Willow Lane

Eleven

Marley had her 11th Birthday on April 1st.  Where has the time gone??  My 20th high school reunion is this year, and I still feel act like I just graduated, LOL! So much has happened in those years but it's flown by, it really makes me want to slow time down and really take the time to enjoy things. Anyway, we took Marley and 2 friends to the movies, I think they giggled for 4 hours straight. Marley picked out her cake, she wanted a meatloaf cake, so her dad made her one and she loved it. We might have to make it this way all the time, it's much more fun than my plain boring meatloaf.  I think it was a great birthday!

Get Real Monday!

Randi is having Let's Get Real Monday over at her blog. I've been procrastinating with my Spring cleaning, so this was a good reason to get started.  I come from a long of serious housekeepers, it's a rule in our family that you clean on Thursdays, and everything is done a certain way....my favorite is that you clean upstairs first because all the dust falls downstairs. Anyway, I keep a clean house, I'm always worried that someone will stop over and the house won't be "just right". I have a secret though, behind some of my closet doors, things aren't so pretty. Today I decided to tackle my bathroom. To walk in you'd think it was just cleaned, then if you'd open the cabinet doors you'd think maybe not. So here it is. I finished this evening but didn't get a chance to take pictures, I'll take some tomorrow. WHEW!! Thanks Randi!

All this stuff came out of that cabinet!!

Green

Happy St. Patricia's Patrick's Day! I'm a day late. I think I had some kind of reaction to all the green food coloring I ingested, I could not stay awake.  The weather was terrible and I'm so thankful that the girls didn't dance in the St. Patrick's parade this year. It would have been so miserable.

Jennifer had a post about Shamrock shakes, and seeing if they could be found. Friday I went to our local McDonald's and the Shamrock shake was on the menu, but they were out of them. So, yesterday I went out in search of the elusive Shamrock Shake. I FOUND IT!! I did have to go to another state, but I got it. Of course I forgot to take mty camera, so I turned up the air conditioning and drove it home.

Here are some pics from our St. Patty's dinner. It really doesn't look very appetizing in pictures.

    Ham, green beans, green mashed potatoes, green cloverleaf rolls, and giant green cupcakes.

Spring??

I was going to write the other day about the beautiful spring weather we were having, but I thought it would jinx us.  Tuesday was beautiful. It was in the 70's and sunny. The girls came home, put there shorts on and rode their bikes around the block, over and over and over. We grilled steaks and opened the windows.  Wednesday it was cloudy and in the 60's. Today 30, rain, wind, freezing rain, snow, floods etc. A lovely day. It's supposed to be in the 30's all weekend. 

Anway, look at these cute coasters I made. I've been drinking alot of tea lately (I gave up my beloved DIet Coke for Lent).They have a little dried lavender in them, so they look like real tea bags, and smell good.  This set is in my Etsy Shop.

   

Wednesday-Friday

What a difference a day makes!

Wednesday the kids were off school because of the snow. Today they are out riding their bikes and enjoying near 60 degree weather.  I wonder what the rest of the month will bring. Here are some pictures from Wednesday...hopefully the last snow we'll see for a while.

 

Quilt

Whew! I finally got it put together.  This is Penelope's quilt. This was definitely a challenge, but I'm happy with the way it turned out. I really wish I could have taken a better picture.

Fun Stuff

We had another yummy Sunday! The kids really like picking out a menu and helping with the prep and cooking. Madyson did most of the menu making this week.

                                                            

And here is sushi chef Madyson

Oh yeah, manic mom, a blog I read daily was having a contest. She quit posting until she recieved  100 comments telling her something interesting about yourself. I was comment number 99, and I'm a runner up (the winner hasn't been picked yet)....I never win anything, LOL!. Anyway, the comments were really interesting, they range from serious to hysterical.

You've got mail!

Today was one of those fun days, when you get the mail and there's a box with your name on it. I love when that happens. I got this great package from Jennifer. I love the fabric fortune cookie. There were also some chocolate hearts and a chocolate dipped fortune cookie....they all seemed to disappear rather quickly, and I have three children with chocolate breath, hmmm.

                                                      

Better late than never?

I was just looking through my pictures and I found this one.

 

Linda send me this seamstress journal she made. I love it. It's sitting on my new sewing table and I'm filling it up with notes and ideas. She also sent the cutest cards, but I've already used them and forgot to take a picture.  Thanks Linda!!

Happy Birthday....to Me!

Sunday was my birthday. We started by going to Ikea and Barnes and Noble on Saturday. Ikea was so crowded, but I mananged to pick up a few things....definitely need to go back on a week day when it's not so busy.

My son told me to pick out some recipes and he would cook all day for me. He has two cookbooks, Better Homes Junior Cookbook, and an Emeril kids cookbook. If I was a good blogger I'd have links to the books, but I'm too lazy. Anyway, I picked the recipes. Here's a pic of the menu.

I love that my husband refers to himself as Chef DH. He asked me the other day what DH meant, I told him, but he didn't believe me, LOL!

My birthday also happened to be Chinese New Year, so I had "DH" make some spring rolls, they were delicious and so pretty! Happy New Year!

OK, here's the grand finale, it definitely deserves a blog picture.

I love cupcakes. I first saw some here. I kept telling the girls that we were going to make some for my birthday. "DH" surprised me and bought me the pans for my birthday.  The cupcakes were really good, but I was feeling ill after eating mine. Half a cupcake is plenty. Yummy!

Here's another picture to give you a better idea of the size.