emily top-right; Buzz Lightyear Ian and his mom Jessica (taking the picture); and Tanner the tiger and his mom Lauren in black.

The kids got some darling portraits taken, thanks to the talented Jessica Shorter; I love the bone clenched in our triceratops's hand.

The kids decorated cupcakes and foam pumpkins. We asked Jessica if her pumpkin had the measles or just extra noses--she said the latter. I think the eyes make it extra hilarious!

Our friend Zachery here is singing our 2 songs: "First You Take a Pumpkin" (to the tune of "Sing a Song of Sixpence") and "I'm a Mean Old Witch With a Hat" (for which one girl left the room for fear of witches). Jessica is not phased by scary stuff, yet. She's the one who asked for a "mean" face when we carved our pumpkin at home.

We played 3 games based on our first three lesson units: Musical *Hugging* Ghosts (Relationships), Hot Potato/Pumpkin (the Earth), and Skeleton Treasure Hunt (Bodies). I altered them to be less competitive for toddlers. But 3-year olds are clueless about basic game play, which makes them extra funny.

The first was like musical chairs, except you stood on paper ghosts. The more ghosts that were taken away, the more you had to "hug" to stand on the last ghost. Some kids got the humor of cramming together, but some were so eager to help, they assumed when the music stopped it was time to clean up all the ghosts.

We played "hot potato" with a small pumpkin. When the music stopped, whoever held it was eliminated; and the last kid would win a large white pumpkin. But they didn't understand the passing part, so the whole time every mom had to coach their kids "Ian, give the pumpkin to Jessica." "Jessica, pass it to Julia!" etc. But I didn't want kids upset, so I gave them a treat bag when they got out. This incorrectly incentivized the kids, like Haven below, to keep the pumpkin because they would rather lose and have candy than be the winner. The last round of 2 girls passing it back and forth was very confusing for them.

The last game was a Skeleton scavenger hunt, which ended in our basement and a bone-themed dance party. 

Sadly, I don't have a picture of it. My kid "skeleton songs" playlist was cute, but not loud enough. It wasn't dark enough to see the glow-in-the-dark bracelets or dance lights. But each kid got an animal balloon in the shape of a bone, which they loved using to beat each other and a plastic skeleton hanging in the middle. When they were all popped, it was the perfect segue into cupcakes.

That's pretty much how children's lessons go for church, piano, or preschool: plan several activities in the hopes that part of one of them sticks!

Marriage Party

Two friends at our church, Dustin & Deena, got married this July for time and all eternity. I attended their wedding in the gorgeous Orlando LDS temple while Dave stayed home with Jessica. I didn't get any pictures, but the day was about like this picture: beautiful, just very hot.

Another mutual friend John Haase had just flown into back to the states with his lovely girlfriend Esther. As John had the key to Dustin's house during their honeymoon, we decided a little 'welcome home' was in order. So we drew pictures of a bride and groom riding an alligator by a lighthouse on their windows:

marked their mirror with X's & O's:

left a surprise in their closet...

and John found some gifts he knew Dustin would appreciate. Who needs Ferrari pictures, when you can look at High School Musical? or DVDs, when you can have Richard Simmons and country line dancing on VHS? What a great friend John is!

We drug Deena's siblings into the dastardly plans by decorating Deena's car (no pictures, unfortunately, but it was cute), and sneaking some furniture into Dustin's bachelor pad.

I helped decorate their reception, which was post-honeymoon and had a great fun beach theme. Congrats you two; we're happy for you!

You can see Jessica at the bottom of the picture.

We Wanna See ALL of Arizona

We decided to fly to Arizona to see our newborn nephew Graham "Gramster" Peter Robertson. No Christmas stress in March, and we get the bonus of seeing both sides of the family: little Graham Cracker's parents are my sister Emily, who married Dave's cousin James.

First stop: Phoenix, to see Dave's grandparents (Grandpa was sick):

and pick their oranges.

Quick stop to see my aunt & uncle & a cousin,

then we drove down to Tucson, AZ to see the new baby.

Jessica was not as good a traveler as when she was 4 months old. She loved the airport shuttle bus, but couldn't keep still on the plane, and slept only an hour the whole day. On the drive to Tucson, she decided she would angry scream (not cry) most of the way there. The last hour I hopped in the back seat with her and pulled out every entertainment method I knew to stop the shrieking. After realizing purchasing 2 seats with Continental doesn't mean they will be next to each other (thank heaven for people who will swap), & that Dad doesn't pack what Mom wants for traveling, subsequent debates included "OK, you get to do it next time." and "I love you. I love vacation. But I hate travelling."

Anyways, Jessica was thrilled to play with cousins Henry & Wesley & so many toys, and slept great once she had a pack & play. We all took a hike through Sabine canyon with our families, plus James' brother Jay & his girlfriend Jessica (who braved the Robertson insanity for a weekend.)

Besides being windy, it was a great day to hike. I love saguaro cactus, and Jessica didn't burn.

After, famous Sonoran hot dogs at el Guero Canero: bacon-wrapped, spicy bean-smothered deliciousness. Sadly, it was without my brother Chris, who recommended the joint in the first place, but was 2 hours too late. We got him a double.

Saturday night James' sister Emily & her husband & kids drove down from Utah on their way to Florida. (Yay, we now have family in the state!) We celebrated James' birthday, ate delicious food, and we all slept in the same house. (Good people; too bad we couldn't make ourselves stay up later! We blame Eastern time.) The fifth family was Robertson cousin Sharon & her family, who live in town and joined us for the baby blessing. 

James did a wonderful job, and I got to transcribe. Em went up to the pulpit with the other testifiers and spoke strongly about her love of God and her family. Ahhhh.

My sis & I both deal with infertility. She has several years of waiting before and between her kids. So we are very glad for her.

Sunday afternoon, we drove to Yuma (near the California & Mexico borders) to see Dave's sister & her family, & Dave's brother & wife who were picking up their kids after a company trip to Vegas.

We went from Tucson's "everyone has a lawn of rocks" to Yuma's "everyone has citrus trees in their backyard." Yuma is the lettuce capitol of the U.S., apparently all thanks to the Colorado River. 

The wind thwarted our trip to the camel farm, but we still enjoy lots of talking, Gumbo, fruit, trampoline time, music, and laughs from Danny & Karen's description of the most expensive place to vacation. Jessica loved the dog, new toys, and 7 little cousins.

Melanie took me letterboxing, a hobby she introduced me to. We found 2 new stamps hidden in the old railway/mission part of Yuma. I'm up to 15 finds now, and I can't wait to get to Utah in April & find some more.

We drove back to the Phoenix airport after only a week of vacation, and happily, Jessica was not so crazy on the way home. We love you AZ fam; thanks for the good times.

Our First Birthd...Wait, JESSICA'S First Birthday

Let's just be honest: Jessica's first birthday party was for us as much as her. I love cooking, and Dave is the toy king, and we were glad all the parents stayed to talk to during the party. But I think she liked it too. I hope so; we'd been looking forward to it since Christmas.

In preparation for the big day, I surfed the internet & started sketching cake designs. I practiced a bunch of new cake decorating techniques. (I think I've been watching too many cake-decorating challenges on Food Network.)

In January, I made this pink one: yellow cake with raspberry filling & Dave-made lemon curd, lemon frosting, and pink raspberry marshmallow fondant. I just used a box cake mix, store-bought jam, & tub frosting. But the fondant was from scratch (I had play-dough flashbacks) & I tried edible markers to make the little dots.

Refrigerating the cake made the slices come out perfect-looking, but it was soooo sugary: a 1" slice would give me a headache. 

In February, I experimented with these techniques: drying royal icing decorations, then gluing them on with icing (fish on the sides & the vertical swirls); whipped chocolate ganache filling; chocolate cream cheese frosting (lower sugar); rice crispy shapes (the giant fish); modeling chocolate (dark Ghiradelli's & corn syrup, yum!) in chocolate (fins) and white chocolate, dyed blue (to cover the fish); sugar free cake; making those swirly icing decorations; & dying cake layers.

I still used a boxed white cake mix. And buttercream frosting makes me gag, so I was glad to find another option. The chocolate cream cheese frosting (cream cheese, a little powdered sugar, chocolate chips, & cream) was so decadent---not too sweet---that I added it to my "banned foods" list. (It's 3 desserts that I only get to make once a year, & I have to ask Dave permission first.) I'm not a big fan of cake anyways (I ask for pie on my birthday), so we've been giving out cake right and left.

So when we celebrated Jessica's birthday, I felt more confident about what I was doing. I decided on a farm theme, since Jessica loves animals so much, especially dogs, cats, & cows. Her farm cake on the bottom was chocolate box mix (hey, I wasn't going to add "from scratch" to this already complicated endeavor!) with green cream cheese frosting. The barn was sugar-free yellow with chocolate cream cheese frosting. And the cake board & both cakes were covered with orange-flavored marshmallow fondant. The roofs, mud puddle, dog, etc. are made from modeling chocolate, and some of the animals we made with almond marzipan.

And by "we" I mean me, Dave, and his parents. They were here to celebrate Jessica's birthday (late) & mine. They drove all the way from Houston, & what do I reward them with? A day of slave-driving in the kitchen! Dave's Mom has good cake-decorating experience, & she was a huge help: piping furrows & plants, covering the barn, making the coconut haystack, roofing the barn, etc. Dave's Dad made all those little apples, Dave mixed colors for the animals, & they both hung balloons & streamers. 

I totally could have done the cake myself, as demonstrated by the two previous cakes. But with the party deadline, I WOULDN'T HAVE GOTTEN ANY SLEEP THE NIGHT BEFORE WITHOUT THEM! Thanks Mom & Dad & Dave! 

Of course we know our parents love us, but let's tell the truth, they were there to see their grandchild! They clinched their good favor with Jessica with cuddling, singing, flirting, and this winner of a baby toy: the ball-blowing machine with music. She learned pretty quick how to push the red button, and she was screaming with delight at those flying balls. And that's a blessing of not having the first grandchild: her toys are all pre-tested, grandchild-approved.

That was before she got sick though. She wasn't eating well the day before her party. And unfortunately for her first birthday, along with some lovely gifts, she also got diarrhea, poor girl. So she wasn't her hyper self with the other kids, and she picked at her cake, instead of mashing it in her mouth.

(She got the lumpy silo, and the duck.) We played an animal race game, and had punch balloons (when I saw them in the dollar store, I had a flashback to my own childhood, and bought them.) I wish we could could've invited everyone, but you can only fit so many clowns in a car, you know. We had a great time: thanks to everyone who came and the gifts, all of which Jessica loves.

We delayed Jessica's party by 2 weeks because 2 days after her birthday we would fly to Arizona to meet Jessica's new cousin Graham and see other family. (I'll blog about that trip & the weekend with Dave's parents later.) And I spent the 2 weeks before her actual birthday (Feb 28) finishing a project more important than cake: I made a first-year scrapbook of Jessica for her birth family. They are the whole reason we had an excuse to party. And it's really hard to mail cake. Thanks to Nancy Morris, who helped me make a little month-themed scrapbook years ago; I'd been saving it for this very reason, and it turned out cute.

On Jessica's actual birthday, Dave made a "J" in her birthday pancake. That evening we opened presents: animal puppets & tails. Dave played with her so much she knows how to put her hand inside them. He is fantastic with kids, and I'm so glad he's Jessica's father. His interrupting-cow knock-knock joke is funnier with a cow the size of a boxing glove on the end of his hand.

She also got clothes (size 18 months) & Baby Einstein videos (thanks to my Mom!), glasses (which she loves), Mickey Mouse color wonder paper & markers (and FYI, one month later she can now take off the lids and put them back on, which made me hide all the regular markers.)

See Jessica puffing up her cheeks in the picture? I worked for a month teaching her to blow out matches, hot food, feathers, etc hoping she would be able to blow out her birthday candle. No dice. (She blows everything else now.) After dinner we quickly had some cake, then put her to bed at the neighbors' house. We had tickets to see violinist Itzak Perlman at the Broward performing arts center. (He & his pianist were really amazing, especially when we could see his hands after we moved down from our nosebleed seats.)

Happy 1st Birthday to our wonderful little girl.