Mickey Mouse and a Star Cake

 Last week, a friend mentioned she was in need of a couple birthday cakes. Within like 7 days, the family has 3 of their birthdays. So I volunteered to help her out by making a Mickey Mouse cake for her 6 year old. I was going to make the cake the night before, and then Josh would deliver it the next morning.

Tuesday night, I was getting ready to decorate the cake and her husband contacted me to see if I could make a 2nd cake for his wife, since her birthday was the day after their son's. He wanted a rose cake. I told him his choices were a dinosaur or a star, I didn't have a rose pan. So he told me her favorite colors were purple and red and we settled on a star cake. I hopped online and looked a few designs, and found one I really liked. But by the time I got Mickey done, I was worried I wouldn't have enough frosting for the design I had chosen. So in the end, I went with something very simple.

 

When Josh dropped off the cakes, he said there was some very excited kiddos. One of them said "Oh, Mickey IS the cake." Wish I could have seen their faces. I have so much fun decorating cakes and I'm glad I'm gaining the confidence to do them for family AND friends.

Love Boat Night

Every year, the local USU branch does a Love Boat Casino night the weekend of Valentine's. This year was our first year going. It was fun. A lot of people dressed up in formal wear, but at the last minute I chickened out. Next year, I want to dress up fancy like everyone else.

 

Dinner was catered by the Golden Corral. I am not a fan of their buffet restaurant, but I LOVE their catering. Dinner was chicken cordon blue that was out of this world delish. Then they also had someone catering dessert, which was a wide assortment of cookies, cakes, brownies, cheesecake bites, etc. Then another company came in and had free smoothies. It was all so delicious.

 

After dinner, they hand everyone some fake money and open the gaming tables. Josh and Andrew tried their luck at Blackjack. They both did pretty good. At one point, Josh even made me come get most of his winnings so he wouldn't loose them.

 

 

At the end of the night, they had a ton of prizes they auctioned off with the money you won. Most of them didn't look that interesting, but Josh did bid on a fishing pole until the bid went outside of his winnings. After that, nothing looked good, so we gave our money to Andrew & Jessica. Then a few other people gave us money as they walked out. In the end, Andrew had just enough to win the 3 pot crock pot Jessica really wanted.

 

My favorite part of the night was when Josh asked me to dance. Twelve years of bliss and he is still a romantic guy. ;)

Valentine's Day 2013

After coming off the high of our anniversary, Valentine's just isn't as big a deal for us as it seems to be for the rest of the world. My roses were still blooming like crazy and smelling amazing, so I hinted to Josh I would love some Ghiradelli chocolates. Which he choose perfectly! Then I decided to get us each a Strawberry flavored Chocolate orange and some iTunes gift cards.

 

 

 We also decided it would be more fun to stay home for a romantic dinner. We tried eating out on Valentine's years and years ago. It was insanely busy and we ended up crowed in a dark corner of our favorite restaurant. Since then, we've decided its not worth going out on that night.

 

Instead, we decided to make Olive Garden Alfredo, a drink and dessert. It all turned out delish!

 

Dad's Hip Surgery

There is a lot of things I know about my dad.

He has a great sense of humor.

He loves to garden.

He is full of service.

He loves collecting tractors of any shape and size.

 

 He has always (for as long as I can remember) walked with a painful limp.

To say he has needed a hip replacement for years would be an understatement.

 

But finally, that is what he did. On Wednesday, he went in for surgery. One of the nurses in the surgery said his hip was one of the worst she has ever seen.

I think my dad was pretty nervous going into the entire thing, but his spirits have remained high and he is doing amazingly well. The day after his surgery, they set a goal for him to walk halfway down the hall. He made it all the way to the end and back. When his dr. saw him, he said he was good enough to move onto the next stage of recovery.

 

So today, he moved into the Villa Care Center. Hopefully, in a week or two, he'll be able to return home.

 

Its been hard to watch my parents age and go through their own health struggles. But its also an amazing feeling to see them do so well afterwards too. 

Preston's 6th Birthday

Preston's 6th Birthday was actually the end of January. But because of conflicting schedules, we didn't get to celebrate with him until tonight. His mom and I looked at a few cake ideas. In the end, we decided to do a Bowser Castle Cake that I found on THIS website. I made the cake and then Melanie collected some Mario toys to put on it.

I must point out that I asked Melanie what I should get for Preston. I love buying clothes, but I don't want to become the uncool aunt that only buys clothes. But she told me he would love a Mario t-shirt. It took some searching, but I was finally able to find a few.

 

When we got there, we gave them their Valentine's gifts a few days early. They were a HIT. At this point, I could say I'm the coolest aunt ever.

 

We played a few rounds of Uno, then headed down to grandpa Paul's for cake and ice cream because today is his birthday too. While waiting for everyone else, I had Preston but the toys on the cake.

 

Everyone wasn't there yet, so he rearranged them again. And again. And again. I LOVE that he loved his cake so much. I repeat, coolest aunt ever. 

 

Then we gave him his present. He was excited to open it. 

 

Then he took it to his mom and whispered "why do they always give me clothes?" Coolest aunt, NOT.

 

But he must have got over it quickly because he put all three of them on at once. But to be on the safe side, this aunt is going to have to find different gifts in the future. ;)

Nephew's Valentine's Gifts

This year, I found a few things on Pinterest and couldn't wait to make them for the nephew's for Valentine's.

 

Seriously, aren't these robots the cutest thing EVER?!



 

Then I also decided to give each boy a baggie of the small Cutie oranges. Tyler loves them because he can peel them himself. But he is a perfectionist (like his aunt) and if the peel doesn't come off in one peice, he throw the ENITRE thing away. Then he grabs another from the bag and starts all over again. 

12th Anniversary

I could just title this "The week of our 12th anniversary." It seems like we did something small to celebrate almost every day. On Tuesday, the first half the of Josh's gift came. I had a friend of his help me get him a few new beaver traps. I knew he would be setting traps on Wednesday, so I gave them to him Tuesday night.

 

Then on Wednesday, I took the day off. One of the things I really wanted for our anniversary was a deep, cleaned house. Josh does his best, but sometimes it just needs a woman's touch. So while he went to set traps, I clean. I finished around noon. Then we spent the rest of the day watching movies together.

 

On Friday, I came home to a dozen red roses. They smell divine!

 

 

After that, we got caught up in the excitement and exchanged gifts then. I have just started getting into the doTerra Essential Oils. So Josh told me to get a preferred membership and place a large order. I also got a book about the oils and one of the newest books by my favorite author.

 

For Josh, I got him some more stuff to use for his trapping and the 2nd book to a series he has been reading. 

 

On Saturday, the actual day of our anniversary, we had planned to go horse riding. But the night before, there had been a snow storm and we couldn't get to the horse trailer. So instead we made a delish Valentine's Chex Mix and watched movies all day.



 

That night, we got all dressed up and went to the Steakout in Altamont. (Notice my dress! I wore it to a high school dance in January 2000 and haven't been able to fit into it since. So proud of myself!)

 

The Steakout has been open for a few months, but we hadn't been yet. Luckily, a friend had mentioned we get reservations ahead of time (which Josh did all on his own). When we got there, they were packed. But when we mentioned our name, we were led to an empty table. Their food was so good and I can't wait to go again.

Super Bowl 2013

 This year. we went to Josh's parent to watch the Super Bowl with  his parents and Dallon & Natalie. It was a great time.

 

While we were there, Barbara made us Skooies. We've never had them before, so it was fun. She made chocolate chip, and double chocolate chip. (Can't go wrong with all that chocolate!)

 

 

We cut them into 4ths and then topped them off with ice cream. cool whip, caramel and chocolate sauce.

 

I never really cared which team won, but that way I can say my team won. :) My favorite part was the power outage. I think its because I work for a power company. I spent that 30 minutes telling every one to be quite and not change the channel because I wanted to know what happened.

Riding Horses

Josh and I have taken up riding horses on the weekends.

 

Even in this frigid cold weather?

 

Yep.

 

The people who are letting us keep Jazzy in a stall, have also been kind enough to let us ride their horses, in their indoor arena. We still have to dress in two (or three) layers, but its been fun.

 

I don't have any pictures, but I'll remember to take a camera one of these weekends.

 

Its been fun to ride with JoLynn and Robin. I'm not a very experienced horse rider and they have been so much help. I feel like I'm gaining confidence (and hopefully some skills).

 

I swore I would never ride a horse past a walk, but on the very first weekend, they had me trotting. And then even a little bit of loping. I have loved riding in the arena where I don't have to worry about anything spooking me.

 

The last two weekends, we've gone riding on Sunday, but this weekend, we ended up riding on Saturday. We were there checking on Jazzy and just as we were leaving, they showed up to ride. We told them we would join them tomorrow, but they insisted we stay, so we did. They had some other friends coming so they could work on their cutting for their competition next weekend.

 

I rode one of their horses, but Josh rode Jazzy. I think she really enjoyed being a horse and hanging with other horses today. When it was time to put her back up, her and another horse went to the other end of the arena. Glad to see she made a friend.

 

It was fun to watch them and it seems we were both helpful in helping with the cows. Hopefully we'll get to do it again someday. We also hope to ride our own horses next weekend for our anniversary.

 

 

Book Club - "Naked in Death" by J. D. Robb

After taking a break for the holidays, we got back to our book club this month.

 

This month, my mom choose "Naked in Death" by J. D. Robb.

 

My mom fed us white chili for dinner and we had a great night visiting.

 

Our book club is now done to 3 members, but we have decided to keep it going as a Mother-Daughter night so we can keep getting together once a month. Can't wait for next month.