Treat time again

Well it's almost Easter so that means I've been working on some fun treats!! yum!!

First a trip down memory lane from when I put those cute bunny ears on the boys and took their picture!! Gotta love it!! I think they were both around 6 months old here in the pictures. Can you tell who is who?? I think it's pretty obvious but of course I'm the Momma!!

So this morning I made boys these cute little Cinnamon roll bunnies. I have to admit in person they look pretty funny since I used Halloween eyes, so the rabbits have blood shot eyes! ha ha.. But they loved them anyway!

These cute little bunnies and chicks were fun to make, but I admit they really took some time to do. I left some home for the boys and took some to work. I think if you click on the picture you will be able to see the picture larger if you want. These are just colored chocolate disks that you can buy at Michael's or Hobby Lobby and pretzels. Then you just decorate with whatever you can find..ha ha.. I also made my yummy homemade carrot cake for work. It's the first time I've taken it to my coworkers here in Florida. I'd say they loved it because it was totally gone by lunch time! The boys were hoping for a left over piece, but not to worry, I'm making our own family carrot cake for Easter. :-)

Of course yummy chocolate covered strawberries! yum...the berries are so fresh and juicy, these are delish!

I got creative and made each boy their own plate with a giant selfie strawberry! ha!

The neighborhood egg hunt is tomorrow. I thought it was last weekend, but I got confused with the dates. I'm trying to decide what treat to bring. They are asking people to bring pastel colored treats....I'm trying to decide....  They are also having a funny hat contest..too bad I didn't prepare more for that one. I definitely would of entered...ha ha....! They have collected over 1,000 plastic filled eggs for the hunt!! wow...although Dev just makes the cut off for the hunt, up to age 10. Wow...sad that he is growing up so fast and about to hit the preteens!! eekk!! Next year he will be in the tween/teen group! yikes!!

Saturday will be busy with soccer games early in the morning, the egg hunt and then later Mike and I are headed out with another couple for a couple's night out. I'm looking forward to the dinner. We are going to a place called Roy's that is in Naples. Mike has been to one before but I haven't. Last time we did a fairly casual dinner night so this one is a little more on the dressier side. I should of planned better though with it being the night before Easter! I will have to make sure I'm prepared ahead of time, I think we will be out fairly late. I also had wanted us to go to the early 7:15 Mass since we are usually up early anyway. Last year we went to the later service and it was standing room only and we stood the whole service. Yes, we did get there early too! I have great plans, let's see how it goes!! 

Last weekend we ventured out to try another nearby beach. We have quite a few beach areas around us and we are trying new ones to see which one we like the best. So far, I think this one was the best. It actually had some soft powdery sand unlike most of the others we've been to so far. It also had a lot of shells if you wanted to collect shells. Check out Mom in the bottom picture jumping in the air! Hysterical!

The boys loved just digging in the sand and playing in the water. They aren't totally comfortable with going much past their waste just yet. I think the more often we go, the more comfortable they will get. They are too worried about fish biting them right now...ha ha..

After the day at the beach, this was the car ride home!! yep!!! Snoozing!!

If you like Margaritas..have you tried the new mini cans? They have regular flavor, strawberry, mango, and raspberry. I had only tried the regular and strawberry and like the regular flavor best. Well now the local stores have where you can buy just singles of these. So last week I picked up the Mango-rita to try it out. I really liked it and so did Mike. The other day I saw this one and picked one up to try. Not my fave...it's ok. but my faves are the regular Margarita and the Mango flavor, very yummy. The trouble though, they are much to small!! I need a big can!! ha ha...

So if you haven't noticed, Bry is letting his hair grow out!! He wants an afro according to him! His hair has gotten pretty long in the past, but I think we are probably at the longest his hair has ever been! We played around the other night and even got some small pony tails in it! wow! I'm not sure his motivation for the hair style. Although, he has been pretty intent on watching Michael Jackson on Utube from the Jackson 5 days. He knows several of the songs by heart now, so maybe it's where he is getting his inspiration. He loves to sing the songs so I hope to try to get some video of him one day. He gets too shy to perform for the camera, but I'm getting him closer to agreeing to it! LOL...

Ha ha..Dev is the opposite. We just got his hair cut really short all over! I'm wondering with the heat factor how long Bry will tolerate all the hair. We shall see! 

 So on a side note if you watch either of these shows....these are my winner predicitons.

American Idol...... Caleb with Jena in 2nd place

The Voice......this is tougher, there are several good ones. At the moment I'm going with Josh on Usher's team. The  short guy with the hat that sings bluesy... But I do think that each judges' team has strong people on it, so it could be very tough!

In case you want to try a new recipe. I'm not sure if I've posted this before or not. We really like this and even the boys really like it! 

For the link click here:

Unstuffed Cabbage Rolls.

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 1/2 to 2 pounds lean ground beef
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 small cabbage, chopped
• 2 cans (14.5 ounces each) diced tomatoes
• 1 can (8 ounces) tomato sauce
•  
• 1 tablespoon cider vinegar or wine vinegar
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• dash nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon sea salt

Preparation:

In a large skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add the ground beef and onion and cook, stirring, until ground beef is no longer pink and onion is tender.

Add the garlic and continue cooking for 1 minute.

Add the chopped cabbage, tomatoes, tomato sauce, vinegar, cinnamon, nutmeg, pepper, and salt. Bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 20 to 30 minutes, or until cabbage is tender.

Very yummy!!  Well that's all I have for the moment. I hope everyone has a very happy and blessed weekend!! Toodles!

Proud parents!

So it's Honor roll assembly week! We are so proud of both boys for getting such grades. They are even busy three nights a week with TKD, soccer, and Church and they still made the Honor roll!! Dev told us that only 4 kids in his class made the honor roll and he was one of them!! Great job!

In Bry's class there were only two boys that made the honor roll and he was one of them! I'm so proud of him!! We told them that it is super that they are able to do sports and get good grades!! Only one quarter left so I hope they hang in there and don't let summer fever take over!

Bry had a book report project that he needed to make a character out of a soda bottle. Here is the finished project. He decided he wanted to do Albert Einstein since he had just gotten a book from the book fair about him. I think it turned out pretty good.  I did the hot gluing part but he did the rest of the gluing and painting and telling me what he wanted him to look like. Thanks to Mom for finding the great hair! He even cut out the design for the tie. 

Now onto my bragging rights...I WON THE BRACKET CHALLENGE  at our house! Oh yes!! I picked the overall winner and got the most points for games picked that were right! Hee hee...it's pretty hysterical since I don't know much about the teams. I even almost picked the final game teams since it was almost UCONN and Wisconsin in the final, but Kentucky beat Wisconsin. That's ok, I picked Uconn to win it all and they did!! But Mike told me that even a broke clock is right twice a day...ha ha...I guess he wasn't as happy as I was that I won!! hee hee... Love ya baby!! :-)

So now this lizard...or should I say Iguana. Mom and I were having lunch at my work one day and I saw this guy from across the parking lot. He was huge!! I wanted to get some pics so I kept getting closer taking some pics with each step in case he ran off. Luckily he didn't jump on me or anything. I can't believe how big he was! You can kinda see the size by comparison if you look at the jeep mirror in the background..wow! Needless to say it made lunch pretty interesting!

Last weekend was great and I got a few of my projects done that I wanted to. I thought I was going to be off on Friday and be able to get my painting done, but it didn't work out that way. That's ok. We did make it to the pool on Saturday and it was so relaxing! I could just sit out there all day! Bry scored an awesome goal at his soccer game on Saturday. Dev played really well also, but no goals this time. 

Random thoughts:

I hope I can get the living room painted this weekend

I'm not sure what animal is eating the bark off our tree in the backyard

Only 5 1/2 weeks till our trip to the beach with friends

I hope to get a run in tonight while the boys are at Church

We have been watching the show Resurrection....whoa...wierd..

The neighborhood is having an Easter egg hunt this weekend

Missing all my girlfriends 

Well I think that's all for now. Hope everyone has a great week and weekend. Toodles...

Gardening fun and more

So the creative bug hit me again. I saw this cute idea in a magazine. I decided I would go for it. I love how they turned out. I'd say the hardest part was finding what plant I wanted to use for everyone's hair. As you can see I didn't do mine yet. 

I even did one for Mom...ha ha....

Ok but here's where the lesson comes in. So I didn't read any directions for the project just saw the picture and did my best to copy. So here is what happened after I watered plants!! wow...the zombies came!! LOL...so now I know that next time I will have to either laminate the pictures first, not tuck the paper over the top into the soil, or according to a friend if I printed the pics with a laser printer then the ink would not of ran. Oh well...at least I got some pictures of them before the water took over! So I really did like how they turned out so I will have to redo them and this time I will do one for myself also. We could have our own plant family.

As I said I'm in the creative project mode. 

#1 I planted some more flowers out in the yard yesterday and I want to add some more to the back yard this weekend. 

#2 I bought a few solar lights to add to the landscape also. 

#3 I also picked up two paint samples to see what color we want to paint in our living room/kitchen area. I'm going to pick up the paint today and hopefully be able to get the painting done this weekend. 

#4 I bought some mirror trim pieces to spruce up our guest bath mirror. It will add a beveled edge to our boring builder grade mirrors. Then I want to paint the bathroom.

#5 Picked up paint swatches to decide on a color to paint a wood bench that I picked up along the street that a neighbor had put out for trash. I want to repaint it and add some decorative pillows or something to it.

#6 I took the handles off our bedroom furniture and had Mom paint them for me. I didn't like the color of the handles anymore and the new color gives the bedroom furniture a whole new look!! Simple DIY or should I say HSDIFU (have someone else do it for you...ha ha)

I better not get too carried away, too many ideas and not enough time!!

Well the weather is supposed to be a beautiful weekend and hopefully I can squeeze in time for us to hit the pool also!! 

On a side note: I have been watching American Idol and The Voice. I have to say that I think the Voice has better singers on it than American Idol!! My two faves on AI are Caleb and quirky Alex if you watch the show. Malaya is good too, she is just still very young and needs some more training, but her voice is awesome. The rest of the people I think are just so-so, they have good and bad weeks in my opinion. 

Happy Friday!

Rain rain go away

    Well the good news is that the rained held off this past weekend so that we could have both boys soccer games and almost the whole Sox vs. Twins game. The boys are doing really well in soccer. Bry got tripped and fell and someone stepped on his hand. Ouch...I was worried it might have been broken but luckily after some ice and rest he even went back in the game at the end. He is playing very well this year and I think he is starting to get some more confidence of how good of a player he really is. A parent came up to him after the game and checked on his hand and then told him how well he played. He told him that he was doing great as defense and he could tell he is getting confident but to remember to keep that same confidence when he is playing offense because is good enough to score a lot of goals! smile....I hope he listened. Sometimes it helps when they hear things from others and not their parents. But I'm proud of him and I can tell he is getting more confident each game. Dev also played really well. His team has really improved and this past game was great. They stayed in their positions and passed the ball really well. The other team scored a few goals but only because Dev's goalie is not good at all. He comes really far out of the box to get the ball and then stands far back in the goal to stop a goal and therefore it ends up being a goal. Anyway, otherwise his team played really well. Dev scored 3 goals!! The last goal he scored was awesome! I couldn't believe the moves he did as he headed towards the goal and then....bam! He nailed the ball into the goal! The other team had a great goalie also or Dev's team would of had even more goals. It was a great game. Dev told us that on the last goal he did that he went into Beast Mode....LOL...that is hysterical but whatever works! Proud of both boys for a great weekend of soccer.

The Red Sox game was fun. We stayed until the 7th inning. The Sox were winning until the Twins hit a homerun with some guys on base. The boys really enjoyed it. We left early because of the rain coming and made it almost home and then the rain came. It was neat to see the teams especially the Red Sox since they were World Series Champs. I took several pics of the players but honestly don't know who any of them are...ha ha... but now maybe if I watch a game on TV this season I might recognize a few of them. 

Mom sat in a different section than us because I didn't get 5 seats all together. I don't think she minded though because she was closer than we were. You can see her grinning from ear to ear in the middle of this picture. She was happy to see the Twins play since she is from Minnesota. She also rubbed it in that they won since we were rooting for the Sox. ha!

     The rain did manage to cancel our camp out though. The boys were disappointed. They have set a reschedule date so hopefully the weather will cooperate the next time. It kinda worked out in our favor anyway since we already had such a busy morning/day with the games so we got to relax the rest of the day.
     Well on my basketball bracket I picked two of the final four correctly! So I still have a chance to win it all with my winner...we will see. I think Mike has two of the four also. We have picked different winners though so it will interesting to see if either of our teams win.
     In my usual funny Mom fashion I planned a few April Fools pranks for the boys...

So the boys got a surprise when they opened refrigerator, I put googly eyes on a bunch of things. Bry's face is priceless!!

Lunch included an apple complete with worms and a smiley happy sandwich. They were both surprised with the apple because I wrapped the apple in foil and then put it in a sandwich bag so they never saw it until they opened it at lunch.yay!

Breakfast had funny eggs complete with gummy feet (thanks Mom for finding those crazy feet)

The boys were funny eating their egg, they were calling them Humpty Dumpty as they cracked open the egg..ha ha...

Back by special request from Bry was the Jello as a drink trick! I think they were expecting it this time but still just as happy as he tried to take a drink and it wouldn't pour!

I got them good with this one. I froze water in the bottom of their cereal bowl and then topped it with cereal. They went to scoop up the cereal and couldn't , it was a good one! They weren't expecting that one! Then when Bry wanted more cereal he poured the Trix box but Cheerios came out...haha...gotcha again!!

I also saw this neat idea of making fake chocolate chip cookies with mashed potatoes and black beans. Mom helped out and baked them for me. The boys didn't know I knew about them so they tried to trick me when I got home that Granny had made some cookies. I played along and ate one expecting it to be a cookie they thought it was so funny. I think they were suspicious though with all the beans. Maybe next time a few less beans might would trick my coworkers...maybe next year!! 

I had to leave for work so I didn't get to see this one, but I stuffed their shoes with napkins so it would be hard to put them on. Sneaky Mom!! ha ha....

Just a little bit of cuteness:  I found this cute drawing by Bry in a box over the weekend. I love looking at their drawings. :-)

        The boys got creative with the rain we had. They decided to draw on the screens with the water that had accumulated. It tricked both Mike and I at first because I didn't know what they used. Mike was even worried they might have used chalk....it wasn't April Fools this day but they tricked us for sure. It was actually kinda cool. 

     I received my virtual run medal in the mail this weekend. yay! A Florida race group holds marathons and 1/2 marathons near Tampa and they have the option of a virtual run. What the virtual part means is that you can run the race at home. It is on the honor system and no awards are given for virtual runners ( I wouldn't get one anyway) but anyway the rules are that you run the distance in a certain amount of time leading up to race day. You can choose to run it all at one time or split it up however you like. The money you pay for the virtual race as well as the actual race goes toward local charities. So I signed up for the 1/2 marathon virtual race. I had planned to run the 13 mile distance in two days, but with schedule issues and other things I ended up in three days but that's OK too. They always have the starfish as the theme on their medals. I am hoping that I can participate in one of their actual races one day. All the racers brag online about how well the race is organized and the course is beautiful! They also send you a bib that you can wear while you are running your virtual run. I don't wear the bib running around my neighborhood...LOL..but I still like the bib.

     Not too much planned for the weekend ahead. Soccer games and that's about it. I'm not sure yet what we might do. I have to say the snowbirds are starting to leave. Wow...when I moved here it was "out of season" and people kept talking about how busy "season" would be and then once it was over the town would be a ghost town. Wow...they weren't kidding! Season has definitely been a huge change in the amount of daily traffic, people in the stores and restaurants etc. Most snowbirds, or so I have heard, tend to start leaving to head north from April 1st to Easter. I can already tell that the traffic is getting lighter and there are a few less people in the store. I now will totally understand how the town will be a ghost town once they all leave! It's amazing how much it makes a difference. The good part is that they will be gone for summer which is when we as locals want to do most stuff anyway. So once they are gone we will be making more trips to the beach and other fun local adventures. Many local people have said don't even try to go to the beach during season, unless you go really early and stay late. Otherwise the traffic is ridiculous and you could hardly find a place to park! I believe it!

     Well I think that's all of my update for now. Happy Hump Day!! and Happy Weekend ahead! Toodles.

A heavy heart

     I end this week with a very heavy heart. My classmate from HS gained her wings and flew to Heaven this week.  Three short years ago she was at our HS reunion going through chemo with a new diagnosis of Breast cancer. She fought this battle hard over the years but unfortunately the cancer won. She is a single Mom with a daughter that is turning 10 years old next week. It breaks my heart that she left this world way too early. Although on a very touching and positive note, it is very apparent through the support shown on FB of how much she is loved and how many, many, many lives she touched. She has a beautiful smile that lights up a room. As we go through our daily lives it is easy to get discouraged at little things, get caught up in the busy days of life and take things for granted. You never know what might happen any day in your life or a loved ones, so live each day to it's fullest and keep in mind that sometimes those around you are fighting battles you can't see. This short story is very touching and a great reminder:

I know you did not know Shana but I still would like to post this link in case you feel led to contribute. In lieu of flowers the family has set up a fund for her daughter. 

You can click on the words Shana's legacy below for the link to the donation page.

Shana's Legacy

Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers and please continue to pray for her family and friends during this time of loss. Thank you.

We are "Happy"

We did our own little " Happy" video while heading to Tampa! ha ha...just sharing for you to get a laugh! By the way...I even got Mike to participate!! yay!! Dev gave up easily but Bry just kept singing along in the background! Cheers to being silly!!

Cloudy skies

We were up early Sunday morning and headed to Tampa for the air show. The forecast was clear so we were excited for a great day. Well I don't think it was clear the whole day except maybe when we were leaving. The good part of the cloudy day was that we were not really ever hot. A moment or two when the sun did try to shine through the clouds let me know how hot we could of been on the forecasted clear day! I wasn't sure how good the show would be with the clouds but it ended up being a great show anyway. I know they altered a little of the show due to the overcast skies and low clouds but we still had a great time! A trip would not be complete though without our silly picture!! 

I am most impressed with the shots I got with my new camera!! yay!! It was difficult to tell how they were turning out with the overcast skies. I was very pleased to see them later at home. I won't bore you with all the pictures but I just love the detail I was able to zoom in on! Also, I don't have any photographer experience...LOL...and I don't even know all the tricks I could do on the camera, so I wonder what a little knowledge could do?? :-)

I love that I can see the pilots in these pictures!

The boys were excited to see this plane fly because they have the toy one at home!

Bry and I were walking around and peeking at this Blackhawk helicopter and one of the guys came up and offered to open it up so we could get a better look....awesome!

I really like this picture! It also reminds me of the story.....I was telling Mike he could just lay back a little in his chair and then lift his shirt up some to expose his belly in an attempt to get a little sun tan...and then Bry blurts out very loud!...."Like the guy over there??!!" OMG...seriously.......the answer is yes, but....don't yell that out next time please!!! LMAO!! That's what I get for making a sarcastic remark about the guy next to us!! ha ha...

Bry also announced loudly to the crowd behind us as he was sitting on Mike's shoulders..."wow! You were right Mom...all the short people are behind us!"  haha...because right as the Thunderbirds were about to climb in and take off all the tall people came out of nowhere and decided to come in and stand in front of all of us that had been patiently waiting in our chairs for the best part to start. Oh well, we could see pretty good once they got in the air! ha ha... Watch out what you say around Bry!!

The boys were amazed at all the controls inside this refueling plane! As you can see they were being given the info by a girl!!! yay!! Go girl!! 

We had a great time seeing the Thunderbirds! I don't know if the show was better than the Blue Angels though, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt since they didn't have clear blue skies to fly over the beautiful Gulf of Mexico. We had a great family day!!

The first soccer games of the season also went OK. Both boys teams lost but they both played pretty well and I think they have some pretty good teams. I am already turning into a cold weather wimp though. The temperature was 69 last night while I sat out watching soccer practice and I was freezing!! I was snuggled under a blanket and freezing! In my defense the wind was blowing pretty strong! LOL...

Well we have a busy weekend ahead with soccer games, a Red Sox vs Twins game and the neighborhood camp out. The bad news is it has rained already this week and it's supposed to rain on Friday and Saturday! Boo!! Maybe the forecast will change in time for Sat. I hope so. 

By the way we did get the History fair projects turned in...whew.... and none of us will win the billion dollar bracket for the NCAA. Although, good news is that even though I've picked some losers for the bracket my overall winner pick is still alive! I'm not telling who I picked yet so I don't jinx them or anything. I think we are all about tied as far as wins and loss picks. I will have to total them up and see where we stand. 

I'd like to ask for prayers again for my HS friend battling breast cancer for the 3rd time. The cancer is winning at the moment and she isn't doing well at all. Please pray for her strength, comfort and peace. Thank you.