Well folks, for those of you who check here often, you can take the week off. Cause I am! Monday morning we are loading up the kids, some warm clothes and headed to Disney World. Again. We went in October and are going back b/c Brandon has to take his Step 3 board exam for med school and where else, but Orlando, is one of the locations for this! His parents are going to be joining us, to which we are very excited, and are looking forward to having two pairs of helping hands. Although they seem to be as giddy as little children themselves (it's adorable!), so I may be the only "adult" there. We will return on Sunday, but please don't expect photos to be popping up here by Monday morning. I promise I will do my best to get them on here as soon as I can, but you have to understand, I will most likely have 2 cameras (ours and the in-laws) photos to go through. This means, hundreds, not 100, more like 400-500+ photos to dig through. This will take time. I wonder if I can get Brandon to drive home and I can start editing the photos? (By that I mean just go through them, there's no real editing going on, in case you haven't noticed.) So, I hope you have a great week wherever you are and I'm hoping we will too!

Brandon and I were talking in the kitchen at lunch time today and Sophie was playing with the phone. She'd push the talk button and hold it up to her ear saying, "Hi." It was really cute so we just let her keep doing it. If I saw she pushed some buttons I'd hang it up and let her keep playing. I heard a voice on the other end of the phone, so I picked it up thinking it was the operator telling you to hang up and try again. It wasn't. I glanced down as I was hanging it up again and saw she had dialed 9114683. Yup, you saw that correctly, the first three numbers were 9-1-1. I couldn't believe it and set the phone on the counter hoping nobody actually picked up b/c she dialed them too quickly for it to register. I was wrong. The phone rings and it's the 911 operator asking if everything is ok. He starts asking where we live and our names and other info. As a precaution they have to send a patrol car out to the house just to make sure. Yup, the base patrol shows up a few minutes later and he laughs when he finds out what has happened. I am completely embarrassed and tell him thank you for being concerned. I'll be more careful next time she wants to talk on the phone.

My birthday is coming up and this past weekend my husband told me that he knows what he wants to get me, that it's kind of expensive and he knows I would love it. Since our budget is usually about $30 (we're cheap, I know) and I hadn't even told him what I wanted I was extremely curious what he'd come up with. Last night as we were going to bed he told me what it was, new flat iron. The only reason he did was b/c he saw the one I currently own sitting out and was wondering where it came from. That alone should tell you how much I've actually fixed my hair in the last year+ b/c I've had it for years and hate it. It's a cheap one and all that I could afford, so it had to make do. I've never been much of a makeup/hair/jewelry/clothes person, but I'm trying to work on it since I'm now a mother of two and can't pull off the college look anymore. (Finally having a paycheck helps too!) Now, my hair has always given me trouble. The top half is straight, the bottom half is curly (and not the pretty kind) and all of it is frizzy!! Living in FL does not help it either. Back at Christmas, I borrowed my sister-in-law's Chi flat iron and fell in love. My hair was so smooth and silky and not frizzy. And it stayed that way for 3 days! (Please don't be grossed out, remember I am a mom of 2 and bathing is a luxury!) It always felt that way when I'd leave the salon, but I figured it was the stuff they put on my hair, which I'm sure helped too. I didn't realize Brandon was even in the room when I talked about how much I loved it, but apparently he was b/c he told me last night that when he heard me saying this he thought he'd store that info for my birthday. He continues to tell me that he has spent quite a bit of time researching flat irons to find out more about them so he can get the best one. He goes on about the metals that are typically used, the brands and the pluses and minuses of each, the temperatures they'll reach, and on and on. My mouth hit the floor. What man would take the time to research a hair product for his wife??????? I fell in love with him all over again. He knew WAY more than I did about all of this. The only reason he told me was b/c when he saw the one I had sitting out he was afraid he'd have to come up with another idea. The funny thing is, this is the only thing I wanted for my birthday and was just going to use whatever money I got to buy it! Do I have the sweetest husband in the world or what? I love him!!

Here are more photos from the party. I forgot to mention that she has icing all throughout her hair, that's why it looks greasy. Don't worry, I at least wash my childrens' hair!


Sophie and her new bracelet from her new purse.


Sophie and her new nail polish, which turns out, wasn't meant to be in there!


Sophie and her new dress, that was meant to be in the gift.


Sophie in her party dress. Grammie made it for her! You can't tell, but it has little snowflakes on it. This was only worn up until cake time.


Sophie made this face every time she opened a card. Not sure why.


Sophie playing with her minivan. She loves it!!


Sophie enjoying the icing.

Here's the icing recipe I used. It's from the Williams-Sonoma kids parties book. If you are icing a chocolate cake I'd recommend doing 1 1/2 the recipe. I had to do a second layer on the bigger cake b/c flecks of chocolate came up with the icing while spreading it. It looked pretty like that, but if you want it to be "fleck-free" you'll have to do a second coat. It is so smooth it doesn't take any time to spread it around. Unless you are eating it! I'm telling you, this is the best icing you will ever make!!!

Vanilla Frosting:

3/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
3 1/4 cups confectioners' sugar
2 Tbl. heavy (double) cream
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 tsp. salt

In a bowl, using an electric mixer on low speed, beat together the butter, sugar, cream, vanilla and salt until creamy and smooth, about 3 minutes. Use frosting right away.

To color the frosting, proceed as directed, then beat in food coloring, a drop at a time, until the desired color is achieved.

For lemon frosting, proceed as directed, but reduce the vanilla to 1 tsp. and stir in 1 tsp. lemon extract and 1 tsp. finely grated lemon zest.

Enjoy!!

This weekend we celebrated Sophie's 1st birthday. Grammie and Pop and the Khans (stayed with friends) were able to come down from Alabama to join us and it was so fun to have them around. I thought a few months ago it would be funny to have a "snow themed" party since we are living in Florida now. It's January and what else do you think of other than cold weather? (I also had some inspiration from a kids party book my father-in-law had given me.) I went to the Dollar Tree before Christmas and bought snowflakes to stick on the windows and foam ones to hang from the ceiling. I had these huge ideas of how to decorate the house, the cake, the goodie bags, games we could play, but I knew I was crazy for trying to tackle that for a child who won't even realize there is a party going on. So I simplified. We had a small party around lunch time on Saturday (still used the snow decorations I'd bought) and I didn't realize until the week of the party that all the little kids that were coming were boys. But that's what Sophie is used to being around, so it was quite fitting. Since I made Christopher's first birthday cake, I thought I'd do the same for Sophie. We made pizzas for lunch, had birthday cake (I forgot to serve the ice cream) and then opened presents. Christopher was really tired so he actually asked to go take his nap and crashed on our bed during lunch and missed most of the party! Sophie had so much fun eating cake and did a great job opening presents. She got some wonderful gifts, including clothes (for herself and one of her babydolls), books, a toy purse, new chair (used to help climb over the couch earlier in the week!) and get this.... nail polish!!! (Thanks Aunt Jenny and Uncle Trey!) We had a wonderful time with everyone and thank you to all who remembered her special day and called, emailed or sent cards. I'm working on getting other photos, ours didn't turn out as well. I'll post them as soon as I can get them.

Sophie's cakes were chocolate on the left and a yellow "smash" cake on the right. They were boxed cakes, but they were delicious, the icing was homemade. I'm not an icing girl, but this stuff was amazing! If you want a simple and yummy white icing recipe, let me know. I have always wanted to learn how to decorate cakes, so this was my first attempt at it. It was so easy! Of course I did probably the easiest decoration known to man, so there's nothing to brag about!

Sophie wearing her new tutu from her buddy William. It was so cute!! She loves wearing these. Hopefully we have a little ballerina in the making.

Sophie not liking her hat, but loving her icing. She really didn't care for the cake, until the chocolate one came out. She's a chocolate girl!! (Just like her mommy!)

Sophie and one of her biggest fans, "Uncle" Matt. Our kids love the Ramages!! (But who doesn't?)

I don't know if I've talked about what a climber Sophie is or not, but she is insane! She makes you think she wants to sit in your lap, but really she wants to climb onto the side table or over the back of the couch onto the window ledge. She will climb up onto Christopher's PBK chair to get to the big chair to grab the tree and try to pull it over. The other day at the store I had her buckled in the front of the cart and this one had a strap between the legs that snapped to a strap on either side. She got out of it. She also was able to climb up on the chair outside that is used to get onto the trampoline. Now don't panic, she couldn't get onto the trampoline and the only reason she got onto the chair was b/c the legs are dug into the ground to prevent it from tipping over. Last Saturday night we were watching our friends' kids while they had a date night (we went the night before) and found Sophie on the top shelf of the little cabinet in the kitchen.



This morning I was doing the dishes and caught her and Christopher using her new chair (Land of Nod, I love it!!!) to climb over the side of the couch over and over again. (They didn't know I was taking their pic, they both just happened to turn around at the same time.)


Then this afternoon we were at Walmart and I strapped her into the seat, but she kept trying to turn around to see Christopher. I thought I'd try putting the two of them in the big area, but once we got to the food section she kept trying to open everything so she had to go back to her seat. We are almost done shopping and she's trying to turn around again and making some progress. She is now facing backwards, on her knees and suddenly flips over the back of the seat and is hanging upside down still strapped in, legs kicking in the air!!!!! A teenage girl came over to see if I needed some help b/c I was having a hard time unhooking Sophie, but was more mad than anything. How horrible of a mother must I have looked? Thankfully the girl's mother said her daughter was the same way when she was a child. I had to carry her the rest of the shopping trip, which wasn't easy b/c she didn't want to sit still. I finally had to put her back in the seat and pull the strap as tight as it would go. Next time I can't forget my cart cover. It's the only way to contain her. Tie he down in every direction.