St. Patrick's Day 2012

Just a little blurb about St. Patrick's Day...  It's become tradition to have my grandmother over for St. Paddy's Day dinner... this year we added my Uncle Mike and cousin Chris to the evening...

Thanks to my obsession with Pinterest... yes... yes I DID make a rainbow out of fruit!  Complete with a pot of gold at the end and marshmallow clouds.

 We had the standard St. Patrick's Day corned beef and cabbage, with potatoes and other veggies (which, aside from the potatoes, my Irish friends assure me is NOT a traditional St. Paddy's Day feast lol), topped off with a grasshopper pie... simply for its greenness rather than any link to Ireland...

 

 

 

 

I was glad to have Dave home on a holiday for once...

 

Best of all, my cousin Nikki was in town from Florida and she and her mom Dena came over for some corned beef and cabbage...

 

 

Even Lily got all groomed up and wore green hair bows :-)

 

 

It was a very nice evening... and if you are super observant and noticed that there was still Christmas greenery on my mantle... you would be correct.  It took my a looooooong time to undeck the halls this year because of my leg problems.  Sigh... one of these months I might even get that Christmas tree down ;-)

The Pinewood Derby

This is yet another, long overdue, blog...

Last year, when Dave saw a flyer for the Pinewood Derby, held by a boyscout troop at our church, he wanted to make a car with Amerah but it was too late.

This year he planned a little earlier and the two set off on a father daughter adventure in racing...

Lily and I wisely kept to the living room as my perfectionist husband worked with my it's-good-enough and why-don't-we-add-pink-polkadots daughter.  I watched as the two worked together, argued together, and finally compromised...

 

 

On St. Patrick's Day, Amerah could hardly contain herself.  She watched as the boy scouts raced in the regulated division and waited impatiently for her turn in the unregulated division.

 

 

 

 

Finally she was able to race...

 

 

 

Aaaaaaaaannnnnnnndddddd.... drum roll please.... Amerah walked away with 1st place!

 

 

 

 

Needless to say she was VERY pleased with herself and did not give her dad much of the credit haha.

Nikki's Baby Shower (May 20, 2012)

I am so far behind on my blogging that I'm not sure I'll ever catch up...

On May 20, 2012, we had a baby shower for my cousin Nicole, to welcome her baby girl, Averie (who has yet to make an appearance)...

Nikki is one of the most beautiful pregnant women I've ever met so I'm sharing lots of pics even though she might kill me :-)

So here are a bajillion pics of Nikki opening her gifts (Amerah took most of them which explains the interesting angles and centering :-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Amerah and Alexis cleaned up in the prize area... winning quite a few of the baby shower games...

 

 

 

 

 

Amerah wanted her photo taken with the mama-to-be...

I wish I had taken more photos but here are what's left... random shower photos...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And a couple group shots (wishing I'd had the sense to have someone close the blinds behind us - but then, I had someone else take the photo with my camera so I couldn't see how bright it was.

 

Little Averie will be arriving in style after being showered with so much love!