Well, Corey's birthday was yesterday! That should wind things up around here (in the birthday department) until February. We get off to a big start each year!
Last night we celebrated by going out to eat barbecue with his parents, his sister Kinley, and her two children, Jordan and Jackson. We had a nice time, and then his parents and Jordan came and spent the night at our house.
This morning, Corey, his dad, Christian, Carson, and Jordan, all went to the Big Buck Classic...a deer hunting expo that was in town. (Though none of them are very much into deer hunting!) It had live animals, and other things that the kids (and the men!) were all interested in seeing.
After the Big Buck Classic, they headed to Jordan's basketball game, then with Mickey (Corey's brother-in-law) added to the mix, they came here to watch the Razorbacks.
Corey's mom, Kinley, Caylie and I all took that as our cue to run out and hit a few stores!
We wound things up with Mexican food at our house before everyone went home a little while ago.
It has been a busy, but fun weekend so far.
Now I'm heading out the door do the the c25k training that I just started on Thursday. Hopefully I will have the discipline to stick with it through the end! Thank goodness I have my own personal trainer...Caylie! She is quite the encourager...and has very little tolerance for excuses!
Writing the Waves,
Christi
Saturday, January 23, 2010
And The Birthdays Keep On Coming...Happy Birthday Corey!
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Happy Birthday To...Me!
Yesterday was my birthday!
My birthday is only 3 days after mom's, and 10 days before Corey's! January is a busy birthday month in our family!
Corey and the kids woke me up with breakfast in bed...an egg sandwich, coffee, juice, and a candle! Of course they sang the birthday song...Carson would have had it no other way! He was beside himself with excitement! It was a great way to start my day.
Corey took a picture of me with my pj's and crazy hair, but you're just going to have to use your imagination on that one!
During the day, it started to appear as though my birthday might make a bad turn.
As I was transferring clothes from the washer to the drier, I looked down and saw Christian's flash drive (with his school work on it) in the bottom of the drier! Not good.
I then walked straight into the kitchen, and looked down, only to realize that I was standing in a big puddle of water that was leaking from the dishwasher!
Love it when that happens!
Anyway, moving on...
We decided to eat at Shorty Small's for dinner. We hated to not have Caylie with us, but she had a volleyball practice that she needed to attend.
Shorty Small's has great mozzarella sticks. Carson sure enjoyed his!
He didn't seem to care about our instructions to look at the camera and smile. Here he is with my sister, Jeanna, and me...2 out of 3 smiles...I'll take what I can get!
Mom, Christian and Corey...
While we were waiting for our dinner, I got to open my sweet cards and gifts.
Mom and Jeanna gave me a Coldwater Creek gift certificate (one of my very favorite stores), and a Wood Wick Almond Orange candle. Mom had given me one of these candles a couple of years ago, and it is almost gone now. They knew that I wanted a replacement! I was so excited!
Corey and the kids gave me a gift certificate for a new blog design (which I had asked for)!
The deal that I have made with myself, is that I must get my 2008-2009 blog entries printed before I can get my new blog design. If I don't have a goal, it won't get done!
I have been playing around with the "blog to book" software that I downloaded from blurb.com. It is going to be more time consuming than I had hoped it would be to get it all laid out correctly, but I'm hoping to make it happen before TOO long!
I wish I could just print it out exactly as it is, with me just determining where the page breaks would be, but all of the sites I have found either mess the layout up when they automatically fill in the pages, or require me to do pretty extensive photo and text layout in order for it to make sense.
So, if you see that I have a new blog design anytime in the near future, you will know that I have finally met my goal of getting my blog printed out!
After dinner, we went to mom's house to enjoy the wonderful pound cake that she had baked for my birthday! She served it with whipped cream and strawberries! Yum! :)
It was a very nice day, and I appreciated all of the nice things that were done to make it so special!
Writing the Waves,
Christi
Monday, January 11, 2010
Celebrating Mimi at Mimi's
Last night we celebrated my mom's birthday (Mimi to my kids), at Mimi's Cafe...how appropriate! :)
She opened her birthday gifts, which were framed pictures from the recent photo session that we all did together. One frame held a collage of several different images from that session, and the other frame was a picture of Mimi with the grandkids...below the picture, it read, "The best things in life aren't things." I think that she liked them!
Can you tell that this picture is posed? I was so caught up in the moment, that I forgot to take pictures while she was actually opening the gifts...so I made them fake it for a picture!
Another recreation of the real moment...
Here she is after we sang to her. She is about to blow out her candle.
As I have mentioned before, Carson LOVES, LOVES, LOVES birthday celebrations!
After dinner, we all came back to our house to hang out and play a game together. It was a fun night!
Happy Birthday Mimi!
I couldn't ask for a more, wonderful, special, gracious, and loving mom!
I love you!
Writing the Waves,
Christi
Monday, August 10, 2009
Carson's 3rd Birthday Party
Earlier in the week, we celebrated Carson's 3rd birthday with his 3 little buddies. Addie, Rachel and Will. They have been fun little playmates that he has really enjoyed spending time with, and their families are all friends of ours.
Mom came over and helped me quickly pull things together for his little buddies and their families to come hang out in the front yard, and have a very casual (but fun!) Sesame Street birthday party. It was a very laid back party. The adults sat around and visited, and the kids ran around and played in the yard. The main attraction was the Slip and Slide that Corey and Christian had set up!
Carson liked his fun Sesame Street birthday cake from Mickey's cake shop! Mickey's has done our family birthday cakes for years and years. There have been a very few exceptions here and there, when I have tried my hand at cake decorating, but I must say, Mickey's has me beat!
Ready to dig in!
Here is the birthday boy sporting some cool shades and his whistle necklace hanging down over that cute little poochy belly. Talk about handsome! That's my little stud muffin!
While the Slip and Slide was lots of fun, the pinata was a pretty big hit too!It was quite a battle for the kids to get it to break apart, but after many, many hits...
Christian swung the final blow, and the candy came pouring out!
Daddy wouldn't let a perfectly good pinata hat go to waste now, would he?
As we were winding things up, the kids played "Pin The Nose On Elmo"...some were much more accurate than others!
Our wet little birthday boy enjoyed opening up the nice cards and gifts that he was given before his friends headed home. 
It was a fun evening, and when it was over, Carson was worn out from running around and playing so much! Friday, May 8, 2009
Party Time!
Tonight was Christian's birthday party with friends.
He asked to go to Playtime Pizza. It is a entertainment complex near where we live. It has a big dinner buffet, laser tag, rock climbing, blacklight putt-putt, go-carts, bumper cars, bowling, a huge arcade, a toddler area, etc., etc.!
Paradise for kids big and small...for parents, maybe!?!?
But it was his party, so we were up for it.
He invited 3 of his good buddies.
As I was getting some things ready for the party, and Christian was loading some music onto his new ipod, Carson just walked over and gave him a hug and said "Happy Birthday BB." I didn't catch the original hug, but I asked Carson to hug BB again, and he happily did it again!
When Carson was just learning how to say all of our names, we thought that Christian would be too hard to learn, so we taught him to say "BB" for Big Brother. It stuck. Today as we were driving down the road, Carson started crying, and said, "I want my BB!"
While the crying wasn't so great to hear, I loved hearing him ask for his BB...too cute!
Before heading to the party, Corey decorated the windows of the truck.
Carson even got to help a little bit!
When Christian went outside and saw the truck, he said, "Yes!" :)
I asked the boys to pose in front of the truck, and Carson was double checking to make sure that he had the pose figured out.
After we arrived, and everyone was fueled up for some fun, they guys hit the bumper cars...
And the go-carts...
The DDR...
The roller coaster simulator...
The arcade...
And much, much more!
Carson had a great time, but got tired before the big kids, so since we were in two cars, I brought him back home and put him in bed.
When the rest of the crew returned, we had cake and ice cream, sang Happy Birthday, and then the boys just hung out until it was time to hit the sack.
Since Carson had been in bed, and missed participating in the Happy Birthday song, we squeezed it in one more time...at breakfast!
Check out Carson, trying so hard to hold back his smile as everyone sang Happy Birthday to Christian!
Writing the Waves,Christi
PS: One of my college friends read my geocaching post yesterday, and commented that there is also another version of "treasure hunting" that does not require a gps system. It is called letter boxing. I looked it up online, and it also looks like fun. I think that if you have kids that would enjoy treasure hunting, both geocaching and letter boxing can be done just about anywhere!
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Christian's 12th Birthday!
Today was Christian's 12th birthday.
We woke him up with breakfast in "bed", which was really breakfast on the couch.
Since he shares a room with 2 year old Carson, we usually let him sleep on the couch if he wants to so that he can read, etc., after Carson goes to bed.
Carson LOVED singing Happy Birthday to his big brother! He was all smiles!
After enjoying his birthday breakfast, Crib (his nick name) was off to school.
I can't believe how grown up he is getting! He looks like a big guy now!
Carson loved singing the birthday song so much that he wanted Caylie and me to sing it a few times in the car with him today even though Christian was out with Corey doing something that he loves...
Geocaching.
Corey and Christian started this little hobby a few months ago, and really have fun doing it. It is a "treasure hunt" that uses the GPS system to go find little "caches". The caches are hidden all over the place. There are probably 20 within 10 miles of our house. Check it out here if you have some kiddos that might enjoy it!
This evening, Christian got to choose where he wanted to eat with the family. He chose Chili's, so we met Corey's parents, his brother in law, and my mom there. We had a great dinner, and then they brought out the Molten Lava Cake for Christian!
Yum!
Christian got to open his family gifts while we were at dinner. He got some spending money from his grandparents...which he always enjoys, and Corey, Caylie, Carson, and I gave him an ipod nano. He has been wanting one for a long time, so he was very excited!
He is planning to use his money for some ipod accessories, and music, among other things.
Before heading out, we had to take a group picture to remember our guy's big night.
After we got home, Carson had to do one last performance of the birthday song for us...he truly couldn't get enough of it!
Christian will have his official birthday party, with some friends on Friday, and I will post about that later.
Writing the Waves,
Christi
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Winding Down A Fun Weekend!
Caylie's party on Friday night was lots of fun. The house was as put together as I had hoped to have it before her guests arrived, despite a sick and fussy toddler hanging onto me for much of the day! :) I think the antibiotics are helping because although he still hasn't gotten his appetite back, and is fussier than usual, the fever is gone...love that!
The girls had fun, and Caylie said that she was so happy with how everything turned out! Yea! That's what a mom wants to hear! Take a look at some of the fun...
Cake....
And the results....
This was the scene the next morning...yes, there really are teenage girls in there somewhere!
After breakfast they had a LITTLE more life in 'em...
Christian just got back home from spending the night with Nana and Papaw. He always enjoys that, and while he is there, Papaw always finds something "outdoorsy" to teach him about that Christian finds so interesting. This time, Christian got to work on perfecting his fire lighting skills outside in the fire pit. He loves that stuff! Corey told Papaw that if Christian grows up to be an arsonist, that we will blame him! :)
Today Mimi did Caylie and me a big favor! Thanks Mimi! First of all, after church she took Caylie, Carson and me out for lunch (Corey was at real estate school, and Christian was with Nana and Papaw.), and then she took Carson to her house to give him a nap and let him play for a while, so that Caylie and I could have some girl time at the mall! FUN!!! That has been pretty rare for us lately, with Carson not being the ideal shopping buddy and all!
It was so much fun...I could do it again tomorrow...especially when she is paying!
Well, off to bed!
Writing the Waves,
Friday, December 12, 2008
Aagh!
Help! Wouldn't you know...tonight is Caylie's sleepover birthday party...and Carson is sick!
He has been kind of off for a couple of days, and just when we think it's over, he starts feeling bad again. I have been counting on having today to get everything done since Carson has Mother's Day out on Fridays, but I realized when he had fever yesterday and then woke up fussy today, that we were going to have to call the doctor.
So after spending over an hour of my coveted party prep time at the doctors office, we discover that he has an ear infection. Hopefully the antibiotic will get him back up and running pretty quickly.
In the mean time, I get to shift into super high gear so that I can get Caylie's cake made and decorated, clean the kid's bathroom, declutter the dining room craft mess, etc. before all of the the fun begins at 6:30!
Pray with me that the little guy sleeps through the night with a house full of giggling girls downstairs!
Gotta go...wish me luck!
Writing the Waves,
Christi
