Future Envy of the PTA

I wanted to post the pictures from the most recent Mother's Day because I just love being with my family. Paisley and Carter are growing so fast and they are such great playmates. It's hilarious to watch them as they enter a room together. It's like firecrackers! Carter starts squealing, kicking his feet, and yelling "Paibley, Paibley, Paibley!" and Paisley squeals back and always goes running for a hug from her "Car-Car". It's the sweetest thing! They all came to my house for Mother's Day and we ribs on the grill, fresh veggies, and a nice cookie-cake dessert (looooooooove it!).

This boy loooooves his rainboots!
(AND PLEASE DO NOT JUDGE ME BY MY KITCHEN!! WE STILL HAVE DONE NOOOTHING TO RE-DO IT, OR STRIP THAT NASTY WALL PAPER!!)

I love that she looks just like me!

...but she acts just like her momma!

This is my favorite picture, almost of all times! My mom is so good with our babies and lets them be wild babies, but has a good ruling hand if she needs it!

My little family :)

I have to post these next photos just because I have the cutest kid in the world and he has quite the personality. I've always had VERY curly hair. I use a good brush now that pulls out some of the curl, but I still have to use the straightener on it. So, I've always imagined that my youngin's would have my curly hair. Not so much. He has my blonde hair, but he has his daddy's hair line, hair texture, and hair "direction". It always lays flat on his head like his daddy's, and it parts the same way as his daddy. So, this girl was dying to have a curly headed day for Carter. So, I got it all wet, scruched up his curls, and then sprayed the crap out of it. He looked like a crazy fool with his hair standing straight up on his head, but I thought it was cute!

....and of course when I went to pick him up at the end of the day his hair was straight as a whistle and laying flat on his head. Gotta love it.

This is his new water table. He hasn't understood that you need to play with that water IN it instead of sitting ON it.

He has always sniffed like he was smelling whenever I talk about flowers. Ever since we've had dandelions growing in the yard he thinks sniffing is blowing. Here is he is "smelling his flower" and giving it to mommy.

.... my sweet boy :)

I've totally gotten out of the groove of making posts. Mostly because nobody reads this bad boy, and mostly because I haven't had time or money to cook creatively, or sew much. But, I will share some of our summer activities. It's been so crazy to have Carter moving and shaking soooo much more than last year. It's opened doors that I never imagined we would be walking through. Trips to the lake, trips to the store, spending time with family and friends have all been changed and rotate around what his schedule is and what his current ~~bad boy getting into trouble~~ activity is. We started out the summer with a trip to a local organic strawberry farm. I never pictured really caring about going to a strawberry farm that is purely organic until I saw Carter absolutely diggin' into the "bewies" (aka- berries) like he did. He could have eaten every single berry in that place! I never knew we had such a wonderful "you pick it" organic farm near us. Isley Farms in Burlington, NC is just amazing. The people working the farm are just awesome, and gave Carter a book about Strawberry picking and stickers. Here are some pics:

We finally got home with our delicious strawberries and promptly decided to dig into the amazing ice-cream they manufactured with their yummy berries. This was Carter's first go with ice-cream, and ..... well..... let's just say he was NOT so happy when I had to take it away from him. I was going to put up a picture of the damage we did to that ice-cream but smartly decided against it :)

Sweet little face dripping with ice-cream!

I've been reading throughout "blog world" for several summers now about how wonderful "freezer jam" is and how incredibly yummy it is. I've always had this "southern girl" desire to learn how to make jams, jellies, and learn how to pickle, but never thought I could do it. Boy was I wrong. This was so easy and soooo yummy!! I could not believe the beautiful red rubbies this recipe made. I tried to take pictures of it to show how bright this jelly was, espcecially in comparison to store bought jelly, but the pictures do it no justice. I've definitely decided that next year will be a year to furociously pick as many berries (of any kind!) as possible and to make this freezer jam as much as possible. I looove opening my freezer and seeing these little beauties inside. It makes me a very happy girl.

Here is the recipe from the "Sure Jell" website (AND CAN I PLEASE TAKE A MINUTE TO STRESS AGAIN HOW EASY THIS WAS TO MAKE AND HOW FREAKIN' DELICIOUS IT WAS!!!):

3-1/4 cups prepared fruit (buy about 2 qt. fully ripe strawberries)

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

1 box MCP Pectin

1 cup corn syrup

4-1/2 cups sugar, measured into separate bowl

RINSE clean plastic containers and lids with boiling water. Dry thoroughly.

CRUSH strawberries thoroughly, one layer at a time. Measure exactly 3-1/4 cups crushed strawberries into large bowl. Stir in lemon juice. Stir in pectin; let stand 30 min., stirring every 5 min. Stir in corn syrup. Gradually add sugar, stirring until well blended. Stir an additional 3 min. or until sugar is completely dissolved and no longer grainy. (A few sugar crystals may remain.)

FILL all containers immediately to within 1/2 inch of tops. Wipe off top edges of containers; immediately cover with lids. Let stand at room temperature 24 hours. Jam is now ready to use. Store in refrigerator up to 3 weeks or freeze extra containers up to 1 year. Thaw in refrigerator before using.

I had a wonderful reason to do a little bit of sewing again. Not as much as I wanted to do, but a little more. Another one of my friends was expecting a baby girl, the first in my group of friends- woooot! So, I finally got to bust out the pinks and purples. I wish I had known how to sew when Paisley came around.... well... maybe not, because that girl would have been spoiled 10 times more than she is now!! We had a beautiful lunch at "The Weathervane" in Chapel Hill. The did a wonderful job setting up the area and having great helpers for me to decorate, and to serve. We sat out on the patio next to a beautiful fountain. I got to do a beautiful pink and orange themed shower. I wish I had done it up a little more on the pink because I'm not sure if I'll ever get to do it again! Here are some pics from the shower and the quilt and baby booties I made. If you are a professional quilt maker you will probably cringe because it is far from perfect, but I loooooved the fabric and the colors together. It made me cry when I saw baby Avery in a picture wrapped up in this little blanket. It did

Here are the cupcakes, pre transit. They were so pretty wrapped in that beautiful cupcake wrapper. Then, they slid allllll over the place and got DESTROYED before I even made it to the venue.

I found some really cute platters at Target and hot glued coordinating pink and orange ribbons to them to help tie in the color scheme. I used the same ribbon on "sand buckets" that I also found at Target and put a little votive in. You can see how the cupcakes were mooshed and destroyed.... so disappointing!!