I am not a Baker...

But I did bake these...

I am also not a food photographer, so if you can't tell what they are, they are Easter Chick Cupcakes. I had plans to make these tomorrow for my son's daycare class on Friday, but then plans changed when I picked him up today and was informed his daycare would be closed Friday! So his Easter party is tomorrow and I had to whip together these cute cupcakes. I feel like Betty Crocker... except I used a box cake mix and tub of Betty Crocker frosting. I did color the coconut and decorated the chickens all by myself!

I think they turned out pretty cute...

I thought I had regular chocolate chips, but they were mini... had to improvise and use 2 for the eyes. One just wasn't cutting it.

I have absolutely no idea how they taste or if my son even likes coconut. I do have a few non-coconut plain cupcakes just in case. And he does like chickens... every time he sees one he says "bock bock". He's never turned down a cupcake before!

If you would like to make these adorable cupcakes yourself or see what they are actually supposed to look like, you can go here.

Birthday Party and BIG Savings!!!

This past weekend Clay went to his first birthday party (that wasn't his own) and had so much fun! It was for our friends' little girl who turned 1. It was a strawberry themed party and was really cute (girls always have the cutest things!!!). It was beautiful weather outside, so Clay spent most of the party running around the backyard. He even ate a whole cupcake all by himself... and was on a sugar high until he crashed in the car on the way home.
I brought my camera to the party and had intentions of taking some cute pictures, but chasing after a toddler doesn't allow much time for picture taking. So the above "after-shot" is all I managed to get. He was OUT!!!!

Then Sunday we had an Easter Egg Hunt, but ended up not going to it because of the weather. It rained all morning and then was sunny during the time of the Easter Egg Hunt, but I was afraid Clay would be more interested in finding mud puddles than finding easter eggs, so we decided to stay home. He was also snoozing quite hard around that time and I didn't have the heart to wake him up.

So we played - A LOT - in the ball pit. He loves to bury himself under the balls and have us find him. And yes... he's still holding that Elmo toy. (He even took it to the birthday party and carried it around most of the time!)
Those big, brown eyes get me every time!!!

And I did wonderful with my shopping this week!!!! My big score was 8 bags of Kraft Natural Shredded Cheese for 55 cents at Kroger!!! Yeah, you read that right... 8 bags for 55 cents total!!! Thanks to my friend Beth for telling me about that deal!!! Now I'm stocked up with shredded cheese for a couple of months! The trick was: I had 4 $2 off 2 Kraft Natural Shredded Cheese coupons that I found at Publix and then Kroger had a sale going on... they were 1.49 a piece and if you bought 8 of a group of participating products (the cheese was part of it), you automatically got another $4 off!!! I loved to see my total savings from that deal... $26.40!! I also did really good at Publix. I spent 59.37 and saved 82.85!!! That's the best I've done so far!! I bought a ton of stuff... I had 50 items including 3 pounds of ground beef and a 3 pound roast! I'm starting to run out of room in my pantry, fridge and freezer!! Thank goodness we've got a deep freezer in the garage that I can stock up!!

Have a great week!!

Flashback Friday - 1 Year Ago

I love going back and looking at my pictures I took of Clay a year ago! I think he's change so much!! He was such a fat little chubby guy and now he's tall and skinny! The above picture was from my first amateur photo shoot with him outside. He was barely sitting up then. I would have to sit him up... take a couple of pictures before he fell over... and then sit him back up! I did get some really cute shots, though.

And this time last year we had just gotten back from Vegas (by we, I mean Mark and I... not Clay). That was Clay's first big vacation away from Mama and Dada and I think it was harder on us than it was on him!

Right after we got back, Mark got sick... REALLY sick! He got the flu! Even though we had gotten the flu shots, he still came down with it. I'm still convinced it was the swine flu and that he was the one who brought it to Alabama. They weren't even testing for it at that time. I got on Tami-flu immediately and only got a mild case of it. Poor Clay also had a mild case of it. Here are a couple of pictures I took of him when we were all sick!

Poor BABY!!! He looks pitiful in this one!

Ok, maybe he was just playing it up for the camera in that last picture... he looks much better in this shot!
We've got a busy, busy weekend planned! We've got another birthday party to go to tomorrow for some friend's of ours little girl's 1 year birthday and we've got and Easter Egg Hunt on Sunday afternoon (hoping this doesn't get rained out!). Hope everyone has a great weekend!!

What's been going on?

This past weekend we didn't do a whole lot... even though it was GORGEOUS on Saturday! I had a sick baby so we stuck around the house for the most part. We had to miss the birthday party Sat afternoon because he still had a fever when he woke up, so I thought it best to stay put. I did want Clay to at least get out and enjoy the nice weather and get some fresh air so we pulled him around in his wagon.

Yeah... he's not feeling all that great!

Oh look... what's that red thing in his right hand??? I'm sure it will come up in other pictures so you can get a better look...

Then on Sunday it was NASTY outside, so no going out for Clay. We stayed in our PJ's and played inside and watched a LOT of Sesame Street. Oh, look... there's that red thing in his hand again!

Then Monday came along and he was much better!! We even got to ship him off to daycare!!!

Yesterday was gorgeous as well! I love it now that Clay can walk around and play outside! This time last year he was just learning how to crawl really good!

Here he is playing in daddy's newly laid pine straw... with that red thing in his hand... again! You can tell a little better from this picture that it's Elmo. Of course it is! I think he's got an unhealthy obsession with Elmo and may need professional help.

Here he is climbing up on his slide... with Elmo...

And here he is about to go down the slide... with Elmo.

This child plays with this Elmo, eats with him, sleeps with him, takes him in the car with him... I'm serious... It's unhealthy!

He's discovered Elmo on his diapers (Pampers has the Sesame Street characters). We can't ever let him run around in just a diaper because he's constantly pulling at it saying "Elmo, Elmo". He even checks other kid's diapers at daycare to see if they've got Elmo on there's. Yeah, pulling down the little girl's pants to see if Elmo is on their diaper is only cute when you're 1... it will be a bit creepy when he's older :)! Hopefully he'll grow out of his Elmo phase... one day...

I Know I Need To Update My Blog...

BUT I have been B-U-S-Y!!! I don't think I've ever gone this long without updating my blog! Work has been a killer, Clay is sick with a virus and I'm very behind on my couponing :)!

So what's been going on... Well, we FINALLY had our pictures this past Monday... and it was cold, wet, muddy... not perfect picture weather. I didn't have the heart to even try to reschedule because it was our 4th reschedule. Clay didn't last very long, especially after he fell and got mud all over the back of his jeans. Luckily we had another pair, but he was cold... REALLY cold. His little teeth were chattering. I guess he's way too young to understand the sacrifices you need to make for great pictures. The photographers said that they did get some great shots even though we were all braving the elements. Had I thought about it, I could've gotten us all some cute golashes and parkas and we would have been set! All joking aside... the girls who took our pictures do AMAZING work so I'm looking forward to seeing what they do with our pictures... we like to give people a challenge! :)

Other than that, Clay spent the night with his Nan and his cousins since they were out of school for Spring Break and he's spent the other time home sick with me. Thank goodness for Sesame Street. I personally think the creator of that show deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. Actually, the Nobel Peace Prize really should go to the creator of Elmo.

And thank you to whoever left their Elmo book in the exam room at the doctor's office. I don't think we could have made it through the long time we were in there waiting on results of the RSV and Flu test without it! Although, we about had a meltdown when we had to leave it behind.

Hmmm... and this is what he's been doing lately...

He likes to line everything up... cars, books, food, elmo toys... everything! And they all have to be facing the same way. Wonder who he gets that from??

And I can't have a post without pictures of Clay. I took these yesterday when he had a 102 fever. You wouldn't know he had a fever from the looks of it! He was all over the place!


I would also like to point out the red thing in his hand in the picture above. That is a little Elmo toy his Nan gave him this week and I do not think he has put it down since she gave it to him. He eats with it... sleeps with... he LOVES that thing! I need to go buy a bunch more to have some backups!

This weekend we've got a birthday party my friend's 2 year old. It's at the Train Depot and I'm very excited to take Clay. He has to be fever free for 24 hours before he's considered "not contagious" so I'm about to get him up from his nap and take his temp!!! Hope he's temp free or no "choo-choo's" for us tomorrow! Other than that... we've got nothing on the agenda! Have a great weekend!

School Pictures

Finally! Clay managed to make it to a "professional" photo shoot! He had spring school pictures last week... let's just say the camera was not his friend (niether was the bunny!).

Yes, he is not a happy camper sitting on the wheel barrow thing...
And standing up holding a baseball isn't working either...
Hey! Let's throw in a bunny... you know one of those freaky white ones with the red eyes that hops all over the place and pees on children (yes, the bunny peed on one of Clay's classmates). You can't tell from this picture, but he is FRIGHTENED of this bunny.
I'd like to point out that on the advertisement posters they showed a very large, fluffy bunny that just sits there and takes the children's abuse. I figured Clay would get a kick out of him, but unfortunately I have learned that bunny has met his demise... which is why the white bunny was brought in.

They finally found the way to Clay's heart (no, not food... the other way) and gave him a book to look at. We finally got a few decent pictures...

But this is the one we chose...

This definitely showcases my baby doing what he loves best... READING! I'm definitely taking books for our family photo shoot next Monday!

(Please excuse the "1stmethsp" under each picture... I guess I could have cropped that out, but I'm too lazy to do it.)

Happy 18 Months, Clay!!!

Clayton… You are 18 months old today!!!

What have you been up to this month?

You’ve finally started eating more and being less picky. I’m still having trouble getting you to eat your veggies and you will not touch a noodle or tortilla. You will eat fruit… any fruit! You especially love strawberries, bananas, pears, and mandarin oranges. You are obsessed with this puffcorn stuff and can’t get enough of it. You never turn down your Go-Gurt and love Multi-Grain Cheerios. We recently bought you some Elmo sippy cups since we were told that you stalked the kids in daycare who had Elmo cups. For a couple of days we couldn’t get you to drink out of them because you were too busy looking at the pictures and exclaiming “Elmo” every 10 seconds. Now you drink out them like a pro. We’re working on using a spoon, but you prefer to eat everything with your fingers.

We’ve been trying to get you to color, but it looks like you may be missing the artistic gene that your Mama is also missing. You’d much rather eat the crayon than color with it. It also looks like you are going to be OCD like your Dada… you like to line everything up in a very straight line – toys, books, food. You also do not like to mix your toys… Little People Farm characters stay together… blocks from the dump truck stay together.

You are ALL BOY and love to get dirty! You like to play on your swingset Nan got you and you love playing with bubbles. You love to play in your ball pit and like to hide things under the balls. You like to go on wagon rides and like for us to push you around the house in your little car.

You are still OBSESSED with Sesame Street (ELMO) and watch at least one episode every day. You know almost all the characters and say their names as they come on the show… Big Bird, Zoe, Cookie Monster, and of course, Elmo are your favorites. You’d take a book over a toy and could spend forever reading them. We read to you every night before you go to bed and you get VERY angry when we stop.

You’re starting to sing and your favorite song is the “La La La” song by Bert and Ernie. You also have this really cute little dance you do where you bounce up and down. I have tried to get it on video, but every time I pull out the camera, you stop! You like 80’s music and like to dance to it in the car.

Wow! Where does the time go?!? I can’t believe in 6 months you will be 2 years old! Can’t wait to see what next month brings!!