Cute Wedding/Shower gift idea.

I saw this great gift idea on Pinterest and was so excited to get to actually get to do it for a friend recently. It is a unique wedding/shower gift that I thought was great! (and that I would have loved getting!) It is several different bottles of wine for the couple - each one to be opened on a specific occassion!

First Anniversary                          First Fight

First Dinner Party                          First Baby

There were a couple more firsts to chose from but those are the four that I decided to go with - then you add a cute little poem and tie them up in an adorable basket! Love it! I went with some cute giraffe ribbon because the couple was getting married at an outdoor wildlife park - perfect!

It was so fun finding wine to match the themes of the occassions --

Sassy B**** for First Fight

Sweet Bliss for First Anniversary

Mommy Juice for First Baby

House Wine for First Dinner Party 

 I hope the couple enjoys opening these bottles and reading the cute little poems that go with them as they hit these milestones!

Here is a link to the free printables for this project!! Enjoy!

Sprinkle.

This weekend my great friends Marie and Sarah threw me a "Sprinkle" shower for baby boy Alvarez. It was such a fun night and was so great to catch up with good friends!

Everyone was so generous! Especially considering this is baby #2! I couldn't ask for better friends!

Elena had fun helping me open all the presents!

There were so many babies around! It was so funny - I had told Elena there would be lots of little babies at the party and she got very excited and said "Ohh, I'm going to pet them all!" It was hilarious! :)

I can't thank my wonderful friends and family enough for a great evening! Especially Marie, her mom Liz and Sarah for all their work putting it together! Thanks for everything ladies! I truly appreciate it!

Go Layna Go!

Elena has had a hard time getting the hang of riding her bike, she never really rode her trike that much and she can't quite seem to get her feet going on the bike. So when she asked to ride it down the street to our nearby park I hesitated but decided to go for it. (Note to self - don't try this while 33 weeks pregnant, trying to hold on to a 100 lb lab, a cup of water and make sure your 3.5 year old doesn't fall since we haven't bought a helmet yet b/c she has hardly rode her bike before, and try to take a video at the same time - what a workout!) But she surprised me and did a great job! This is pretty much the first time she ever rode her bike without me or Robert holding on to the handlebars to help. What a big girl!! (and I love how excited she gets!)

New Sprinkler Park.

We went to a birthday party this weekend for our neighbor's little boy at a nearby park that we had never been too. It was awesome and we will be going back soon! Not only is there great play equipment, there is a sprinkler park too!Elena was a little timid at first...

 but that didn't last long! :) Silly girl!

What a great place! We will definitely be coming back here multiple times this summer!

 The birthday boy loved dinosaurs and though I didn't get many pics from the rest of the party I did get some fun ones of Elena attacking the dino pinata!  

Every kiddo went through twice and Elena was the one that brought it down! She was so proud! It was too funny, she kept telling me that she was the one who knocked it down!

She then proceeded to hoard all the Reese's because those are her Daddy's favorite! Too sweet. It was a fun day and I'm so glad we found a new place to go to this summer as well!

Fireworks.

For the past 2 months every night when Elena sees the first star of the night she has been wishing to see fireworks! I have no idea where this request came from but I kept telling her she was going to have to wait awhile until that wish came true! Lucky for her, we got to go to the fireworks here in town celebrating the end of Riverfest! She was so excited!  

 We drove down to where the fireworks go off with my Mom and good friend Lindsay. Wow - there were so many people it was insane! We finally decided to go back to the spot we went to last year. Wouldn't you know that parking lot was full too - so we drove down a side street and finally found a spot to park. As we got out of the car I swore I heard someone say "Molly", so I looked around and then kept walking - then Linds and I saw someone running towards us and realized it was our friend Jenny! What are the odds??? I swear, if we had tried to meet up with someone down in that madness it would have never worked - but we ended up parking literally across the street from her family! It was perfect! We got to hang out with them and E had some friends to enjoy the fireworks with too!

 The firework show was pretty awesome! Elena loved it and has now moved on to a new wish - a Disney Princess Ultimate Dream Castle! Yeah, doubt she'll be getting that anytime soon but she sure is a persistent wisher! :)

Recital Pictures.

The dance studio had some professional pictures taken of the girls in their cute recital outfits. I wasn't planning on getting any but Elena just looked way to cute not to! :) Here are the ballet pics ~

And the Minnie Mouse pics ~ these are my favorite! Especially the last one! :)

First Dance Recital.

Miss Elena had her first dance recital last weekend! It was so stinking adorable!! They did two dances, one where they dressed as Minnie Mouse, and another with an adorable pink sparkly tu-tu outfit! 1st was Minnie ~

 Make-up time! I think this was her favorite part! We practiced putting some on the week before for pictures (I will post those when I get them back-adorable!) and every day after she asked if she could have "big eyelashes" that day! (uh-oh, I think we are in for it as she grows up!)

On a side note (against my better judgement) I tried to put eyeliner on her when we practiced the make-up. Huge mistake. She had an allergic reaction which turned into a form of pink-eye! I felt like the worst mom ever! Thank goodness we went to the Dr and they gave us some prescription eye drops and it cleared right up. The young male doc asked if I ever watched Dance Moms - I said NO, even though you would think so since I tried to put eye-liner on my 3 year old! :) Then I told him it was a stupid thing to do and Elena totally called me out and said Mom, we don't use that word. Busted. She is too smart sometimes! The doc said the make-up may or may not have caused it - I think he was just trying to make me not feel like a terrible mom though! I definitely learned a lesson about going with your instinct - I knew that eyeliner wasn't a good idea but tried it anyway, I'll listen to my gut next time!

Anyways, back to the recital -

Watching a little Mickey Mouse Clubhouse before hitting the stage.

So excited!!

The big performance! :) She pretty much missed all of the moves to the dance - but at least she looked cute doing it! ;)

 Next it was time for the ballet outfit - so adorable!

On stage! She looked like she was having fun!

She did a few more moves in this one but decided to sing along more than dance! :) She spends the first few minutes looking for me - then she waves and continues on with the dance. You can't really hear it on the video but at the end when she is in the middle of the stage she finds me, waves and yells, "Hi Mom!" It was too cute!

Afterwards we gave her some pretty pink roses for doing so great on stage! She was not feeling the picture taking anymore but adored the roses!

I did manage to get a couple good ones of my parents and I with her though ~ 

We all took her out for ice cream after to celebrate, yum! My mom asked her what it felt like to be up on stage and she said it felt like she was beautiful! Awe, so sweet!

She was wiped out on the way home and fell asleep holding on to her roses :) 

You did a wonderful job my sweet princess, we are so proud of you!

Memorial Weekend - part 2.

Part 2 of our weekend took us out to our good friends Nate and Mary's family lake for a couple days of swimming, sun and fun! We have been out here many times before, but this is the first time we ever stayed overnight!

 

Elena and her bud Presley were inseparable from the start! They are only a month a part in age so they had a lot in common - a love for swimming, mermaids and princesses! :)

Elena is such a fish - she wanted in the water even when the other kiddos weren't in. And yes I even included a prego pic on this one - someday I will look back and be glad I took it! ;) 

 There were lots of older kiddos around that did a fantastic job with all the little ones!

Each family that stayed took care of a different meal and we had dinner on Sun so we Robert cooked up some of his famous fajitas! They were awesome as usual.

So how do you sleep in one giant room with three 3-year olds, a 2 year old and two 18-month olds? On lots and lots of air mattresses! The night actually went very smoothly - I was surprised! I guess all the kiddos were wiped out from all the swimming! (We turned off all the lights and busted out some glow sticks for the kids before bed - they thought it was the coolest thing ever!)

As I said the night went spectacular but as soon as light broke through the window the next morning, Elena was up and ready to go - at 6:30am! Now keep in mind, this girl usually sleeps til 9! We tried to make her lay and go back to sleep but her "quiet voice" is not exactly quiet so we got up and went exploring around the lake. It was so peaceful and beautiful!

She was itching to swim again from the moment she got up! Check out this stylish little lady!

Here's a pic of all the kiddos - Deacon, Elena, Presley, Drake, Kennedy and Kaylee -

 Just like the day before there was lots of swimming but Caleb also caught some minnows that the kids were thrilled about. I couldn't believe they would actually hold on to the squirmy, slimy little suckers!

The minnows turned into bait and Elena even got to catch a fish!  

 For some reason this weekend Elena was terrified of going on the boat. Even when Drake and Presley would get on it for a trip around the lake she opted to stay and swim instead. Finally they (Drake and Presley) talked her into getting on the boat!

We also somehow convinced her to try out tubing (I promised that if she didn't like it she could get right back off)! I was shocked that she was up for it! I was also so proud!!! She even made it around the lake a couple of times before she was ready to get off!! What a big girl!

After a little more swimming and eating we were beat and decided to head home. Elena fell asleep on the way and slept from 7pm until 10 the next morning! I was glad too because this pregnant mama was wiped out from the long weekend as well! Hope that you all had a great Memorial Day weekend too!