That's Awesome!

Direct quote from Ethan this morning..."That's awesome! I sneezed and farted!" (hysterical laughter)

Hey Connie! It's not Arbor Day...

It's Memorial Day and I found the coolest cake surprise I've seen in a long time! Check it out!



You only see the flag after you cut and pull out the slices!

I Got My Erys Perst.

It's the last week of school and Sarah and Jacob are bringing home the contents of their desks and classrooms piece by piece. Sarah brought home a book called "My Monday Journal" which is where they write about what happened over the weekend. This was my favorite entry.



In other news, our psycho neighbors' house sold in three days and a lovely, young law student has moved in. We met Maritsa, presumably her significant other Brant, and her lhasa apso, Layla on Saturday.

T-minus 24 days until Dallas Market.

Sarah's dance recital is this weekend. So is Jacob's birthday party. And coming full circle, Sarah can change out her earrings for the first time on Sunday!

Happy 9th Birthday Jacob!

Finally...after 14 extra days, an auntie's visit came and went, a failed induction and lots of pitocin and forceps... Jacob entered the world on May 25, 2001.

Here he was on his first trip to NJ for Thanksgiving that year. Look at all those teeny, tiny cousins! Now there's several more and the ones in the picture are almost all grown up!



Some of my other favorite pics...



And lastly, his most recent school picture. Sigh. WHY???!?!!!!! WHY I must ask, do you make a kid stand in a lumberjack pose when he has a faded temporary tattoo on one arm and jeans on? Had we known it was a full body shot I would have scrubbed that spot on his arm and dressed him up a bit more. And the pained look on his face is not how he usually smiles. He looks like he's constipated. I'm so annoyed at the people who take these pictures! Lifetouch?!?! I'm talking about you!



We brought cookie cakes up to school today and will head to BJ's for dinner tonight. I will set up his party for sometime in the next two weeks. It's always challenging around Memorial day to get his friends there. Maybe later in life his birthday will be the party everyone goes to on Memorial Day weekend!

Happy Birthday Jacob!

Bridal Shower Cake

Made a bridal shower cake for a co-worker friend yesterday. She asked for yellow cake with raspberry filing. Her colors are turquoise and orange and purple and yellow...but all those frosting colors on a cake should really be reserved for fondant or kids' birthday cakes, in my opinion. Grown-ups, especially ones about to get married, should not have blue lips and tongues in their wedding album pics!

Wanted to get those colors in gerber daisies but could only find magenta and yellow. So my friend Charisse came to the rescue with some ribbon in orange, pink and turquoise. Not my best work, but it turned out OK.

Four Asses to a Sesterius

Jacob has to do a project about Romans. We had to select a topic from a large list and write an outline. I'm absolutely positive he selected Army/Soldiers/Weapons because we could make a model of a weapon and he would get to bring it to school. Unfortunately, every little boy in the class probably had the same idea and only two of them were allowed to report on weapons. So Jacob got his second choice: money. Which means the outline is useless and we start from square one.

Money is a pretty complex subject for these kids. They just learned about the different coins we use in this country today last year. And money in ancient Rome, while primitive, is still complex to grasp and the foreign language names don't help much. I struggle with doing too much of his report for him vs. watching him flounder on how to even do the research!

Just so you know, the basic unit of currency in Ancient Rome was called an "as." Which becomes "asses" when plural. Did I mention we're dealing with young boys here? Oy. Mark can barely keep a straight face. It's like when they say the names of the planets and snicker when they get to Uranus.

Anyway, it's not due 'til next week. Time to procrastinate!

Catch Up

My friend Jay started a blog and I enjoy reading it. He's written about five posts so far and the last one was months ago! I'm tempted to write him and say that the point of having a blog is to post stuff for your readers to read... but then here's me, going almost a week without posting anything. Touche.

This picture is from the outlet mall in San Marcos. We went there on Mother's Day. The kids were watching remote control boats on the little pond but my cell phone camera couldn't capture all that in one shot.



This is Lucas on water day at school last week. Unfortunately, a child was sent home that day with a suspected cases of the chicken pox which was later confirmed. Hope they didn't all share the same wading pool. Lucas has had his immunization but apparently, so did this other kid. Could take up to two weeks to show up so my fingers will be crossed for a little while longer.



And this is what I did this weekend...over 100 necklaces to get ready for the Parker Show we have coming this weekend. Jennifer has hired another girl to help with just beading which is great! She also wants me to create a blog for JMD and also a VIP program.



It's going to be a busy week! Jewelry shows Monday and Tuesday, PTA on Wednesday, Ethan's pre-K graduation Thursday, and then the jewelry show all weekend. And I'm making a bridal shower cake for someone Sunday. Phew! Is it summer yet?

RIP: Fudge

Fudge was Jacob's class pet in second grade. We kept him over the summer and even though Jacob is in third grade now, we kept Fudge for Spring Break too. He was a sweet little guy. Friendly, cute and gentle. It was fun to feed carrots and lettuce to him. Fun to play with and watch run around the living room at break-neck speed. Apparently, he died over the weekend in the classroom. Mrs. Tiller had to bury him on the grounds of the school and then brought her class out for the "funeral" where they read letters to him and put wildflowers on his grave. Poor baby.



I told the kids today. They didn't get too bent out of shape. Ethan said "Awww. I liked him" which pretty much sums it up for me too.