Happy Birthday Baby Girl!!

Our Sweet Caroline will be 6 tomorrow! I still can not believe that 6 years has gone by... I know Joe and I have been married for awhile, I know we have 3 kids, I know we have moved about 8 times, but how in the world is my baby already 6?! Crazy... I can only imagine how my mom must feel when she realizes her oldest baby is 34.5.... aaahhh!!!!

Caroline's birthday is tomorrow, but with Joe's crazy schedule there is no way to know for sure if he would be able to be home and celebrate with us. Early this afternoon he called and said that tonight would be a good night to go ahead with the birthday festivities since he wouldn't know about tomorrow... and better to do the birthday early then make the birthday girl wait if her daddy didn't make it home in time tomorrow. Fortunately when I was at the grocery store this morning I grabbed some stuff for tomorrow to make spaghetti and meatballs and a birthday cake or cupcakes. Little did I know that it was going to be needed for today. I have been watching way too many cake shows and would LOVE to know how they do what they do... it certainly is not with store-bought cake and frosting!!!!!! For some reason at the last minute I thought that Caroline would love to have a barbie cake... and I somehow pulled it off in about 3 hours. Between extra baking time, cooling time and then frosting the darn thing, it was a disaster in my kitchen! I had to put barbie in and out of the fridge to keep the frosting from getting too soft and falling off... but after all was said and done, or I should say eaten, it was all good! Even the meatballs turned out good... For a moment Joe even thought they were my moms!!!! Anyway, here's the pics from the night....

Barbie chilling in the fridge...


make a wish....





She's showing off some leg! ( I used 3 tubs of frosting on this cake!)

Molly loved the frosting!

And on to presents.... Caroline was a little suprised to find a box of diapers... took her a moment to realize that there was a present inside...


I wrapped it in about 10 sheets of tissue paper. She just kept unwrapping...

and then.... a little shocked to find her own pink Nintendo DS

New jammies from Aunt Kendra

Nicholas picked this out for Caroline

Her birthday outfit from Nana to wear to school tomorrow.

A little birthday cake charm (with a candle inside) from Grandpa Paul.

Nicholas got a transformer ornanment from Grandpa Paul too... it even makes noise.. :)

And miss Molly got a snowman that she thinks is a penguin, so he's a "snowman penguin"

3 $2 bills from Grandpa Paul... she thought they were pretty cool!

A learning game from Aunt Courtney and Uncle Chad for her new DS

And I couldn't resist putting these two pics up.. Sometimes she can be quite the fashionista and loves to show off....

6 years ago....

Six years ago, today, I was in the hospital, wondering if this little baby was ever going to come out! Joe and I were in for a suprise when Caroline showed up the next morning. But, man, was it a long night... She finally arrived around 7am on the 9th... 6 days late! And it's been an adventure ever since!!!!!

Max...

We had a new visitor tonight from the North Pole.... His name is Max the Elf and he has come to keep an eye on the kids for Santa. Every night he flies back to the North Pole to fill Santa in on the kids and then he comes back in time for the morning. He likes to hide in a different place every day and has fun watching while the kids try to find them... We'll see how much Max likes hanging out with our kids and how long the kids like having him around.

Fun at Grandma Su-su's

Grandma Su-su always has quite the collection of toys for the kids to play with whenever we come visit. All of the toys she has found at yard sales and most of them are in excellent condition and look like they were hardly ever used. This time one of the new toys was this jeep... Nicholas had so much fun driving around....



Molly decided she liked the real "toys" better... She was ready to go off and mow the lawn.


Daddy and Caroline on the ATV... Nicholas wanted nothing to do with it, but Caroline was all for it. She had fun riding around with Daddy. When we were leaving the neighborhood we saw a Dad and son on thier ATV's... the Dad was on a full size one and the son had one his size.. it was pretty cool.


Molly and her little car...

Lets see how dizzy we can get... Nicholas had fun with the "sit-n-spin"

One of the other new toys was a barbie big-wheel. It looked just like the big wheels my sister and I had as kids and we would spend hours pushing our big wheels up our street and flying back down again. It didn't take long for Caroline to take the big wheel up the walkway and come flying down....

Friday in B'ham

Friday was a busy day. Joe and the kids and Grandpa went down to the train yard in Irondale. The kids got to see some pretty big train engines. They got pretty close but not as close as they will be able to get once we go visit Grandpa at the Railroad museaum in Chatanooga, TN. They found some stakes for the train tracks while they were down there and thought they were pretty cool souveniers....



After the train outing they all ventured over to a park and played for a while...

After the park Grandma Su-su, and the rest of the gang, all met up with them at Mellow Mushroom for some lunch and yummy pizza! Mmmm... just thinking about it makes me hungry :)

After pizza we went off to Vulcan. It's the one "exciting" tourist trap that B'ham has. There is an elevator that takes you up to the statue, or you can take the stairs, and it overlooks the city of Birmingham. From the ground it doesn't look like you are going to be that high up, but when you are up there, the flooring is a metal grate so you can see all the way down to the ground. My knees were weak! The kids had fun going up and down the elevator and playing on the grounds around the statue... it was an absolutely beautiful fall day!

After a hard day running around we were going to go out and make a fire and roast s'mores. But even though it was beautiful out, it was COLD! So we opted for inside roasted marshmellows instead.... they were still good!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

This year for Thanksgiving we drove over to Birmingham to visit with Grandma Su-su, Grandpa Tim, Grandpa Doug, Aunt Katie and Uncle Lee and baby Henry, and Aunt Jamie and Uncle Mike and baby Isaiah. It was fun to be all together for a holiday and to have Joe with us for a couple days to hang out.

Caroline had a great time helping Aunt Jamie make mashed potatoes.

Peel em'...


Soak em'....



And after they're mashed, we have to try them.....


Henry and Isaiah

Caroline and Isaiah

Caroline and Henry

The kids were waiting patiently for their dinner. Lee made an absolutely beautiful turkey, but of course I didn't get a picture of it before it got carved.

Joe and Mike... "cheers!"

Caroline had fun playing with what was left of the turkey...

Mike & Jamie....

Mike and Jamie and baby Isaiah came from WA to visit for Thanksgiving. They came and stayed with us for 2 days and then ventured over to Birmingham to be with his mom and sis and family...

Karhan boys...


Aunt Jamie and the kids watching "The Sneeches"


Molly was in love with Isaiah... she just loved having a little one around

Pilgrims and Indians...

Nicholas had a little Thanksgiving celebration at school. I was fortunate enough to be able to fill in for one of the party mom's who wasn't able to make it (as a mom we only get to go to one party a year and I had already gone to the Halloween one). It's always fun to see what the kids get to do at school and Molly and I got to enjoy this morning... The kids all dressed up like Indians and Pilgrims. They had chicken nuggets, corn bread, corn, green beans and jello for thier lunch and then we made turkey cookies and played "pin the hat on the turkey". Molly had so much fun getting to hang out with the big kids and there was even a spot for her at the table.

My little Indian

This is how I found Nicholas today when I picked him up from school. I made him jump back out of the car and let me snag a couple pics of him before his vest or headdress got ruined when we got home. It was super cute to see all the kids lined up waiting for their moms and dads dressed up like pilgrams and indians. Nicholas chose to dress up as a pilgrim for their thanksgiving party at school so he got to wear his indian costume home today. His indian name is "Dancing Cloud". He's just too darn cute!