Happy Easter!

Ok. This was one of the little kits you get at the grocery store with the foil pans, etc. Let's just say that mine looked nothing like the picture. But it tasted good anyway.

Sweet and Sour

This is what I have been eating all day. LOVE these things, but they sure do a number on my tongue.

Bridal Shower

Two Saturdays ago, was my sister Casey's bridal shower. Her really good friend, Tanya, who now lives in Georgia, was out here visiting her family and they decided to have the shower before Tanya went home. Tanya is pregnant with her first child and probably one of the cutest pregnant ladies I've ever seen! Her due date? May 14--the same day as both Casey and Tanya's birthdays. Wouldn't that be crazy!! And because Casey is getting married on the 17th, Tanya won't be out for the wedding :( So it was really great that she was able to help do this for Casey. They have been close friends forever.

We had the shower at my mom's good friend Marena's house. She and her husband were leaving the following day to go to Jerusalem for 2 weeks, and she was still sweet enough to offer to have it at her house. No way would I have been able to do that! And there was huge crowd there, so a big thanks to Marena!

Tanya and her mom, Dessa, did all the food. It was amazing!! Meatballs, bruschetta, baked raviolis, cucumber and tomato salad, chocolate covered strawberries. . . .everything was so delicious!! Oh what it would be like to enjoy cooking! I have my doubts that I will ever reach that point. Although there seems to be an apron craze going on right now--everyone claiming that wearing an apron makes housework and cooking more fun. Maybe I need to go put mine on. I digress.

I was planning on just taking a back seat and enjoying the shower. Looking back, I had a really bad attitude about the whole thing, and I apologize to everyone for that. I guess I kinda felt like, "Hey! She's my one and only sister. I want to be the one to give her a shower!" How selfish is that? I'm not proud of it, but it was true none-the-less. So when Casey asked me to help out with decorations and games, I got really excited.



Casey and I have a love for old Audrey Hepburn movies. But I think Casey's love has turned into an obsession. :) It has even spilled over into her wedding planning--Tiffany Blue and Chocolate Brown are her colors and there will be a sort of old Hollywood/Tiffany's theme to the reception. So I figured, why not carry that over into the shower as well? These were the games:

1) We played the traditional shower clothespin game, with a glam tiwst. I found these pretty silver bracelts and put them in a silver tray on the table as guests first walked in. The game was, "Don't Say. . ." and there was a list of words you weren't allowed to say in your conversation with other guests. Each person took 2 bracelets at the beginning and then every time you caught someone saying one of the "forbidden" words, you got to take one of their bracelets. Whoever had the most bracelets at the end wins! Honestly, this game didn't go over too well, mainly because there were so many people and all with different backgrounds--work people, church people, institute friends, old friends, family etc. and each group kinda stuck together without a whole lot of mingling going on. Women are so funny that way. I think had we done it the other way where you can't cross your legs, that would have been better.

2) Next, we played the "tray" game. Where you bring out a tray, give everyone only a short time to look at it, then take the tray away and see how many things they can remember and write down. Whoever has the most at the end of the set time, wins. Our twist to this one was that everything on the tray was from an Audrey Hepburn movie. 6 movies were represented, and probably no one but Casey and I really "got" any of it, but it was fun to just have a bunch of random things on the tray instead of the typical "bridal" stuff. And all the cards we handed out for people to write on had Audrey Hepburn quotes on them.



3) This game we called "Famous Couples". We handed out a piece of paper to everyone with the female half of a famous couple written down with a blank next to it. Given only a few minutes, everyone had to write down the male counterpart with the help of a name bank at the bottom of the page. Again, 6 Audrey Hepburn characters were represented. And surprisingly, the winner, Jody, good friend and my boss's wife, got almost all of the Audrey characters correct! I guess we're not the only Audrey fans.


All the prizes for the games were wrapped in Tiffany Blue paper to look like gifts from Tiffany's. The prizes were Audrey Hepburn movies an other stuff like big black Audrey sunglasses, a silver and diamond ID holder, lipgloss and a sleep mask. Anyone seen "Breakfast at Tiffany's?

The highlight of the shower was the video we made of Jordan. Very few women at the shower had met Jordan, family included, so we thought that we should let them get to know him a little bit. So Jason and I video-taped him answering questions like, what is Casey's favorite color, where was you first date, etc. Casey wasn't in the room when we did this. Then at the shower, we would ask Casey the same question and then play the video to see if her answer matched Jordan's. We have about an hour of raw footage which is hilarious! Once you get Jordan talking, he just keeps going. And he has such a great sense of humor. So it was really hard, but we cut it down to about 7 minutes. It was so funny. Thanks, Casey (and Jordan too) for being such good sports!

We also had these little notecards (complete with the black damask border) for women at the shower to write down advice for the bride. It turned out really great--can I borrow the cards sometime, Casey? j/k

Overall I think the shower was a huge hit. Even Geri, Casey's other bridesmaid who HATES showers, managed to make it all the way through. That's a good sign I guess. She had a huge turn-out and received a lot of great stuff. We all love you Casey!

And proof that all the women in our family think alike, look at this photo of my grandma, my mom, Casey and me. All in black and white. I promise we didn't plan it!

Valentine's Day

Andrew, the other ballet teacher at our school, was out of town last week. I was supposed to teach for him--3:45 to 9:00 (ugh!)--on Valentine's Day. However, for once all this crazy snow worked in my favor and the office ended up canceling all classes that day. So I got to spend Valentine's with my4 valentines.

I was not in the mood to cook (shocker), so we had Mac-n-Cheese, what more could you want on Valentine's Day? I did manage to make a cake.

Chore Chart

I think we have had a break-through! Rylee, my 3-year-old, has had a problem for a long time with sleeping in her own bed. She absolutely refuses to fall asleep in it, and though she will sometimes stay all night in it once I move her, she often makes several trips back and forth making for restless nights for both of us. I have spent months trying to get to the root of it all, and finally concluded that she has just made up her stubborn little mind that she will not sleep in her bed and that's that. Being the terrible mom I am, I have given in, not wanting a screaming tantrum at 11:00 at night. BUT. . .she has been wanting to do a sticker chore chart like her brothers. So last night I thought, sure, let's try. I told her that if she went to sleep in her bed and stayed there all night, I would make her a sticker chart in the morning. And every night she sleeps in her bed, she will earn another sticker. It actually worked!! She crawled right into bed and stayed there all night. So true to my word, we made a sticker chart today. She picked the pictures and the paper and even helped me "goo" it and laminate it--notice the wrinkles? But she doesn't care. (I love her little belly sticking out.) And she has already decided that when her chart is full, she wants a new bear. Whatever works!