Miss Ava turns 4

The night before ava's birthday I perfected the birthday cake pancakes so she would have a special breakfast on birthday morning. (I had to try two recipes because the first was way salty.)

the recipe I used.... link below.

Ingredients

For Pancakes:3/4 cups all purpose flour1/3 cup yellow cake mix2 teaspoons sugar1/2 teaspoon baking powderpinch of salt1 egg1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract1/2 to 1 cup milkassorted sprinkleswhipped cream and additional sprinkles for topping, optionalFor Glaze:1 cup powdered sugar1/2 tablespoon milk1/2 teaspoon vanilla extractassorted sprinkles

Directions

Combine flour, cake mix, baking powder, sugar and salt in a bowl and mix. Add 1/2 cup of milk, egg and vanilla extract and stir until smooth. You want the batter to look like regular pancake batter; not too thin, not too thick. This will vary greatly on the brand of cake mix you use. Start with 1/2 cup of milk and add more if needed.Preheat a skillet on medium heat. Fold desired amount of sprinkles into batter. Pour batter in 1/4 cup measurements onto skillet and let cook until bubbles form on top, about 2-3 minutes. Flip and cook for 1 minute more. Serve with vanilla glaze.To Make Glaze:Mix milk, extract and powdered sugar until glaze forms. You may need to add a little more sugar or water/milk to reach desired consistency. Mix into glaze and drizzle on pancakes.

http://happyfoodhealthylife.com/2012/09/20/birthday-cake-batter-pancakes/

After work I picked up the cake and headed home. james took Ava to get mcDonalds for the kids because ava loves McDonald's. while they were gone the boys and I decorated. I had been making decorations all week. One of my favorite parts was the cotton candy drinks. I put a little cotton candy in clear plastic cups then poured sprite over the top. The kids were so impressed. :)

We also had candy necklaces and ring pops instead of party hats.

The theme was a candy party. Lots of candy, and lots of colors. It was insane. But fun.

Ok here are all the pics.

James hanging the pinata

You can see the cups of cotton candy here. Also Ava had a wand a made out of those huge pixie sticks

SO MUCH candy

Some decorations

More decorations.

I love the tissue balls they are cheap and easy and cute. I make them for every party

I added my own decorations to the pinata because it originally had a "1st birthday" sticker on it.

Me and a bunch of crazy kids.

James and Ava, sweet.

I didn't take a very good picture of the cake. Everything was really rushed

blowing out the candles

Me with my cotton candy drink.

James helping Ava open the presents. I did her hair really cute that day too.

Birthday girl

the birthday pancakes

Carter and Ava go Witch Hunting

On Monday I was off work and Carter and Ava were with us, so we went on a little toddler sized adventure. Also I should note I spent our extra money on Halloween (party, costumes, candy etc. ) so we had no money for an activity. Our adventure cost less than a dollar. YAY!

First we went to the library where we were going to get Halloween books (but they didn't really have any so we ended up getting regular books, but we did find a Halloween movie!)

Next we went to Gardner Village. I had printed off the Witch Scavenger Hunt at the library so we spent about an hour walking around, looking at witches and taking pictures. Carter and Ava loved the witches! And when you take the completed scavenger hunt to the bakery you can get a cookie for the kids for only 35 cents

Next we went home, had dinner, made pop corn and kool-aid and watched the Halloween movie.

Godsey Halloween Party 2012

We had a Halloween Party on the Sunday before Halloween since we had all of the kids. We had so much fun! We had Chili and Mummy Dogs for dinner, then we played games including "Don't Eat Frank" "Halloween Bingo" and "Skeleton Dice Game"

 The crew eating their spooky dinner...

 All of my games I printed from free printables I found on Pinterest.

 In the Skeleton Dice Game they roll a dice then collect Skeleton pieces based on what bumber they roll. Right before the party I realized we didn't have dice so I had to make one with card stock. It worked...

"Don't Eat Frank" was a hit. It's like "Don't Eat Pete" but a halloween version. They loved it so much we played twice.

 We didn't have AVA's costume since she wasn't going with us on Halloween, But one cheer uniform and a few stitches and we worked it out. :) I suggested Carter be Woody and use his last year's costume to avoid a spiderman costume disaster since this was before Halloween and you never know what's going to happen with toddlers.


Here is some of our Halloween Decorations ....

a day in the life

in instagram photos! i picked a day last week and took random pictures of my ordinary daily life.

The first thing I see when I wake up. :)

Then I check on this boy

sometimes he wakes up and I feed him

Action figures in the fridge.... seems right....

This is where I park

What I look at all day long.... (at the moment at least, I am moving offices next week to my PERMANANT home, yay!)

Grocery Shoppimg

Hanging out with these crazy kids (they are being chickens)

Finally dinner and putting munchkins to bed!

I watch my favorite tv shows: Modern Family

and The Middle

This is my favorite snack! James got me ADDICTED to these carmel apple sugar babies.  

That's about it! :) I love my life!