Santa Cruz: Here We Come!

We are packing for our second annual family trip to Santa Cruz!!! 

New bathing suits were in order.  A more appropriate toddler chasing one for me.  One that actually fits The Wombat, even if he does look cute in his two sizes too big trunks :)

And new beach toys, which Landon got in his Easter basket.  He has already been playing with these so I can't wait to see him put them to good use in the sand.

Plus LOTS of hats and sunscreen.

Here are some pictures from last years trip:



It was Landon's first time ever to the ocean.  I was cleaning sand out of his little toes for like three days, so we'll see if the baby powder method works this go around.  Here's hoping.

We leave tomorrow and it can't come soon enough!!!

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Diaper Cake: Lost & Found

Do you ever lose pictures only to find them MONTHS later in the most random files?  Well, I do.  It's why I hardly ever delete anything off my camera.  These photos have been missing since September!!! And they have been recently uncovered in the file "Raymond Lake 2011."  Really, I don't know how it happens. 

So hooray for lost and FOUND!  And here is a tutorial for a diaper cake that I made for my dear friend Lindsey.

Here are my supplies for this particular cake:

For the Base:

• Cardboard
• Wrapping Paper
• Tape

For the Cake:

• Roughly 30 diapers (so hang on to those ones your kiddos grow out of!)

• Rubber bands

• Ribbon
• Flowers/Toys/Decorations of your choosing

• Bottle (I just used a plastic water bottle)
• Push Pins (or hot glue works too)

For the base,  cut a circle out of some cardboard (I used one of my many MANY Amazon boxes) and cover it with wrapping paper of your choosing.

For the cake, start by rolling up your diapers and rubber banding them.  Once you have them all made you can start playing around with your layers. 

The ratio I used for this cake:

• Base Layer  - 20 Diapers
• Middle Layer - 7 Diapers
• Top Layer - 3 Diapers.

Replace (or cover) your rubber bands with ribbons on the outer layer diapers.

I garnished the cake with some fake flowers to go with the colors of the shower, but I've also used small baby toys, rattles, pacifiers, etc. 

And now you have a gift and a decoration all rolled (literally) into one!!

Simple Things

This kid melts my heart every.single.day.

He gets that from his Daddy :)
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Ashland

I had a fantastic weekend.

Ben was actually scheduled for a weekend off (this NEVER happens) and we jumped at the chance for a mini vaca. So we packed our bags and headed up to Ashland, Oregon. We dropped The Wombat off at his grandparent's house on the way. I don't even think he noticed we were gone. He was too busy playing with all the animals and breaking in his new swing that his grandpa hung from a tree.

I. Love. Ashland. It is cute and quaint with an actual Main Street called Main Street. The people are friendly. The food is good. The shopping is addicting and tax free. But best of all are the plays. Especially the Shakespeare ones.

My first choice of lodging would have been The Ashland Springs Hotel. But it was booked {sigh}  next time we'll have to plan our trip sooner. Our second choice was The Plaza, which was nice because it was still right off Main Street and we could walk everywhere. And walk everywhere, we did.

We shopped.  We dined.  We saw a beautiful rendition of Romeo & Juliet.  We slept in. Uninterrupted.  (Landon cut FIVE teeth this month, including three molars.  It's been a rough month, sleep wise).  We spent a lazy morning reading our books.  Then I shopped some more...here are some of my tax free goods:

Oh yeah, and I found all of the Lincoln Lawyer books in a used book store.  Hooray.  I've been on a Michael Connelly binge lately.  Also picked up some Philippa Gregory's.

It was a great weekend.  Full of quality alone time with my hubby and a good break from dirty diapers and 4 a.m. teething sleep interuptions.  I sure did miss that Little Wombat though :)

Pinterest Recipes

I have been a slacker when it comes to crafts lately.  However, it seems that whenever I ignore my projects I make up for it by diverting my attention to the kitchen.  These past few weeks I've been crossing off quite a few of Pinterest recipes.  There have been some so-sos, some goods and some GREATS.  So here are the greats:

I have never made tortillas from scratch before and I had no idea what I was missing.  Oh. My. Lord.  Why did I wait so long?!?! I could have been content eating these plain!  But I combined it with super easy crock pot chicken plus toppings.  I foresee many more homemade tortillas in our future dinners.

For our anniversary (which was April 4th but we are officially celebrating it this upcoming weekend) I made a three layer Reeses Peanut Butter Chocolate Cake.   I still don't know how I managed to bake this while Ben was at work.  The original plan was to wear Landon out at the library's story time, then bake during nap time.  But then story time got cancelled and Landon slept long enough in the car to refuse a nap when we got home.  One bag of spilled almonds (keep forgetting The Wombat can reach my kitchen table now), one knocked over lamp complete with broken light bulb and one huge kitchen mess later, we had ourselves an anniversary surprise cake.  And also a toddler demanding attention after being completely ignored so much independent play time.

I've been whipping up these Peanut Butter Banana Smoothies for breakfast a couple times a week.  I like the oatmeal texture so I actually don't blend the oats until they are powdery as the recipe suggests.  Huge plus:  Landon loves these too!  It motivates me to make them more often :)

Can't wait to try more!

Happy Easter!!

Landon had some adorable Easter pictures taken by the very talented Anya McFadden.  She did such a great job.  Landon flashed two brief smiles during the entire session and she managed to capture both of them :)

The Little Wombat is so funny in new environments.  At home he is all smiles but anywhere else (besides in a swing) he is sooo serious.  He walks around taking everything in with a furrowed little brow.  Although the upside of this is that he is too distracted to take his hat off.

He took a few seconds to examine the Easter eggs and then started throwing them.  Kid's got an arm too, let me tell you.

This weekend we visited the grandparents.  We had a lovely early Easter dinner on Good Friday, a bridal shower on Saturday for my sis and this morning we attended church at The Stirring.  Here we are after church with grandma, grandpa, great grandma and the aunties:

Hope everyone had a Happy Easter! He is risen!

Sunshine & Water

We had some serious 70 degree sunshine in between all these rainy days!!!! Yay!  We took advantage of it by setting up Landon's brand new water table that his Papa got him for his birthday.

He LOVED it.  Normally when I try and set up things in the backyard for playtime Landon is usually too distracted by dirt, leaves or rocks to pay much attention to it.  Water is apparently the exception. 

I think I need to get him some swim trunks that fit before our little family vacation in Santa Cruz!  Those ones are about two sizes too big :)