Dreaming in Cream

Well, we are in Orderville preparing for the event of the year... aka Sammi's wedding.  Sam is getting married on Friday and the reception is that night.  My part is the food of course!  Sam conned me into making 400+ cupcakes and a wedding cake!   All of the cupcakes are baked and resting in the store's freezer until the big day.  The cake is underway too!  I'll be excited when it's all said and done because I am even dreaming about the cupcakes!  Ahhhh! 

So if you are in town that night - you better come!  This is your official invite... 

I have 4 flavors and think I'll make some kind of little card telling what each is with a summery title to the cupcake...But I need a little help on the names-

Lemon cake with raspberry filling and raspberry lemonade icing = Raspberry Lemonade 

Creamy vanilla cake with a whipped cream and fresh orange icing = Orange dreamsicle

Milk Chocolate cake, PB cup center, with Peanut Butter icing = ???

Devil's food cake with cream cheese frosting = ???

Sweet Dreams. (get it!)

.Indiana

I had a near ideal childhood growing up in Indiana.  Playing hide and seek in 12 foot corn, ghost-in-the-graveyard at Grandma Shoaf's, and catching lighting bugs all summer.  Indiana gave me fond memories, but it also gave me amazing friends and family... I'm lucky to have lots of those same friends in  Utah now!  Lots of people that I grew up with now live here.  RaNae, Thomas, and Micah came out west for a family reunion and we decided to get all our Indiana friends together for a little party.

Here is a good smattering of the Shoaf family.

Pulled pork sandwiches, corn on the cob, watermelon, and sheet cake were all present too.

Ryan and Nici with their newest addition.

Wes - Super cute!

It makes me feel old when kids I grew up with have kids of their own!  Here is Chrissi B's baby, my Henry, and Marc's Hannah!

Mother of 7

Macey and I decided that Amy needed a little break with her newest baby, so her 5 oldest came to our house for the day!  We made puppets, went to story time, had a picnic, read books, played in the sprinkler, and Kayden made a cake for dinner.  They are great kids and it was fun to be a mother of 7 for a day!

Cutest Babies

If this won't brightening your day... I don't know what would!

Will Work for Flowers

I like to babysit... it's not really babysitting anymore, it's more like a play date without the other mom.  Last week Emma came over and the girls painted cards.

Then we had a Justin Beiber dance party. 

We swam.

That evening baby Amanda came over and loved eating sour cream with her hands (isn't she pretty!  I blame her mother)

Rachel brought me some amazing pizza and Heather paid me with fresh roses that I put all over my house.  Who doesn't love fresh flowers in the bathroom!  I need a sign that says "Will work for food/flowers"!

Besties

I love having two kids.  Their sibling relationship is one of the sweetest things in our home.  They adore each other in a way that I, as a parent, wouldn't be able to teach them to do.  I love it.

Henry is getting more and more mobile by the day and Macey thinks it is so great.  Today she and him were rolling around on the floor, Macey talking his ear off.  I looked over and she was chatting to him and then stopped and kissed the top of his head.  I melted.

People who don't want kids don't know what they are missing.

Splinter

Our big fun yard isn't without peril.  Macey gets splinters just about everyday in her feet... she's very brave when her dad gets them out at night.  I walked into the bathroom the other day to find this:

When I asked her what she was doing she said "My baby has a slibber" and proceeded to poke at his foot with my tweezers.

Orderville Again

I love not working!  It means that we can to whatever we want on the weekends!  We went to Orderville again this weekend and took my cousin Courtney with us.  She has never seen Zion National Park before, so her and I braved a few hikes with the babies while Thomas worked.

Canyon Overlook

The swimming hole at the bottom of the switchbacks.

While Courtney and I had so much fun Thomas was busy converting an old restaurant into a house.

Here is his sweet old lady hat to keep the sun off.

It dyed his head red...

Holy Cow that is dirty!

We made time to have hobo dinners up Main Canyon.

Courtney fending off the million mosquitoes.

Baby Jane feeding Boagie Cheetos.

On Sunday we went to Grandma Griffiths' birthday party in Beaver.  

We might just go next weekend for the Alton picnic...

Busiest Holiday Ever!

Yesterday was a great day in my book.  I stared my day out at 3:08am and went to bed at 10:30pm.  Here is a list of everything that happened! Amy had her baby, we hiked the Y, went the the State Hospital grounds, lunch, grocery shopping, nap, dinner with Courtney and Todd and a mean game of Scrabble.  Perfect day for me!

Amy is Thomas' cousin's (Cam) wife.  She's amazing and a true inspiration to me.  She now is a mother of 6!  We have a ton in common and I really look up to her.  She invited her 3 oldest kids to the birth of their little sister.  One daughter, Kaitlyn decided that she wanted to be there!  We got to talking and I wanted to go too and Amy wanted support for Kaitlyn, so I was lucky enough to be at the birth too!  Amy called me at 3:08 am, I got the hospital 15 minutes later and about 10 minutes after I was there, Kimaria was born.  Amy was only in active labor for about 45 minutes and hardly made it to the hospital herself!  Kaitlyn sat on my lap until her sister was born and then we went right over to the baby and started taking pictures!  Kaitlyn and I didn't necessarily watch the birth itself but it was a very beautiful and special thing for her to be in the room while her mom gave birth.  Good thing I brought my camera, theirs didn't get packed in the rush.  I took Kaitlyn home around 5am and went back to bed for a few hours myself.

Kimaria less than an hour old.

We woke up at 8am to hike the Y!  We took my cousin Courtney with us.

Macey was pretty nervous on the mountain but we made it!

Then we went the the state hospital grounds.  They are gorgeous!

A very busy day indeed!