{week 22}

The week of Memorial Day kicked off with a weekend of Home Depot, gardening, projects & nice weather. We planted a few tomato plants & a squash plant (which we thought was a pumpkin plant & are going to have a lot of explaining to do come Halloween!!) as well as a stacked herb planter that I copied of of Pinterest. We got the water table, which had been sitting in the hallway unopened for a week, set up & the kids had a blast. Note to anyone reading: bathing suits are a better options than clothing! Later in the week we hit the pool for our neighborhood pool party as well as with some friends - coming across a good Samaritan herding a turtle across a busy road. We ended the week with a mommy-kiddos dinner date of leftover pizza. Fancy as usual!

{week 20}

Summer begins!! Week 20 was the last week of preschool for Cassidy & Kalea. We celebrated at the school picnic on Tuesday. I hit up Pinterest & found a cute gift idea for the class gift for Kalea's wonderful teachers. (Cassidy's teachers are fantastic too, but I just wasn't the room mom to create a class gift!!!) The kids & I celebrated Mother's Day by spending Sunday at church & then heading out for brunch. Michael came home from his trip right after lunch & spoiled me the rest of the day...no diaper changing or cooking for me!! We hit up the zoo with a friend mid-week where the kids got to pet some goats & ride the merry-go-round. I visited with a friend from out of town Thursday on a rare night out mid-week which was super fun...until Cade woke up at 6:15 the next morning. How do they always know?!? We ended the week with some more yummy food, a new app for editing pictures on my phone & a performance of "The Gardening Show, A Musical" written and produced by Cassidy, starring Cassidy, Kalea, Cade and Michael. In our backyard. It was stunning!

{easter}

We had a lot going on the past few weeks leading up to Easter. In the midst of the egg hunts, candy & fancy dresses we did manage to make it to not one, but three, different churches! We're still on the fence about where we'll make our church "home" but are glad to have been welcomed at each.

The first celebration was at preschool where I was lucky enough to be one of the party moms for the day. The kids chowed down on Pinterest inspired lunch treats. The adults thought everything was super cute...the kids were just happy to have a party!

That Saturday we headed to Adams Park for an Easter Egg hunt sponsored by the City of Kennesaw with some friends. The girls all did really well & there were no shenanigans from other grown ups as far as we could tell. The city also set up a bunch of food & cheap bounce houses & slides on an adjacent field where the kids crawled, jumped, slid & played before we went out to lunch. We're really liking the events that the city puts on regularly. It's totally a family centered place to live & we're grateful to have found friends & a community so quickly...can you believe that Michael's been back in the South for an entire year already?!?

Then on Thursday after dinner we painted eggs...or, as my brother-in-law corrected me, dyed eggs. Apparently I haven't completely assimilated into the South & say it wrong! :) Cade was very interested in what his sisters were doing. He's definitely loves his sisters & thinks they are hysterical. He's a sweet, pleasant baby nearly all the time, but get him around the two silly girls & he starts baby belly laughing. It is hysterical & none of us can keep from joining him.

We spent Easter weekend at Gran & Poppy's house. Thankfully the Easter Bunny got the message that we were there & remembered to deliver our baskets. I wasn't in the kitchen when the girls discovered the baskets but apparently Cassidy didn't even notice them until Kalea pointed them out saying, "Look! They trying sneak up on us!" It's fun that Kalea is participating in holidays & traditions now. Both she & Cassidy particularly enjoyed the tradition of candy for breakfast!

And of course we had egg hunts at Gran & Poppy's too. Unfortunately my camera was M.I.A. for the first one, but I found it on Sunday for the second round. Cassidy ended up finding one of the "golden eggs" & you would have thought she won a million dollars! I got one picture of her holding it that kind of creeps me out how much I think it resembles me around that age. What do you think?

We hope you had as wonderful an Easter as we did!

{strawberry yogurt cake}

I came across this post via Pinterest last weekend after getting home from Elliot's Farm nearby Gran & Poppy's house, where we were spending Easter. 

We saw llamas, peacocks, chickens, roosters, goats & more with Saige & Poppy!

The girls were beyond thrilled when they realized that taste testing was allowed!

After all the hard work, we were rewarded with fresh strawberry ice-cream. De-li-cious!

All said, each girl picked nearly a full bucket & we ended up with close to 8 lbs of strawberries which we split between Gran, Aunt Dawn & us. And, even though we picked at them for the rest of the weekend there were still a lot left today - and they were starting to turn. It was time to make strawberry cake!

Strawberry Yogurt Cake

Ingredients

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs
• 3 Tb. lemon juice, divided
• Zest of 1 lemon
• 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour, divided
• ½ tsp. baking soda
• ½ tsp. salt
• 8 oz. plain Greek yogurt
• 12 oz. fresh strawberries, diced
• 1 cup powdered sugar

Instructions

1.  Preheat oven to 325°. Grease and flour a 10 inch Bundt pan. Sift together the 2 ¼ cups of flour, baking soda and salt. Mix in the lemon zest and set aside. Note: Do not leave bowl of flour in front of two year old & turn around. Blowing will be irresistible & the mess will be large.

2.  With an electric mixer, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then stir in 1 Tb. lemon juice. Alternate beating in the flour mixture and the yogurt, mixing just until incorporated.

3.  Toss the strawberries with the remaining ¼ cup of flour. Gently mix them into the batter. Note: Turn around again & the 2 year old will start taking pictures with your camera!

4.  Pour the batter into the Bundt pan. Bake for 60 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

5.  Allow to cool at least 20 minutes in the pan, then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely. 

6.  Once cooled whisk together the remaining 2 Tb. of lemon juice and the powdered sugar. Drizzle over the top of the cake. Eat!!

 

Printable recipe can be found here!

{cookies with daddy}

We were kind of short on Christmas cookies this year, but we did make a little bit of effort.

We made Mommy's favorite, peanut butter blossoms,

reindeer cookies, courtesy of Pinterest, 

& vanishing oatmeal raisin/chocolate chip cookies.
Which I didn't take a picture of because they disappeared too quickly. And also, I forgot.

What are your favorite, kid friendly Christmas or everyday cookie recipes?