Thursday, December 5, 2013

Cora's birthday and Halloween 2013

Here is our beautiful 5 year old girl on her birthday, October 6th, wearing her special birthday dress that I made for her.  The fabric is a little obnoxious for my taste but she loves it - it has castles and unicorns and rainbows, everything our girly-girl loves.  She has worn it almost every Sunday since then, although I was luckily able to remove the bow without her noticing after it didn't fare well in the wash.
The night before Cora's birthday (Saturday night) we took her to the mall to play at the bouncy castles place - ever since they opened she's been begging to go there.  They both had a blast and didn't want to leave.
Dinner was their favorite: "Old McDonalds"
 Auntie Lynne gave Cora a very special present for her birthday - a beautiful wooden dollhouse, complete with people and furniture.  Both kids love playing with it (as do I).  My grandma had one like it in her house so I love that my kids have one now too.
Ryan put up a bunch of ruffled streamers I made for Cora's birthday.  She had a "Pinkie Pie" pink and purple birthday like the girly-girl she is.  She is obsessed with My Little Pony - the new version which looks nothing like the one I watched when I was little.  She watches it on Netflix.  
 We had a dinner of finger foods - teriyaki meatballs, tortellini/cheese/tomato skewers, fruit salad, veggie tray, chips with hummus and salsa, and pink popcorn with sprinkles.
 Although I originally had big plans for a fancy cake with a frozen buttercream transfer image, I decided to go simple with white frosting, rainbow candy borders and a plastic toy Pinkie Pie on top.  
After blowing out the candles Cora distributed the candles to her cousins and brother to lick the frosting off - Elijah ate almost the whole candle before we caught him.
 Cora had her heart set on playing "Pin the Tail on the Pony" since that is one of Pinkie Pie's trademark party games (She is the party planning pony in the show.)  I made this poster and we got her sweet cousins to play along much to Cora's delight.  The poster is still up in our hall and Cora will probably never let us take it down.
 This is just a cute little drawing of a flower with her name written beside it that Cora made.
 Here is the gang at our ward Trunk-or-Treat.  After much going back and forth, the kids finally decided on a Little Mermaid theme. Cora got the Little Mermaid movie for her birthday and they both love it.  So I made Cora a mermaid tail and Ariel-inspired shirt, and I finally convinced Elijah to be the shark from the movie, which I thought would be much easier to recreate than Tritan, Sebastian or Flounder, his other choices.  I was able to make both costumes fairly easily and come out with a couple of pieces that can still get everyday wear.  (Elijah's shorts, Cora's shirt and under shorts).  Besides wanting to save money by making my own, it's really hard to use purchased costumes in Hawaii because they're all just too hot for the kids to wear around without sweating to death.  Ryan was able to go as Prince Eric with items he already owned, and a piece of my fabric as a sash.  Our literal-minded kids really wanted him to be King Tritan since he is Ariel's father but I didn't really want to sew an adult sized costume so we were able to convince them that it would be ok if he was Eric.  They were disappointed that I didn't get in on the action but again, I didn't want to sew another costume and I really didn't want to be Ursula.  ;)
 And here is the Little Mermaid gang on Halloween ready to go trick or treating.  I made their bags too, with creative input from them about the faces.

So there is our family update after 6 months of no posts.  Some of the blame certainly goes to my laziness, but part of the reason it took so long to update is because we've been having problems with our hard drive failing on our (new) computer, so we've been trying to deal with that for a few months. Luckily we try to be diligent about backing up and we don't think we lost any files, although our files are all kind of a mess now from backing up and re-backing up without organizing very well.

Our big news, of course, it that we are going to have baby in March.  We've already announced this on Facebook and to family a long time ago.  We are going to have another girl and are all very excited for her to come.  I was pregnant last January and February but miscarried around Valentine's Day, so the kids have been ready for a little brother or sister for a long time now.  Surprisingly, Ryan and I felt okay about the miscarriage.  We were a little sad but mostly we were blessed with a great feeling of peace, and the knowledge that Heavenly Father was in charge.  It also helped that the doctor reassured us that it was just a chance occurrence and wouldn't have any long term effects, such as preventing us from having another pregnancy.  

So far everything has gone well with this pregnancy, although I am feeling quite huge, I think more so than with my first two.  I was pretty sick for the first trimester but I am one of those lucky ones who say goodbye to morning sickness once the second trimester comes along.  Just like we did with our other kids, our lips are sealed about possible names for the baby until she is born.  But as soon as she found out it was a girl Cora was quick to suggest that we name her Ariel, Twilight Sparkle or Bella.  ;)

Our kids just keep growing up before our eyes.  They sure keep us laughing.  Cora is more of a daddy's girl than ever.  Lately at night when we say good night she's been telling Ryan "Good night I love you more than anything!" and she tells me "Good night I love you more than anything except Daddy."  

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