Welcome to the winter wonderland!

Saturday was Connor's Winter Wonderland party.

8 children, 9 adults. 

The weather cooperated as it was sunny and clear through the first part of the party, and only then did it get a bit cloudy.

Staked balloons in the yard.  Kids loved this, but 30 minutes in, and at least of the third of the balloons were gone.  The 2 year old from next door had a lot of fun pulling them out and letting them go, until Connor got upset.

 

Mostly white (ok, off-white) food.  Cheddar corn puffs, peeled apple slices, yogurt covered pretzels, white fudge covered oreos, vanilla meringues, Monterrey jack cheese and crackers, kettle corn and white chocolate Bliss candies.  I did have Bacon/crackers for the adults.   

Connor and his cake.  The goody bags were pretty cool too.  They each had an arctic friend stuffed animal (polar bear, penguin or otter), a arctic friend ball, a peppermint tootsie pop, and four finger lights.  If you have not seen those lights yet, check them out.  The kids loved them. 
Amazon finger lights

Pin the hat on the Polar Bear.  I had 2 heats - one for 5-6 year olds, one for 3 and under.  Each kid won a prize, but the winners got to pick first. 

Favorites were the pooping polar bear and the grow your own polar bear.



 

 

Final images of the cake - note the shadows of the fish in the water.  Ha Ha.  I loved this cake and it was super fun to make.

 

Connor had fun at his party, and now Kaitlyn wants a winter wonderland themed party as well. 

Polar Bear Party

I am choosing to ignore the fact I haven't posted for 5 whole months, and am just movin' on.

Connor's birthday is coming up, and since it is during the holiday, we are embracing the season and having a Polar Bear (Arctic friend) Party.

I started working on the cake, and I think it is coming out cute despite my husbands pointing out the non-snowy whiteness of the bears.

I think they are cute!  They are made from tootsie rolls.  Dollar tree had big vanilla ones.  They aren't as white as the vanilla midgees, but I think they are fine.  The little one got fatter and more "slumpier" as he cooled, but oh well.

Their igloo.  Hope it holds together when I transfer it to the cake.

Now, I just nee to create the jello pond, and then put it all together.

We will be playing a toss the snowball game, pin the hat on the polar bear, and maybe one more game, but I might just let them play.

Menu is all white - kettle popcorn, Monterey jack cheese bites, vanilla meringues, white chocolate covered oreos, apple slices, crackers and yogurt covered pretzels.  I might do pizza since we will need to eat before we head out to the boat parade, but we'll see.

8 maybe 9 kids are coming.  Can't wait.

Gingerbread

Just a quick post here.

We decorated Gingerbread houses with/for the kids.  This went slightly better than the pumpkin carving where Monica and I did 90% of the work.  Here they did about 40%, but mostly they ate the candy. 

Trying to back post, so we'll see if it works.

We had a halloween party for the kids before they went trick-or-treating.

Mummy Hotdogs, Halloween chips

Cheese Broomsticks, banana ghosts, kiwi frankensteins

Pumpkin and ghost pizza

 

Those kooky kids.  Kaitlyn was a Black ballarina bat.  Connor was Spiderman.  You can't see Buzz very well, and of course, the Cat in the Hat with Thing 1 and Thing 2 and the fish not in the photo.

So, we are back from vacation (no, it hasn't been from February until now) and I am ramping up the cooking.

Summer means more grilling, and more cool food, but since the air conditioner is in, I am still oven cooking when needed.

Great dessert last night.  Chocolate Eclair Cake.

You can kind of see the layers on the next shot. 

1 packet of instant vanilla pudding.  Make as directed for pie filling.  Fold in 1/2 of an 8 oz container of cool whip. 

Put a layer of graham crackers on the bottem of the pan.  Top with 1/2 the pudding mixture.  Add another layer of graham crackers and the rest of the pudding mixture.  Top with a final layer of graham crackers.  Heat up 1 can of chocolate frosting until pourable, and spread all over the top.  You have to chill this for at least 6 hours so the crackers soften.

Here is a better view of the layers in the pan.

Jason loved this.  Connor, my chocolate lover, liked the vanilla pudding inside.  Kaitlyn, my vanilla lover and self professed "chocolate-no like" er (Yes, I can't stand when my 6 year old talks baby-talk), liked the "brown" top.   Go figure.  At least there was something for everyone.  And Daddy ate what the kids had left. :)



Meatball Mania

A few weeks ago, I wanted to stock up the freezer a bit so I made a big batch of meatball.  The nice thing is now that Kaitlyn is 6, she not only WANTS to help, but she is ABLE to help.

We did a basic recipe of groung beef, eggs, breadcrumbs, oregano, basil, salt and pepper and parmesan cheese.

We used a cookie scoop to portion them out so they would be the same size.

Kaitlyn then rolled them all and placed them on a cookie sheet.

We made about 50 regular meatballs and 30 minis.  I baked them off in the oven, and most are stored in the freezer.  We did have spaghetti and meatballs that week for dinner, and they were yummy.



Valentine's Day

With two little kids, and the holiday on a weeknight, we were not about to brave a romantic dinner out.  We had our fun stand-by meal - "Brinner".  This is breakfast for dinner, generally a surefire hit with the kids.

I had to step it up a bit to match the theme, so we had bacon and pancakes - all heart shaped.

The bacon before it is cooked.

and after.

 Making the pancakes - looked better than they tasted.  Didn't have the right pancake mix (I am an Aunt Jemima girl, and Bisquick has never cut it for me.)  I also had to borrow eggs from my neighbor.  That was fine as she had previously borrowed a cut of sugar from me, some cocoa too.  Ha Ha.

The completed meal......................................................and Kaitlyn's plate.  I call that a success.