White Sand, Blue Water, and a Red Lobster

Although it sounds like it, no we didn't go to the Caribbean, but this was still a very nice place to be today. Moody Garden's Palm beach is a beautiful place to visit.
It's well worth the ten dollars to get in. I also thoroughly enjoyed the fresh water of the mock ocean as opposed to the salty mess that you are left with after the real thing.
Logan sure did have a good time. This is his fifth or sixth time in the water. This time around he splashed and made lots of happy shrieks.
Check out my pirate man! Arrrr!Logan kept his cool by staying in the shade with the hood up and a portable fan.
Ayden made a sand castle, or at least started making a sand castle, then he got distracted and started shoveling sand behind him.If you look real close you will notice that this is the same outfit Logan wore to the zoo. Not because he was out of clothes but I thought the cute little crab was fitting for his first "beach" expedition.
They have a great splash pad were kids can play and parents can sit and watch without fear of any danger. Ayden had a blast in this area. There were buckets that would fill with water and then dump and if you were in the wrong place at the wrong time (or right place if you were a kid) then you would get soaked.And as for the red lobster I mentioned, yes, that would be me. I don't know if I'll ever learn to reapply sun screen. I mean, how many times can a person get burned in one summer right?

A Horse of a Different Color

Today Logan decided he was going to condense his many short naps into two long naps. You would think that longer was better in terms of sleeping. However this also means more awake time to entertain a very short attention span. Mommy had to think of lots of ways. I've forgotten what it's like having a young baby. Ayden has been independent for so long that i'm relearning how to do everything with Logan. Of all the toys in the house, nothing quite satifies him like his swing. But the swing might have some competition in the months to come. We've decided to brake out the pony. (Meme would be so proud!) This little guy (the pony) was a baby shower gift and Logan is just now old enough to use him. Still a little on the small side, but Logan is a natural! Ok, you waited and long enough. Here's a couple a pictures of the cowboy and his horse.

A Flower Garden

While we were outside today, I overhead Ayden say "Oh! poor little flowers... What poor little flowers". He was talking about my flower garden that is in terrible condition at the moment. Since Logan has arrived I haven't found the time to weed or even water it much. We got a good amount of rain the other day and so I figure the only other thing that needed to be done was for me to weed it. I waited until around 6pm to start and the weather was perfect. Ayden wanted to help so we put on our gloves and went to work. He asked me why we were pulling up the weeds, I told him we wanted to flower garden and not a weed garden. We had to make room for new flowers to grow. He was such a big helper. He told me what a lucky mommy I was. Boy was he right! He found a large rock and decided to name it "Rock" because it was a rock, smart kid. Logan watched us from the stroller, there was so much for him to see. When he got tired Ayden helped pacify him by singing and telling him jokes. Ayden was so good in fact that I told him he deserved a strawberry sunday. There is still much to do, as soon as we finish I will post a picture of all the new flowers.

Zoo Much Fun!

Today we spent the morning at the zoo with Ayden's aunt Abbey and cousin Gavin. The nice weather made it a perfect day to go. Ayden and Gavin sat in the double stroller together and Ayden was a good sport. Gavin Loves his big cousin and showed with lots of touching. hehe
Poor Logan was tuckered out most of the time.

We rode the carousel (This is the second time Ayden preferred the Zebra)
And now it's time for the wildest animal of them all! Although he looks deadly he has a heart of gold.We had lots of fun and there were so many animals out and about. From now on we'll always hit the zoo in the morning and evenings when the animals are most active.

July 4th Weekend

It was such a busy holiday weekend. We woke up early to help my mom move some of her furniture. Well... technically the guys moved the furniture. Mom and I watched the kids and packed up some of the small things.
The night before I stayed up making cakes for my dad. Since he's been working out of town he has missed a few holidays with us. I decided since he was not able to be involved at those times that we would make it up to him and celebrate everything all at once. And with my love of cake decorating I whipped up three beauties. Chocolate on chocolate for his birthday, chocolate on vanilla for Father's day, and vanilla on vanilla for their 33rd wedding anniversary.


Here is a close up of the basket weave pattern on the first cake. It took forever, but I love the effect!

Anyway, from there we headed to Baytown to enjoy some swimming at Meme's house. The kids had so much fun in the pool. But before we got into the pool Meme had a surprise for us all. Just a little something she picked up for the grandkids. Her name is Sweetie and she is an Appaloosa. She's a beautiful horse and she seems so loving. She's found a great home at Meme's barn. While we were looking at Sweetie, Ayden gave us a big scare and got in the pool by himself without his floats. He was convinced that he could swim all by himself. After the water covered his head he was able to walk back to the steps and get out. There were definitely angels watching over him that day because we didn't notice he was missing until several minutes later. By the time I ran to the pool he was sitting on the side as if nothing had happened. He told me "Mommy, you were right, I can't swim without my floaties". After I got my nerves back under control we had a great time swimming, Ayden with his floats on.

Did I mention even Logan got to ride?



After swimming we had to hurry and leave to make it to serve at church in time. We packed up some yummy food thanks to Meme and had a picnic on the way to church. Later that night Michael and Ayden watched some fireworks while Logan and I caught up on some much needed rest. Such and eventful day.

Such a Big Boy!

In the month of June (at 4 months of age) Logan has done so much growing! He has started rolling over (which is hard to capture in a photo). He has also started grabbing everything he can get his hands on including his toes.He started solid foods this month as well
He also got his first bath in this duck tub. It's bigger than the infant tub and he can sit up in it. Logan loves bath time.
Such a big boy already, seems like yesterday I was holding him for the first time. I can't wait to see what he does next!

A Very Special Cake

Intermittently I will be posting pictures of the cakes that I have been making. Cake decorating has really become a passion of mine and I intend to pursue a possible career in it.

This is a cake I made for a 60th wedding anniversary. These people are very near and dear to my heart and I wanted to make it extra special for them. The topper was white chocolate as were the "P" in front and "60" on the sides. The icing was snow white buttercream on white cake. The roses were also buttercream icing. The scroll decorations on the side of the cake were glitter clear gel (which in hindsight I should have used white icing instead). The bottom layer was a 8 inch and the top was a 6 inch, both were torted and filled with my version of a Bavarian cream filling. My goal will always be for my cakes to not only look good, but taste great as well!