We are 38 days away from our Southern California trip - YAHOO! Very exciting! There is still so much to do to prepare for this trip, I am in NO rush. We are hitting Disneyland/California Adventures for 3 days, Sea World for 1 day and Universal Studios for 1 day. We will have 1 day with nothing planned just to enjoy the California sunshine (praying for that anyway!)

The kids got a special treat in the mail today. Several Disney characters were kind enough to send us postcards. VERY special. It made the girls smile ear to ear. Tanner even got one from Eeyore, and though he wasn’t as excited as the girls, it was nice for him to be remembered *I* even got one addressed to “Princess Jessica”. SWEET! Loved it… and just adds to the anticipation of our trip. :)

If you are considering a trip to any of the Disney parks, I highly recommend looking into a “Fairy Godmother” for your family. I found mine at www.mouseplanet.com, more specifically this forum thread.

Ahhh… I can’t believe my BABY is 7. I don’t know how this happened, but I know it does not feel like she should be THIS OLD. My babies are growing up way too quickly. Sad…

Bailey went roller skating on Saturday with her BFF Alexus. We then took them to the movies to see “The Tooth Fairy”. Cute movie and Bailey had been begging to see it. She asked me a few days ago if I could do something for her birthday that would surprise her. Her examples were concert tickets for Taylor Swift or a vacation. LOL. I said we already have a big vacation planned and can’t do any big surprises. She understood and then said maybe we could go to a movie and see The Tooth Fairy. I decided that was a surprise I could pull off So they didn’t know about it until we pulled into the parking lot. She was very excited. It was a great day and she had her first sleepover with her BF also… hopefully it was a very memorable way to celebrate her 7th birthday!

Pics…

Bailey’s gorgeous birthday cake that Grandma Lisa made. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!

We had heart shaped caramel french toast and scrambled eggs tinted pink with food coloring for breakfast and heart shaped pizza for dinner. It was Bailey’s 7th Birthday also, she had picked the pizza for dinner. It’s been a tradition we’ve had anyway - Papa Murphy’s makes these cute pizzas

The kids each got something fun for Valentine’s Day gifts. Mostly just candy (ya know… just to make our dentist proud of us) and a few other little goodies. My mom got all of us (even David and I — spoiled brats that we are!!) little boxes of chocolate with $10 Regal gift cards. Woohoo! Now we can all go see a movie for free - that will be so nice to use one of these days! Thank you, Mom!

More pictures to come from Bailey’s birthday!

My two little girls think they WANT glasses. They think they are so CUTE… and don’t really listen to me when I tell them how much they’d hate them! I’ve worn glasses since 5th grade and the 3 older kids all have my impaired vision also. Ashlyn is the only one that wears contacts (great for her! Wish I could!) I can’t even fathom what it would be like to wake up and be able to see everything perfectly without a cloud of fuzziness surrounding everything.

Anyway, without rambling on too much more… this is what two silly girls do while their big brother is getting an eye exam. They look pretty cute and all, but I am SO thankful for their beautifully perfect eyeballs!

The kids were able to purchase Valentines at school for the past week to have sent to their friends. Bailey came home all excited today because she got 3 of these Valentines today. I asked her who they were from.. one was from her BFF Lexi (this wasn’t a shocker, Bailey sent one to her too LOL). Another was from a boy named Michael (awww!!) and the third one was from… guess who… BAILEY!!! I asked her why she sent one to herself, and she said “BECAUSE I LOVE MYSELF, MOMMY!”. lol. Note: Teach my child to be a little more modest. I have to say I admire her confidence in herself. But… I really do think that she’s totally in love with herself!!

This is the last of the Valentines that came home in one piece. The other two she had the candy gone before she even walked in the door LOL.

The littles are out of school on Friday (and Monday) for President’s Day weekend. They are having their Valentine’s Day parties tomorrow. Yikes… I have 3 kiddos that are “done” with class Valentine parties. I’m an old lady. Ashlyn still made Valentines for her friends this year, Tanner is taking some candy in to pass out to friends (or maybe just eat all by himself on the way to the bus stop?? LOL).

We managed to make up 62 cards this evening. These aren’t the Valentines I grew up with! We had little cards you wrote on and then put in an envelope, sealed with a cute heart sticker. Usually we’d fill the envelope with a few conversation hearts just for a fun kick. But no… nowadays, you punch out the heart very carefully to avoid ripping the darn thing and then punch out the arrow. Attach pixy stix (62×2 because each arrow uses 2).. write in the names and alas we are done.

Bailey multi-tasking, talking to her BFF and writing on her cards at the same time

McKenzie drew this picture for me tonight…

It says: “Mommy you opened my heart and filled it with love, joy, and laughter. Thank you for being there when I needed you. I love you.” So sweet… I love you too McKenzie!!!

And Ashlyn wrote this for school, the little pink slips are compliments other students have attached. Cute idea for editing papers on the teacher’s part!

The girls and I made sugar cookies last night. Why is it that when it’s Valentine’s Day I can’t find my heart cookie cutters and when it’s Halloween I can’t find my pumpkin ones? LOL. We improvised, some we will frost and put sprinkles on, the others we rolled into balls and in red, purple, and pink colored sugar.

This recipe is one of our favorite sugar cookie recipes. It’s great for rolled cookies/cutouts and for simple drop cookies also. Great for frosted cookies because the cookie itself isn’t TOO sweet. Just sweet enough.

INGREDIENTS
2/3 cup shortening
2/3 cup butter
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup granulated sugar for decoration

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a medium bowl, cream together the butter, shortening and sugar. Stir in
   the eggs and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt, stir into the
   creamed mixture until dough comes together. Roll dough into walnut sized balls
   and roll the balls in sugar. Place them on an unprepared cookie sheet about 2
   inches apart.
3. Bake cookies 10 to 12 minutes in the preheated oven, until bottom is light
   brown. Remove from baking sheets to cool on wire racks.

McKenzie loves helping out in the kitchen and has been doing it more and more. She made meatballs on Super Bowl Sunday at Grandma Lisa’s… and also made bacon wrapped smokies all on her own. She’s going to be a better cook than her mama!

Tanner rocking some Spudder spirit with the pep band

THEY ARE REALLY GOOD!!

Maybe one of these days we’ll have video to post also…. but here are pictures for now. This was McKenzie’s first time doin Cheer Camp. Bailey has done many. They both had a blast and it was really fun watching them practice together.

Making a slight change to my blog. I initially started this blog as a way of keeping track of my kids, sharing their activities and various milestones with family and friends. I have really developed a passion for bargain hunting over the last few years and while I’ve shared a few things here, I thought it was time to start my own bargain blog, devoted SOLELY to saving money, earning money, and spending less. I will probably still post a few things here and there here… but feel free to come check out my adventures in bargain hunting over at The Bargain Chick.