Whirlwind Weekend

It was a whirlwind weekend. It has been so rainy out the past few days, that the girls needed some exercise. So on days like that, we break out the bounce house and set it up in our living room. It is great exercise and fits perfect in our living room. It was Brook's first time and she was a little skittish and was more comfortable looking in from the outside. She has always loved putting things in her mouth (she is a baby after all) and will crawl with toys hanging out of her mouth. The pictures above show her with a little people person hanging out of her mouth. Crazy girl.

We had Maddy's family birthday party on Saturday late afternoon. The weather is never predictable in October. Two years ago it was 90 degrees, last year a perfect 70 degrees and this year...50 degrees at best. We did not get to have the party outside this year unfortunately, but it was a great party nonetheless.

Maddy loves to get together with family and absolutely is happiest when everyone is together. So Saturday was a dream day for her. We hung a few simple decorations and I make a Barbie cake and cake balls (strawberry cake with chocolate coating, white cake with chocolate coating and devils food cake with chocolate coating) (recipe here). In a day and a half I baked eight cakes. It was fun! I LOVE to bake!!

Everyone arrived and Maddy opened presents and then had cake. She wanted to put her own candles in her cake this year (she is 5 after all) and everyone chuckled because of how she put the candles in, poor Barbie. But Barbie managed to not go up in flames (although she did look like she was surrendering) and Maddy had a great time blowing out all of her candles. After cake, we hung a piñata in the front yard (Maddy has always asked for a piñata (she calls it a penata)). After a lot of hits, it finally broke and the kids pounced and started grabbing. It was fun to watch.

The kids ran around all evening and Brook was so good and curious about all of the people and exploring the house (it was Maddy's choice to have the party at my parents house again this year). My girls are so blessed, not because of parties or presents, but to have family that goes out of their way to make my children feel loved and special - is a gift.

Sunday afternoon Maddy had her first gymnastics meet. We don't normally sign her up, but she has been telling us all summer that it is her dream to get a trophy so when we saw that everyone gets a trophy for participating, we signed her up. It was a long wait (she was 19th to go), but she stood up, did her routine to the best she could and we could not have been more proud! She took 5th place in her division and was able to stand on a podium and hold up her trophy! When she came over after the podium, she said "mommy look that is me on the trophy!" So sweet.