Celebrating Jake’s Birthday
I am just now getting our pictures updated from our last big adventure, so yes a little later than planned…. Our family was able to celebrate Jake’s birthday this year while on our Alaska Cruise vacation! Thankful for an opportunity to spend time with the whole family.
We surprised Jake and had the chef on the cruise ship make him a birthday cake! It was big and extra rich chocolate! The crew sang him “Happy Birthday” in Indonesian which was really cool. He was so thrilled that we made a big spectacle of his birthday celebration. We were so full after the delicious meal that we ended up taking the cake back to the cabin to eat later that night after all the other activities that evening.
SURPRISE!!! Happy Birthday Handsome!
Celebrating Jake’s birthday with the whole family.
Thankful for a wonderful time together and for this amazing man who I get to live my life with!
Love you JACOB!!! Happy Birthday! Wishing you many more healthy, happy, and fun adventures!
Flashback Friday: Fun with Friends and Bath Time
First trip to GattiTown with Mandy, Jack, Danielle, and Riley (Brina & Karlie)
Today our Flashback Friday is in August 2005 when the girls were 6 months old. It is quite an adventure packing up and heading out to visit family, friends, or do errands, but we are getting better at it. The process of just getting out of the house, into the car, and on our way is usually several minutes long.
The girls have been enjoying going out and about more. I try to do at least one fun activity outside of the house each week with family or friends. They are usually exhausted by the time we get home, but we have fun. It is good for me to spend time with other Moms too.
Thankful for family and friends to hang out with. The girls are really good and for the most part do really well when we are out and about. They love watching everything. It is neat to watch them soak everything in during our adventures.
Mandy and Jack on the carousel
Danielle and Riley on the carousel
Brina very excited about driving Riley’s cool car! Vroom…vroom….look out people here I come!
Josh carrying Brina
Karlie hanging out with Kari
Christy holding Karlie
Aunt Vick hanging out with Brina as she bounces around
Cousins Jordan and Rachel feeding Karlie
Brina watching cousin Jack open his birthday gifts
Jack opening his birthday gifts.
Karlie starting to zone. She didn’t like the party hat at first, but soon forgot about it.
1st Bath together after being out with friends and having sunblock on them. It was too hard to safely bath two wet babies at the same time before now. They could sit up on their own and each had a place to safely sit in the tub now. At first they were not sure what to do? You mean we can play in here!?
Getting use to the bath time fun.
Flashback Friday: Celebrating Jake’s Birthday
Brina and Karlie were fascinated by the cool new toy on the floor.
Today we flashback to Jake’s birthday July 2005 when the girls were five months old. It was his first time celebrating a birthday with two little munchkins with us. They made the day quite entertaining. They enjoyed the new things to explore and see throughout the day from birthday banners to candles to rice krispie treats and more.
Jake with his two girls on his birthday. They were intrigued by the candles, but didn’t touch them. Pretty sure they didn’t help blow them out either.
This is cool new mat to lay around sucking our fingers on….
Brina sitting at the kitchen counter. So Mom…..I hear their might be some kind of special treat for Dad’s birthday, can I try it first, pretty please!?
Oh no….too much excitement for someone. Who did it this time!? Brina is feeling better now and Karlie is thankful it wasn’t her this time around.
Daddy’s giggling girls helping him celebrate his birthday.
Our little rolly pollies saying “Happy Birthday Daddy! We LOVE You!”
Insta-Snow Powder for Fun Indoor Snow Activities!
Super cool fake snow!
Our friends Mike, Ashley, and Bradley gave the girls Insta-Snow Powder for their birthdays! It is AMAZING! The girls have spent hours playing with it. Ok, I will admit it I have been playing with it too. It’s just so cool to play with inside!
It is super simple to make (just add water to a measured amount of powder). The canister we have makes 2 gallons of snow. We have only made a few batches and still have the snow we made from the last several weeks. It lasts a really long time if you put it in a ziplock bag. It is fascinating, not cold, and funky to play with.
The girls were wanting to go somewhere with snow for their birthday so our friend sent “snow” to them. They had the snow out almost immediately and within a couple of days of playing with the Insta-Snow we got real snow outside in SC. The kids are convinced our friends are good luck because every time they played with the Insta-Snow they sent them it would snow again in SC (which means no school too).
It is a fun activity for the kids. If any of the snow particles do get on the counter or floors they are easy to wipe up or if you miss them they will dry back up into the powder which is easy to sweep or vacuum up off the floor. We are gearing up to do a science project and the girls are convinced that whatever they decide to do they will need to add some of the Insta-Snow powder to give their science projects an extra WOW factor, ha!
I think the next thing we are going to try is to dye the snow different colors to see how it handles that and what it looks like when you mix various ones together. Thankful for thoughtful friends who know how to brighten the lives of the little ones (and big ones) in our home! THANK YOU Ashley from Reflecting on the Simple Things in Life for providing hours of entertainment at our house!!!
They thought it was neat being able to write messages in the snow!
The Insta-Snow Powder came in this canister and it makes 2 gallons. The snow expands rapidly to 100 times its original size. It goes from being a dry granule to fluffy white snow-like substance in a matter of seconds.
Inside the canister there is a scoop for easy measuring!
First we measured the insta-snow powder into a red cup than poured the water into it.
Mixing up the snow and water. It literally grew in her hands. Super cool!
Playing with it!
So fascinating they wouldn’t even look up for the camera
Pile of fake snow to play with inside.
Felt really neat!
Loved looking at all the little pieces and playing with it.
Building a volcano!
Look it’s snowing inside!
You could play with it for hours with your bare hands because it is not cold like actually snow plus it doesn’t melt and it’s easy to clean up!
Brina playing with the snow!
Creating a replica of the Great Wall of China which we were just talking about the other day!
If you are looking for a fun and indoor activity you can find Insta-Snow Powder and other Snow like items on Amazon.
Love It – Magformers Set
Brina loves creating things with the Magformers!
The girls got a Magformers Set for their birthday. Since then they have played with the set for hours. A bunch of time was spent playing with them during their recent snow days when they did not have school. I love it when they get a toy that promotes creativity.
Magformers are bright colorful magnetic toys that you can use to build all kinds of items with. The set we got contained squares, triangles, and pentagons. They are easy to use and the magnets are enclosed so they cannot be swallowed by younger kids. The pieces always attract, never repel, making it easy for anyone to stick two pieces together to build. The magformers stimulate creativity, engineering, spatial awareness, coordination, and mathematics. You can build pretty much anything you can image from balls, houses, pyramids, turtles, towers, and so much more. This toy has sparked our kids imaginations over the past month and they are still pulling it out to play with it regularly.
Big ball out of Magformers
Of course knocking it down is always a fun task to do too
Brina built all the items in the book first than started creating her own inventions. Love watching her read the directions and put things together. She was pretty quick at it!
Magformers creation
She has spent hours putting together different combinations and items with this set.
Proud of her creation
Making some little items
So much fun
House
Karlie loves playing with them too. She split her time between the magformers and reading some chapter books.
Myrtle the Turtle
Time to take this one apart and start on a new project
Having a blast
Neat creation
Fun toy
There are many different Magformers Sets that you can get. Amazon is a great place to look for them and you can read all the great reviews as well.
“Love It” is a series of posts on items that I use regularly in my household that I love! There are some items in our daily lives that make life more enjoyable, efficient, or just plain fun. I will be sharing with you some of the products that have been given to us (or to me) that have made it to the top of my list. It’s my way of giving a huge thumbs up!
Brina & Karlie’s Birthday Party
Silly kids! They wanted a goofy picture with the banner.
We did a small birthday party celebration this year for the girls 10th birthday. My parents were in town and my brothers family came over to celebrate with us. The kids had fun eating cake, opening gifts, and playing with family. We got to try out some of their neat gifts too which was fun! They are officially 10 years old (still cannot believe it).
It has been a wild couple of weeks with all the snow days from school. I have been spending more time playing outside with the kids since they have been home more the past two weeks. The disadvantage to all the fun is that I am behind on my blogging. It has been fun, but I promised to get caught up soon. A lot of fun stuff has been going on around our house lately!
Happy 10th Birthday Girls!
Ready for some strawberry cupcakes and blue velvet cake!?
Lots of flames! Happy Birthday Brina and Karlie!
Brina relaxing!
My nephews helped the girls open their gifts.
Checking it out!
Birthday Celebration
Happy Birthday breakfast
The girls got two of their birthday wishes on their birthday – one was that they would have snow on their birthday and the second was that they would not have to go to school because of a snow day. They got both wishes and were very excited. It’s not every day you get out of school on a Wednesday for snow in South Carolina. Thankful for these two girls and look forward to many more amazing memories this year with them. They each got to pick out what they wanted to eat for their birthday breakfast. For their special birthday dinner they wanted a Seafood Meal at home.
Karlie had eggs with spinach, mushrooms, tomatoes, and cheese in them.
Brina had a slice of cinnamon swirl breakfast cake.
My sister-in-law Becky shared a chocolate cake recipe with me that was both egg and dairy free so I decided to try it for their birthday. It turned out really well. They loved it. You couldn’t even tell that it was egg and dairy free. The flavor reminded me of my Grandma Doris Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake she used to make from scratch.
The girls wrote out a list of inside and outside activities they wanted to do on their birthday since they were home from school due to the snow. Even though they didn’t get to do all the items on the list I would say they did the majority of them. We packed a lot of fun activities into the day.
For their family birthday dinner they requested a seafood meal and specifically asked for King Crab. They love seafood and the King Crab was a hit and they are getting better at digging out the meat without assistance.
Jake and I picked up Mai-Mahi steak burgers to try as well for their seafood birthday meal. The Mai-Mahi steak with the fresh bakery bun, lettuce, and tomatoes were a tasty hit too! Thankful for our girls and that we can celebrate another birthday with them!
Happy 10th Birthday Brina & Karlie! We Love You!
Happy Birthday Brina & Karlie!
Wishing our two beautiful daughters a very special 10th birthday! Today is a bitter sweet day. They now in the double digits which feels like such a big step in them growing up. We are so excited to be celebrating our twin daughters 10th birthday, but at the same time we are in shock that they could be turning 10 already. The time has gone by way too fast and our babies are growing up!
Thankful for these two amazing blessings in our life. There is not a day that goes by that we do not thank God for giving us these two precious gifts. God has richly blessed our lives with these sweethearts.
Brina and Karlie both fill our home with excitement, laughter, and a lot of fun activity. While they were born on the same day they could not be more different. Thankful for the gifts and talents God has given each one. Brina has a big heart for animals and Karlie has dreams of one day blasting off into space! We are proud of them and look forward to watching them grow up into beautiful young ladies.
Praying that God will continue to work in their hearts and lives this year as well as give us wisdom as parents in raising them. Wishing them a year packed for awesome memories, growth, good health, and so much more! Happy 1oth Birthday Brina and Karlie! We LOVE you more than you can imagine!!! Hope your birthday is truly OUT OF THIS WORLD!
We LOVE you!!!
Flashback Friday: Barnyard Theme 1st Birthday Party
Happy 1st Birthday girls!
Today our flashback event goes back to the girls first birthday party! We had a barnyard theme for their first birthday party. Our family and friends came to celebrate the special day with us. They were very excited and quite confused by all the commotion that day. Even Jake’s Mom, my parents, and my grandparents were able to come for this special event with us!
Thankful for our family and friends who celebrated this special day with us! It is amazing to see how much these families have grown and changed since this celebration over 9 years ago!
Jake’s Mom (aka Grandma Kay) made these beautiful farm cakes for the girls. She put a lot of time and energy into the cakes and they were so adorable! Brina’s was a calf and Karlie’s was a lamb. The rest of us got to enjoy the barn cake! They were super cute and delicious.
Brina demolished her birthday cake. Karlie didn’t want to touch her cake or get messy, the only frosting she got on her fingers and face was from us sticking her fingers into the frosting for her and smearing it on her face.
What’s everyone looking at!? Brina thoroughly enjoyed her birthday cake! 🙂 What a mess!
Brina’s adorable calf cake before she tore into it.
Karlie’s cute lamb cake. It looked almost the same once she was done with it!
Birthday Celebration!
The birthday candles kept relighting!
It has been a crazy few months around our house! Recently, I had the privilege of celebrating another birthday. It was a wonderful day! This year my birthday fell on a Saturday so Jake and the girls made me breakfast, we had delicious food, played games, read books, relaxed, opened gifts, ate cake, and ended the day by watching a movie together.
The cards, gifts, texts, phone calls, messages, emails, and all the best wishes made my day super special. Thankful for my family, friends, the opportunity to celebrate another year, and the many amazing blessings in my life. I have so many great memories and praying that this upcoming year is packed full of even more!
Delicious red velvet cake picked up by my sweet Handsome!
It was rich and tasty!
Cards and goodies from my family. They each picked out and wrapped their own gifts! I even got some cute birthday “notes” on a couple packages! 🙂
The perfect appetizer before a yummy birthday dinner!
