Teds Birthday

Ted turned 33 on November 19Th. I decided to make him a red cake for this special day. He is always bragging about how good his moms was and I thought I would give it a try. Making a cake from scratch is something I haven't done, EVER! A little advise if you are thinking of trying this in the future, It takes a huge bottle of red food coloring. I red the ingredients before going to the store to make sure I had everything, I noticed the food coloring and paid no attention to the amount. When I was at the store I saw the food coloring and bought a 4 pack with 3 other colors. Thinking there was no way it could use a huge bottle. Well it did, so i filled up my measuring cup with tho coloring that I had then added water to fill it up. Made sense to me at the time.

Now to the frosting, you had to cook it! The first half you cook on the stove then let it cool and finish it off later. For some reason it never really blended together. To me it was a mess! Ian thought it tasted like hard whipped cream. I had to put it in the fridge for several hours to harden up.

Now for the Ted test.... After the first few bites, he scraped the frosting off and left most of the cake on his plate. It was a little dry. The Kids loved it, especially Ian. This cake took me over 4 hours to make, Im not sure if there will be a repeat for next year, maybe?? :)

Ashlyn and My camera

Today I went to use my camera and it was out of Memory. I don't remember using it recently and I have a 2 GB memory card! After looking thru them trying to find out what I should erase so I can take a few more pictures and I came across Ashlyns self made photo shoot! There are over a hundred photos she took of herself, smiling, making faces, she even brought in a few of her dolls and stuffed animals to take pictures with! She is one crazy girl! Who does that sort of thing? When your 4??

San Diego, Ca

For Halloween weekend we went to San Diego. The weather there was really nice. We went to the zoo and to Sea World. I had been to the zoo but not Sea World. It was a lot of fun. It was cool to see Ashlyns reaction to what she was seeing. I think her excitement wore off on all of us. Teds sis and family met us down there on friday so she went to Sea World with us.











Ashlyn and Ted had never been to the zoo before and they both had a great time. All of the animals were out which was really cool. After about 4 hours of walking around I convinced Ted to take the bus around which took us to the last few areas a lot faster. for some reason Ashlyn kept asking if the tigers were going to eat her. I told her several times tha animals are in cages, They wont hurt you. I guess she didn't believe me until she actually saw the cage.








Sandcastles are the best part of going to the beach. Well for some reason I made it my personal challenge to build a super big one. It is actually quite hard and it just looks like a huge mound of sand for a long time. so while the grown ups enjoyed the waves I continued to build, for hours my new castle. It really was fun!!

Happy Halloween! A little Early

We will actually be out of town for Halloween so I took the kids Trick or treating at the rec center. They had games, music and the whole staff was dressed up. Ash has a lot of classes there so it was fun for her to see all her friends dressed up. We are going to San Diego for the long weekend. I think I should bring her costume just in case they do something for Halloween at the hotel we are staying at. She loves to wear it, Halloween or not!!

Just Pj's

It is partially my fault I guess, only partially since I was the one who bought the purple skirt. The pink feather boa I have no clue who bought that for her, but she Loves it! It drives Ian crazy when she dresses like this. I think he gets embarrassed. He tells her to Just put on her PJ's and nothing else.

Dress up Queen

I was not joking when I said she scares me sometimes! I told her to get dressed, (we are going to a high school football game)and this is what she tries to come down stairs wearing! It is starting to cool down at night here so this would definitely not work, and um no feather boa is really aloud outside of the home at any time except Halloween. So she is upstairs in her room trying to find something to wear......She is too funny!

The cartwheel......

Ashlyn really, really, really wants to learn how to do a cartwheel. She takes a class at the rec center called tumbling for cheer which is perfect for her! She learns a new cheer every week which she practices over and over and over again. The dilemma is the cartwheel. I have been trying to help her and so I tried to show her I could do one, BIG MISTAKE!! :) (It kinda hurt falling on my head, and then she had to tell everyone the story, her version is much funnier. She saw it, I felt it:) She practices all the time, some are almost there and then others are not even close. I am not really sure if kids her age can do stuff like this anyway. In her class the girls are all about the same age and none of them can do it either??? Ted really surprises me sometimes. I told him she is having a problem with it and tries to help. Come to find out HE CAN DO ONE, not just one but several!! So now it is on, I'm convinced I need a second chance......Yep not a good idea on my hard wood floors! What happened! So Ted and Ash practice in the backyard and at the park where there is a lot of grass. I think I'm still a little in shock he can do a cartwheel:) So I guess we will see if he is a good teacher.