Cutting ice cream cake

Like the bracelets?  It's really 15 ponytail holders she bought with her own money.

Giant radish...

... for sale.

First harvest

Happy Fake Birthday

At Parker's school everyone brings cupcakes or cookies for the class on their birthday.  I'm pretty sure there are district rules about serving everyone sweets, but don't worry about that part.  Since Parker has a summer birthday, we just pick a day at the end of the year and announce that it will be our cupcake day.  Last year I bought cupcakes and that was fine, but this year I decided to make them myself.  Believe it or not, I've never made cupcakes (not counting as a kid).  Luckily, Parker wanted a certain mix from the store that had colored sprinkles in it ("confetti") so I didn't have to do them from scratch.  I hear that the box and from scratch taste about the same anyway.

Parker wanted to help.  She poured the batter with me hovering over her and dictating her every more.  "That's enough in that one!  Little more in here.  That's enough!"

 

Next was icing.  They looked really pretty like this - light blue frosting with some sugar sprinkled on for a little sparkle.  But we couldn't stop there.  Parker announced that her theme was going to be tie dye.  I don't know where she gets this theme business.....her Gigi I guess....but she's big on wanting to know what the theme of all events will be. 
Cupcake newsflash:  Wrappers are all the rage now.  We made homemade wrappers out of doilies and painted them to give them a tie dye look.  Even Bob helped.

The finished product.  Pretty cute, right?

Big artsy picture, like the food bloggers do.  I added little candy stars, which don't quite fit the theme I'm told, but added that little extra guild on the lily.

I managed to get them up to school without smushing any of them.  In Parker's class, you can dance with friends or do a solo while they sing to you.  To my surprise, Parker did a solo.  She's very comfortable with her classmates apparently.

My cupcakes got rave reviews, and several of the kids carefully slipped their wrappers of and took them home.  

I hope this didn't have too many pictures to load properly for all of you.  If so, let me know and I can break up the posts into parts for faster loading.

Saturday Fishing

So the day after the busy friday was Saturday, the neighborhood kids fishing tournament.  Bob had his annual ill-timed golf tournament, so I got to do the fishing gig solo.  It was our first year to participate, and I wasn't sure what to expect.  Parker isn't much of a fisherman, but since a lot of the other neighborhood kids were doing it, she wanted to be a part of things. 

This is someone's back yard.  Really.  Now I know why their house cost $100k more than ours. 

There was NOTHING biting this year.  Every year prior to the tournament, they tag a bass with a certain tag, and if you catch him, you get $100.  If he isn't caught that day, the offer still stands for the rest of the year.   Parker was a little disappointed that she didn't catch a fish, but was very relieved that she didn't catch a turtle. 

After a while, she and her friend lost interest and played on a neighbor's swings. 

They give out trophies for the biggest fish, the youngest angler, etc.  Since there were so few fish caught, one kid got most of the awards.  Parker wasn't eligible for a trophy, but she won the drawing!  She got a new fishing pole and a tackle box.  She promptly came home and dumped out all the tackle and filled it with her little toy animals. 

Later that same evening.....she wanted to go back out and try for the $100 fish again. 

We didn't catch anything on our second try that day, but Parker got in lots more practice casting.  There are much worse ways to entertain a child than sitting on a dock on a pretty spring evening.

Busy Friday

2 weeks ago was the perfect storm of stay at home mommy/school/neighborhood activities.  It was Teacher appreciation week - so.... on monday bring cookies, on wednesday bring a pasta salad, on thursday bring homemade cards for 5 teachers, on friday bring something for the goodie bag, etc etc. Friday was also (1) Mother's day Tea,  (2) the set up for the yearly district foundation fundraiser,  (3) Children's book week parade (dress like your favorite book character) and (4) the neighborhood Front Yard Cookout.  Bob was able to maintain his normal schedule....although one day he helped out his company's Golf Tournament committee by doing a 'dry run' of the golf course.


 There's nothing sweeter than the First Grade Mother's Day Tea.  All the mommies show up and are escorted to their tiny seats where there are poems and drawings and flowers.  Then the kids sing several songs they've been rehearsing for weeks in their music class.  Parker normally tries to match a little better than red with blue plaid, but she was wearing part of her book week costume.

After the musical number, they served us lemonaide and cookies.

After that, I dashed off to help stuff 750 goodie bags for the next night's fundraiser.  It was one of those days where I ate a sandwich while in transit.

For the book character parade, Parker was Clementine.  She was thrilled because being Clementine meant she could carry around a stuffed kitty.  I was pretty pleased with our costume choice.  There were about 100 Junie Bs and a jillion Harry Potters.  Do you think there's any way I can convince her to be Laura Ingles next year? 

If it was a contest, the counselor would win.  She was Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs.

So after the Book Parade, we dashed to the grocery store and got provisions for the cookout.  Did I mention we also had a house guest that night too?  Luckily he's low maintenance.
There's a little island in our cul de sac, so everyone gathers there.

Cookout night coincided with one of the Mav's playoff games, so Bob borrowed a blow up screen and a HD projector so no one would have to miss a dribble.

You can't tell from my photos, but it had an amazing picture quality.  No one could believe how clear it was.