Mason's 2nd Birthday

Several times a week we read Dr. Seuss' One Fish, Two Fish before bed, so it seemed like the perfect theme for Mason's big "2".

Matt's sister and her family came down from Redding on Saturday and stayed with us. Here are Samuel and Mason making breakfast on Sunday morning.

These were all of the kids at Mase's party (except Samuel)! We only invited our families and still ended up with about 25 adults and 5 kids. Thankfully, it was a gorgeous Nor Cal day and guests could sit outside or inside (of course, most of the men chose inside so they could watch the football games).

Lunch time! I used THIS pulled pork recipe and it was delicious! Katie came over early to help and made the coleslaw from THIS recipe. Of course, you can't have a Dr. Seuss party without green eggs. We also served fresh veggies with ranch, baked beans, and raspberry Jell-o with gummy sharks "swimming" in it.

This *might* have been my favorite part of the party. :)

I found an overhead projector on Craigslist for cheap, copied an image from Google onto a transparency, then used craft paint to create Thing 1 and Thing 2. Home Depot sells 4x8 styrofoam boards that are a half inch thick for $8, so I had them cut one down to a manageable size for me and I cut out the holes for our faces.

Guests took turns getting their pictures taken and I'll send a copy of each couple's photo to them with thank you notes.

Mason and Uncle Jared

Mase and Jenna (How funny are their expressions?!)

To mimic Thing 1 and Thing 2 hair, dessert was Cotton Candy cupcakes. They are french vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream frosting mixed with cotton candy. Plus a little on top for garnish.

Tessa, from The Frosted Cake Shop, made Mason's smash cake again this year.

I always request a low-sugar, organic recipe. This year she did a chocolate cake with strawberry filling. Mmm...

Me and my birthday boy.

I still can't believe he's 2.

Everyone should have a special birthday outfit! I made Mase's shirt with applique a simple "2" and two small blue fish.

And a birthday hat a'la Cat in the Hat!

I've said it before and I'll say it again, you can make anything with felt and hot glue (and, in this case, pipe cleaners).

At first we gave him the whole cake and told him to go for it. Being my OCD kid, he gingerly licked a finger's worth of frosting off and that's about it. Our families were trying to tell him there were toys inside so he would dig in. No go.

I handed Mase a fork and he made a small dent in one section of the top-- being careful not to disturb the pretty yellow writing.

And that was it for the cake. There's a lot left over for me and Matt!

Our attempt at a family picture. At least one of us is looking at this camera. :)

We all had a great time and spent the evening playing with new toys (Mason), putting together Mason's cool new play table (Matt), and cleaning up (me).

This year's One Fish, Two Fish party was a LOT less work than last year's golf party, and even more fun!

Oh, and favors were bags of swedish fish and gummy sharks. (Matt and I might've stashed a couple extras to keep for ourselves!)

Wednesday is Mason's actual birthday and I've got a fun-filled day planned that includes a visit to the pediatrician for his 2 year shots. Don't worry, there willl be sufficient birthday treats involved too.

Now, time to start brainstorming for the 3rd birthday party...

I can't believe

my BABY is turning TWO next week!

I'm told this happens. I refused to believe it until now.

We are celebrating this weekend.

Pictures to follow. :)



Cranberry Sangria

Here is the Cranberry Sangria recipe I made for Jaime's shower. It was adapted from THIS Bobby Flay pomegranate sangria recipe. Lucky for me, there was a bit left over by the end of the shower, and I finished that off last night. Mmm. :)



Ingredients:

- 1 bottle fruity red wine (I used Crane Lake Cabernet-- it's $3 a bottle at Winco)

- 1 1/2 cups Trader Joe's Sparking Pomegranate juice

- 1/2 cup cranberry juice
- 1/2 cup brandy (VSOP was quite tasty)
- 1/2 cup Triple Sec
- 1/4 cup simple syrup (equal amounts sugar and water, heated until sugar dissolves, cooled)
- 1/4 cup pomegranate seeds
- 2 Mandarin oranges, thinly sliced
- 1 green apple, cored, halved and thinly sliced

Directions:
Combine all ingredients except for the Sparkling Pomegranate juice in a pitcher, cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or up to 48 hours before serving. Immediately before serving, add the Sparkling Pomegranate juice and serve over ice.

I doubled the recipe for a shower of about 12 and it was so yummy, I will definitely make this again. In fact, Mason's birthday is next weekend... I could work that into a "One Fish Two Fish" theme, right? :)

Sprinkled

Sunday we celebrated Jaime's 2nd son, "Baby G" with a baby sprinkle. How good does she look for having a due date of February 11??? Craziness.

Some of the girls drove up from the bay area for the occassion. This is Laura, Lindsey, Jaime, me and Heidi...

We all happened to be wearing boots, a la Jaime. Funny! :)

The menu:

Three Cheese Hot Artichoke Dip

Roasted Cinnamon Almonds

Smoked Salmon Gaufrettes

Bruchetta with Goat Cheese, Pears & Honey

Mini Cheddar Herb muffins

Brie en Croute (thank you, Laura!)

Red Velvet mini cupcakes with Cream Cheese frosting

Cranberry Sangria (which was by far my favorite part... mmm...)

Heidi brought the cupcakes, courtesy of bay area baker Sinful Bliss. They were little bites of heaven. Mmm...

After such a full day, I was in bed by 8pm. So there are already two posts covering this shower, HERE and HERE. Thank you for taking pictures, Heidi! I will definitely share that sangria recipe soon. It was SO good.

Congratulations, Jaimes! We can't wait to meet Baby G!!!

Weekend in pictures

Happy Birthday Jenna!

The princess even had her very own castle (the boys are storming the gates here).

The kids got to dress up in their Halloween costumes. Can you guess what Mason is?

The birthday girl opening gifts, with help from dad.

Church on Sunday and dodging enormous rain drops completed the weekend!

The girls of Edina

Labor Day weekend I got to take a mini-vacation to visit with friends in Edina, Minnesota. Two full days in a suburb of Minneapolis and one of those was spent at the Minnesota State Fair. Here we are taking the bus to the fair, because the fair is enormous and if you drive there and park you have to walk all day to get there. At least that's what I'm told.

The Minnesota State Fair is also so enormous that you can't walk the entire thing (especially not with pregnant ladies in your group). The sky-ride thing was awesome.

We all know the only reason you go to the fair is the food though. Check out Heidi's thorough recap of all things fried HERE. (And all the shopping!)

Best part of the trip, these moments...

The whole reason for the Edina getaway-- L. Shanna's baby shower. Kim and L.'s sister-in-law put together a gorgeous and elegant celebration of Chewy. You can read their recaps HERE and HERE and L.'s HERE.

Obviously, I am the last to post pictures and thoughts of the weekend, but it was such a good time with some of the most important women in my life. I am the luckiest woman in the entire world.

Summer Solstice

Two years ago we had just bought our house in Spokane and had yet to meet very many of the neighbors. Summer Solstice happened to be on a Saturday that year and we thought it would be fun to host a "Summer Solstice Cocktail Party" and invite the neighborhood. We had such a good time we decided to make it a tradition.

Here's how to host your own neighborhood gathering!

Step 1: Pass out invitations to each house on your street (include the neighbors one street over who have a child the same age as yours)

Step 2: Make a simple centerpiece with empty wine bottles, a few hydrangea stems and simple labels

Step 3: Light a few citronella candles

Step 4: Thank darling significant other for making the patio and yard look amazing

Step 5: Set out glasses, turn on some good music, and clean out the liquor cabinet

Step 6: Provide simple refreshments

Step 7: Remember everyone's names!

If you don't know your neighbors, try this! Or even if you do, it'll be a fun way to reconnect. Everyone left thanking us and commenting that our neighborhood should do this every month.

Welcome summer!

Weekend Fun

Church, dinner with family and a PARTY

Have a great week!

Sunny San Diego

I wish I could regularly fly down to So Cal and just spend the day walking on the beach and shopping in the awesome antique shops they have there. I'll settle for special occasions though!

Me, Julie, Amanda, Heather and Mel

There are lots of gorgeous photos from Heather's insanely beautiful baby shower (taken by Mel) HERE.

The best part? Getting to spend the afternoon with some truly phenomenal women talking marriage, babies, home decor, parties and just life in general. Let me tell you, life is good.

Happy Birthday Dad!

We had an impromptu family dinner party tonight to celebrate Grandpa Flint's birthday

Cheesecake bars with homemade strawberry jam and lemon meringue pie

(The candles spell out "51")

Uncle Jared and Mason spending some quality time together

Simple paper bunting and some festive place mats liven up our earth tone decor

(The daffodils on the table are from Trader Joe's. If you have a TJ's near you, go pick some up. They are $1.29 a bunch and I guarantee they will brighten your day. These are yellow with orange centers!)

Tacos + virgin margaritas + good company = the perfect weeknight celebration

Mason's First Birthday Party!

Happy First Birthday to our little Peanut! Mason doesn't technically turn one until tomorrow, but we celebrated yesterday. Here are some highlights...

The theme of Mason's first birthday was "On the Green" for two reasons. One, everything had an environmentally friendly focus (we even asked guests to keep their gifts "green") and two, we incorporated a golf mini-tournament. Here is Uncle Justin (and Great Grandpa Saner in the background) at the course. Unfortunately it was rainy but the guys were total troopers.

Uncle Jeff came prepared with his umbrella (obviously he is one of the experienced golfers.)

The golfers included Tage, his friend Danny, Uncle Jeff, Great Grandpa Saner, Uncle Jared, Uncle Justin and Uncle Keith. The guys planned to golf 9 holes but then they decided it would be fun to ALL golf together (instead of breaking up into groups) so an hour and a half into the golf game they were only on the 3rd hole. Since there were some significant others and children waiting back at the party for them, not everyone got to finish the 9 holes.

I love Mason's golf hat. And those are Mason's first pair of shoes! One fell off in the car and he was so upset, he wanted us to put it back on immediately. I made the argyle design on Mase's shirt using this tutorial.

We are so proud of our families and friends for keeping their gifts recycled, reused and organic! There was NO wrapping paper waste and Mason got some great gifts (new organic cloth diapers, a Klean Kanteen, LOTS of new-to-us books and a few new and new-to-us toys and clothes.)

Now the cake.

The best part. :)

I ordered Mason's smash cake from Tessa at The Frosted Cake Shop. It was her first request for a low-sugar, organic cake. As you'll see, Mason approved. All I told her was that our colors were apple green, orange and brown and that it was a "golf" theme. Mase's cake looked almost exactly like the bib (which I also made!)

At first Mason gingerly picked the frosting pieces off the top of the cake and ate them one at a time.

Once he realized the cake was all his to eat, he got right down to business.

THEN when he discovered there were two delicious layers-- it was all over for that cake.

"Here Mama!"

I think Mason literally sat there for 40 minutes working meticulously on eating as much of his cake as possible. It was everywhere.

It was a wonderful day, Mason had a great time at his party and I think our family and friends did too. These are just about all of the pictures I took but Auntie Jaime took some too, so hopefully I'll have more to post later on. All week I'll be sharing the rest of the party (food, decor, activities) on the Pear Tree Events blog, so check there too.

Mason's first birthday party was intended to be a huge THANK YOU party to all of our family and friends for helping us survive our first year of parenting. We could not have done it without their support (physically, emotionally and mentally.)

We are excited for year #2. :)