Hudson's "Happy Day"

Our Hudda Boy turned 3 (over a month ago... I'm so on top of things)! He was so excited for his "train happy day" he could hardly contain himself.

Here is a sneak peek at all the details from his party.

My cute friend Lacey made his cake. It took her 25 hours to do, but it was perfection. Thanks, Lace (and Jeff)! I had to spoon feed Hudson every bite of his dinner before his party guests arrived because he couldn't even function. He just kept flapping his arms saying "I see my train cake, I see my train cake!"

Here are some up close pictures of the masterpiece.

Here are some signs I posted around the house:

In the game area:

On the bathroom door:

By the sweet treats, of course!

We played a game of tossing the lumps of coal into the Hudson Express coal car


I made a giant track (about 40 ft.) out of cardstock stapled together that took quite some time to make as well as tape down to the floor. I thought he would be ecstatic about it because he pretends everything is a train track. When he came out of his bedroom after his nap and saw it, he acted like he'd seen it a million times and didn't even look twice at it. Like we have track like that all over our house all the time. Glad I spent the time. And, it was trashed in about 2 seconds, so we didn't even get to play "Follow the Conductor" like I had planned.

In each guest's goody bag, they got a cd of train tunes to get their
groove on after the party was over, along with train bouncy balls, stickers, pencils and punch balls.


The kiddies playing the coal toss game. It was so funny to watch them. Most of them just walked right up the the coal car and slammed their lump of coal right in.

We played a rockin' game of "hot train" instead of hot potato. We used the train tunes cd for our music.
Thanks, Teal for being our DJ!

Hud-man got some fab gifts from everyone. But I've never seen such joy or awe on his face for any gift until this one. His cousins Sloane and Beckett gave him a Thomas the train (very soft) blanket. He had never uttered these words before, but when he pulled the blanket out, he buried his face in it and said,
"I love you".
Glad to know the first time he said it, it was to a blanket, not his loving mother.

He spread the blanket out on the floor to take a closer look at it, and said
"There it is!"
Like he'd been looking for it his whole life! Another great gift was from his aunt Katherine. She knows how much our kids love the new Willy Wonka movie, so she put together a bag full of Wonka candy complete with Mike TV glasses. Hilarious! Ollie modeling the shades.

Hudda's present from us was this cute Thomas train table to zoom his wooden trains around on. (I vowed never to buy any "character" themed items for my kids, but what do you do? I'm that mom I guess).
But it will never get so out of hand as to purchasing light-up shoes.
That one, I can guarantee I will never give in to.
Anyway, he liked the table, but Ollie loves it. Go figure. At least it's getting played with, right?

Happy Birthday Hudda Boy! We all love you so much! We can't believe you are 3 years old.
Time flies, and you make it all worthwhile.

Drive-thru Dilemma

Going through the drive-thru at Wendy's:

Hudson: Husson wants a hangaber, Olfinn wants chicken nuggets.

Me: Olfinn, do you want chicken nuggets?

Oliver: No. Cheese.

Me: You want grilled cheese? They don't have that here.

Oliver: No. Cheese.

Me: Do you want a plain piece of cheese from home?

Oliver: No. Cheese! (Signing cheese this time)

Me: I don't know what you want...(Racking my brain, wondering what he could be talking about)

Oliver: Cheese! Cheese! Cheese!

Me: Oh! Do you want a cheeseburger?

Oliver: YES!!

Me: OK! I'll get you a cheeseburger...I didn't know you knew the difference...

Driving home from the back seat I hear:

Oliver: Mom! Mom!

Me: What, buddy?

Oliver: Mmmmmm.

Me: (laughing) Good! I'm glad you like it!

Oliver: Mom! Mom!

Me: What, buddy?

Oliver: Mmmmm Mmmmm Mmmmm...

Picture Tag

My friend Chrissy tagged me. It's actually a really fun idea! I was supposed to go to my 4th file and choose the 4th picture in that file and explain it. So this picture was taken on our 3rd wedding anniversary. We were about to go out to dinner at Tuscany, and then we were going to spend the night at Castle Creek Inn. Oh, the memories!

Love you more today than I did then, Stevie Wonderful!

Now I'm going to tag some people. Ready, Set, Go!

Chels, Katherine, Jeanne, Krista, Ashleigh...You're it!

Is there a RAT in our house?!

*Before reading this post, please turn up the volume on your speakers for a hilarious story soundtrack

NOPE!!

It's just our sweet little Ollie, whom we lovingly call Templeton (the rat from Charlotte's Web).

Oliver loves the groceries. He's not our picky eater. We've got an extreme one of those. He'll eat most things, and at least try everything. Which is nice. It's just that he's well....gross to put it mildly. Nobody wants to sit by him when it's time to eat. And watch out when he's finished eating, because he throws everything off his high chair tray onto the floor. Which I'm convinced he does just so he'll have something to eat later. Yuck.

Proof that he might have been a rat in a previous life:

Exhibit A:

He digs through the garbage

Exhibit B:

He eats disgusting combinations of foods together. Here are some of Templeton's winning combinations:

*Nacho cheese flavored chips in strawberry yogurt (how does one get so gooey while eating with a spoon?)

*ham slices swirled in watermelon flavored yogurt (delectable!) *tortilla chips dunked in water water until soggy *fries in caramel dip

*toast in cream of wheat (not too bad)
*what goes better with a sucker than tiny bits of hair?

And my all time favorite:
*hot dogs in orange juice
{Please note: I do not intentionally feed him these foods at the same time. He requests them.}
I realize he is only 17 months, but the boy can talk. I'm just so glad to finally have a child who eats, I put all my squeamishness aside and am just grateful that he's eating something!



Exhibit C:

He thinks every meal will be his last. When he was about one year old, he would cry for food every time we would walk past the kitchen. My dad used to do it over and over as a joke! When I take him out of his high chair to wash his hands, he scoops food scraps furiously out the sink (no matter what it is) and tries to shove it in his mouth as fast as he can! Double yuck.

Frantic because I took some birthday cake away




Exhibit D:

Not only does he eat the food, he tries to eat the dinnerware as well!






Exhibit E.

He loves to play in/with his food. Steve insists if he continues to do this, he is going to make an appearance on the Jerry Springer show one day as someone with a food fetish. I think he's truly worried. I have to keep reminding him he's just a baby! Yes, that's cottage cheese in his hair. I sometimes have to wash his hair twice a day.

Exhibit F:

He can't get the food in fast enough. One spoon just isn't enough sometimes!


Aaaaahhhh



Exhibit G:

No, the camera did not catch him with his eyes closed. He savors every bite.


And since he can't reach any of the cupboards himself, he gets a little help from his partner in crime. No, I did not let him eat those. I walked out of the kitchen to get something, walked back in, and this is what I found.

Exhibit H:

A day full of eating can be exhausting! But heaven forbid he go to bed without a bottom full of water in his sippy cup!

glut, glut, glut, glut!

Happy Halloweenie!

Here are some pictures from Halloween. Hudson was Woody from Toy Story (one of his fave movies) and Ollie was a chicken. I like to say he was Al from Al's Toy Barn in Toy Story 2. Then I can kind of have a theme/coordinate them, even though that wasn't the original plan! But seriously, isn't he the cutest chicken you've ever seen?

Here's Woody riding his trusty steed "Bullseye"

Ollie, what does the chicken say? "Bawk Baawk!"



All the cousins getting ready for some serious trick-or-treating

Grammy and Lily, along with Buz, Katherine, Jeanne, Dave, Sloane and Beckett came over to my parent's house for scones (sorry there weren't any left!) and homemade root beer. Yum!

No trip to Mimi's would be complete without a game of chase!

Heading home after a long day

All worn out after a making a great haul! Sleep tight, my little spider and skeleton!

My Newest Niecey

I got to Sac and couldn't wait to feast my eyes on my new little niece Gretel Emeline. Chels had her on October 12th. And for any of you moms out there who wouldn't dream of going through childbirth without an epidural, my brave little sister did!!!! She wasn't sure if she was "in actual labor", and arrived at the hospital at an "8", and from there, gave birth less than two hours after that! Criminy...that will never be me, but that's ok. I prefer to flip through magazines serenely and reapply my gloss routinely throughout the process. So Gretel weighed 6 lb. 10 oz., and was 18" long. Tiny little thing! I had so much fun snuggling with her and kissing her to death. I miss her already!
Of course I couldn't let my talent go to waste down there! I dragged my hair stuff there and colored and cut my mom's and Chels' hair, and even put a bow in Gretel's sweet little 9 day old hair!
Chels, me, Gretel and Mom

Okay so this picture is so fun and making my taste buds tingle just looking at it. Back in March when we were in Sac Town visiting for Spring Break, my sweet hubby brought me a deliciously soft, buttery, salty pretzel for my enjoyment so I wouldn't have to break stride in my marathon shopping. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. I couldn't stop thinking about it days, weeks, and even months after. Chels even tried to mail me one as a surprise, and the lady at the post office wouldn't let her. What a kill joy! So for Gretel's first official outing, we drove about 25 minutes to the nearest Wetzel's Pretzels location in Roseville at the mall. There were so many flavors to choose from...I had to get the original since that's what I had been salivating about for so long, though Mom got a Jalepeno Cheese one and thought it was divine. Oh, sweet mannah from heaven!