Grace is 5!!

I got the idea for her cake from I Am Baker. Her cakes are fantastic! They seem to be as fun on the inside as they are on the outside. You should check out her jack-o-lantern cake and her heart cake. Ohhhh and her Easter cake. She is AWESOME!

My colors were not as vibrant as hers, she must have used gel food colors. I just used a white cake mix and separated it into smaller bowls and colored them with regular liquid food color. Grace loved it.

So many Months.....

So many months have gone by since my last post! I kind of let it get away from me, didn't I. SO in lieu of a lengthy post(s) about the last several months here are some bullet points.

-April: Tim was offered a job in Olympia Washington in the beginning of April. So we quickly listed our house for sale and it sold in 4 days. And they buyer wanted to close exactly when we were needing to head north. It really worked out perfectly.

-May: Tim was training in California for the first 3 weeks of May. I was doing the single parent thing but thankfully since the house was under contract I didn't have to worry about showings etc. We survived. Then on the 24th we closed an the house and drove out of town the same day. It was sad to leave our friends and we miss them a lot.

-June: After driving through Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, and Washington we made it to our new (rented) house. We spent June visiting family in Oregon and getting acclimated to our new town. Towards the end of the month we went to Oregon for Tim's family reunion. Eleanor turned 3 at the end of the month. She had a little b day party at grandmas house.

-July: My sister Abi got married. I made the wedding cake. Spent a fair amount of july in oregon.

-August: The kids and i made a trip to Idaho to visit my extended family. Loads of fun! Swimming, marshmallow roasting, and sleeping in the camper. The 9 hour(one way) drive with all 4 kids by myself wasn't particularly fun so next year maybe we will convince daddy to go with us.

-September: School started. I am sure my rejoicing could be heard for miles. Eddie and Grace are at the same school now, which is nice. We live close enough that i walk them to and from school. Some time in August, with Tim's encouragement I signed up for the 5k at Oktoberfest in Mt Angel. I had been running some since we moved but hadn't gotten serious about it till then. We went to Oktoberfest the 2nd weekend and i ran the race. Since then i have continued my running and am running at least 3 miles every day in preparation for a 4 miler on thanksgiving.



-October: Eddie turned 7 in October! It is so hard to believe that he is that old. He is really a great kid. For Halloween Eddie was a jedi, Grace was a Doctor, and Eleanor was a giraffe. William wore a festive sweater( after making costumes for the other 3 he kind of got left out. Next year...)

Now it is November. Grace turns 5 on Friday. She is coming along, although her teachers are concerned that she may have other delays besides speech so we are looking into that.

William is getting so big. He cruises around the furniture and is starting to stand on his own too. He is a really happy baby and if I could just get him to consistently sleep through the night I would be one happy Momma!

One last update about myself. All this running has been beneficial to my figure. I happened to come across a paper where i wrote down my weight and measurements when i started back to the gym after having William. I have lost 35 pounds and MANY inches(i haven't actually measured recently). Also, I am down 4 pants sizes! YAY ME!

A grocery deal too good to pass up.

On Krazycouponlady today she detailed a grocery deal that i could not pass up. I rarely pay more than $1 for a box of cereal and my supply was getting low. I am going to try to break this down but explaining is not my strong suit so here we go.

I bought 10 boxes of cereal and 10 boxes of fruit roll ups/fruit by the foot, 3 doughnuts, and one softsoap all for $14.87. I think the most expensive thing was the doughnuts.

For the soap I used a $.50 off coupon, which doubles to become $1, and the soap was on sale 10 for $10 making it free.

This is the portion of the receipt that was the cereal and fruit snacks. If I were to averege the cost between the 20 items it would come out to $.65 per item.
This is the portion of the receipt with my coupons. On the Krazycouponlady she posts links to all kinds of printable coupons and e coupons. I had a couple of extra higher $ off coupons from various mailers.

Annnnd.... this is the savings portion of my receipt. I pretty much rock.

But to top all that off I got 2 catalina coupons(the ones that print out at the register) totaling $7.50 which i used to by 4 movies that were on clearance.


I paid $3.78 out of pocket for the movies.

Girls Dresses

My friend Jennie posted about some sewing goals she had for the new year. I decided to take her lead and start some projects of my own. On of her projects was making a little girls dress from a mens shirt. I went to good will and got 2 shirts for $5 each. I used the link jennie provided for the Red dress but i wasnt rally satisfied so i hunted around for a different one. the turtorial found HERE is what i used for the green dress.
This is what i started with.

My finished product

.
Eleanor wore hers to church today. I am going to alter grace's a little bit and then she can wear hers too.

Grandpa

My grandfather passed away this morning after being ill for some time. He was a wonderful man. I had the privilege of living with my grandparents fro 2 summers while i was in college. I was able to form a wonderful relationship with both my grandparents. I remember Sunday mornings, when it was almost time for church, he would play the piano and it was kind of a signal that it was time to be ready for church.

the kids an i were able to go to McCall in 2008 for his 80th birthday. I am so glad most of my kids were able to meet this amazing man. We saw him again in April for Ada's wedding and i was able to speak to him on the phone earlier this week. He was such a wonderful grandpa, and i will miss him dearly.

So blessed in 2009

The blessings dont get much better than this...Happy New Year!!