Hubby's Birthday Celebration

Today was my husband's birthday and it didn't start off the best but ended up a great day. We woke up to realizing that the house was freezing and the furnace wasn't working. Luckily the heating guys came fairly quickly and took care of the problem and got us all toasty again!

I had planned on cooking and having my mother in-law over for dinner but the boys decided they would rather go to her house to eat. So, I cooked over her house and Karl's brother's family came and we had a nice night together. His mother went all out on the decoration's.... Yes I know he isn't 5 but it was cute and the kids liked it!!She made some delicious Greek chicken and lemon soup called Avgolemono. I need to learn how to make this! I watched her so next time I will write it down and let you all know the recipe to try it.

We had 3 desserts to choose from. Well I guess nobody really chose just one but kind of tried a little of each of them. I think we almost set the smoke alarm off with all the candles though! And this is my "little" nephew who I had to ask tonight to shrink a few inches because he is aproaching my height and that just makes me feel really old!!
Well off to hit the couch now and relax!

My little monsters "monsters"......

I saw this idea on a favorite blog of mine, Little Birdie Secrects it's alive! kids drawings brought to life . She did such a great job with her tutorial that there is no need for me to do it again.

My kids love to draw strange creatures so I figured I would give this a try today. Here are the pics as promised.

They are a little weird looking but the kids liked them so I guess that is all that counts! Now we just have to come up with some good names for them and maybe make one more for the little guy in the house. He was very happy going through all of mommy's sewing stuff and the bag of polyfill!

Friday night happenings

So what do you do when you are sick of winter and don't feel like going out anywhere on a Friday night with the kids? We had make your own pizza's and movie night. I've been trying to make a good pizza dough for weeks now. I think last night's was my favorite so far. The kids did the traditional red sauce and pepperoni but I wanted something different for ours. I ended up doing a white pizza with spinach, chicken, sauteed mushrooms, garlic, mozzarella and parmesan cheese. It turned out very yummy so this one will have to become a keeper.Then the kids sat down to watch Barnyard 2. I didn't see it but they said it was a good movie.
After the kids went to bed I started working on bringing some of their "artwork" to life. Check back later today to see if I can find some time to finish that project and post some pics. Have a great Saturday!

"What, I didn't do anything"

So I forgot to blog about this last week so I thought that I would share this story now for a little laugh. My 7 year old, got that he's 7 not 3..... came downstairs about 5 minutes before the bus was coming one morning missing a 2 inch chunk of hair over his eyes. Now that is 2 inches straight up not across! I stood there looking at him wondering what the heck had happened upsairs in the couple of minutes that he had been gone. Did the words go and brush your teeth somehow get confused into give yourself a really bad hair cut??? Now when I asked the child what did you do, he looked right at me and said, what, I didn't do anything???
Hmm, really then where is the hair that was on your head 3 minutes ago?? After a little song and dance on his part he finally said it was bothering me and in my eyes so I decided to cut it off. Now I really wished that I had taken a picture but seeing that I some how had to get over my initail shock and try and fix this before the bus was beeping outside I decided to grab the scissors instead of the camera. Needless to say, I couldn't fix it and he ended up getting a short bang haircut.
Children, I will never figure them out!

5 year old Pirate Birthday Party!!

my little pirate

Phew! The party that seemed like it would never happen finally came and went! The kids all had a great time and I'm glad that we switched it to this weekend so thatall the kids could come. There were lots of pirate crafts including:

a pirate windsock

an eye patch, sword and mini telescope.

Cannon ball popping, hooking pretzels on their "cup" hand hooks, pin the flag on the treasure chest, tattoos, scull bandanas and a good old treasure hunt to finish things off. The cake was enjoyed also! Here is a picture of the big ship
I was very happy to have my sister in-law and her husband and kids join us all the way from Canada too. It made the day extra special for us! We had a great time, but now the dreaded clean up must begin. Well, maybe it can wait until tomorrow. I think another piece of cake is calling my name........

Last day of school break!!

It's Friday!! I know, I know I shouldn't be a little happy that it's the last day of school break but I am. It's hard to occupy kids 24/7 when it's so lousy outside and you already have major cabin fever. We woke up to snow and it's been non stop here all day so far. I finally got the boys to go outside and play and I think they are so "over" winter. They resorted to trying to use the swing set instead! Luckily they are headed for a great day of snow tubing tomorrow and I hope they have a great time.
As for myself, I sat inside folding laundry and eating some yummy left over chicken wing dip! I'll include the recipe if anyone out there is craving that now, enjoy!




Chicken Wing Dip
24 ounces chicken breasts, cooked and shredded
1 (12 ounce) bottle hot sauce (use whole bottle or just half, if desired)
2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 (16 ounce) bottle bleu cheese salad dressing (or can use ranch or 8 oz blue cheese and ranch)
2/3 cup chopped celery
3 cups shredded cheddar cheese or monterey jack and cheddar cheese blend
Directions
1. Preaheat oven top 350.
2. In a large bowl, mix shredded chicken, celery and cheese.
3. In a saucepan over med-low heat, combine cream cheese and salad dressing and stir until smooth. Stir in bottle of hot sauce ( don't have to use entire bottle if you want it milder). Pour heated mixture into bowl with chicken mixture. Stir to mix well.
4. Pour into a 13" x 9" baking pan. Bake uncovered for 40 minutes or until bubbly----make sure top doesn't get browned. Let stand for 10 minutes. Serve warm OR cold-----tastes best warm--- with celery or tortillia chips/crackers.

Pirate Goody Bags

So I decided this year that since I had a bunch of flannel scull fabric that I would make my own goody bags for my son's party. I filled them with a bunch of "pirate loot" and put a tag on them with everyone's pirate name. I hope they go over well and can be used to store lots of things in the future! Let me know what you think

Oh and another little note.... school break week is not the time to hit the grocery store. Trying to navigate through the aisles with 3 kids all hanging off of the already heavy and over loaded cart while dodging other mom's with their 3 and 4 kids is not a pretty site!!