more tangled fun!

For Kerigan's actual birthday on July 12 we went out to dinner at our favorite restaurant, Hickory Park. They have the best food in the world and they always give you a free birthday treat and sing to you so it's always a top choice for birthdays!

I just can't believe my sweet girl is two!

 She was being so sweet and cuddly, giving hugs (instead of eating- Ha!)

 She was so funny and acted shy when they all came to serenade her!

She wasn't great at blowing out the candles!  But this is so cute because she was trying so hard!  (And there's her Rapunzel shoes in the picture!  I didn't think I had a picture of them!)

 I just love this little girl's smiles!  She literally can light up the room.

 A little love from Mommy and Bubba!  We just love her to pieces!

 One of the kids favorite things is getting to fill up a little sack with treats on our way out!  It is like a little old fashioned candy store and you put your coins in the box and pick what you want.  So fun!  And they love putting their money in!

After dinner we went to Ga Ga and Papa's to open her birthday gifts from them.

She got lots of neat stuff from the Disney Store as Ga Ga and Papa had just gotten back from Minneapolis!

She never wants to leave the house without some jewelry on of some kind!  Look at all her necklaces- Ha!  I found this amazing lady on Facebook who does character chunky necklaces and they are the cutest things I've ever seen.  Kerigan just loves them!

I just love this picture.  Papa gave her this sweet little jewelry box with Rapunzel and she spins around to the song "I see the Light" which is Kerigan's favorite song.  He gave her some necklaces to put inside and she just loves it.

The weekend of her birthday we continued celebrating with Craig's family.  We were all in town for a family wedding so decided to have Kerigan's party the same weekend so everyone could be there.

Watching "Tangled" with her cousins!  We did a princess party here too but Evie was the only one who wanted to wear her princess dress!  Ha!

Kerigan got lots of nice gifts from her aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents.

I love how everyone wanted to help her blow out her candles!  *I could have killed Craig for sticking his hand in front of the camera!  When will he learn??  Ha!

All the cousins!  Left to right:  Kerigan, Evie holding Kennedy, Brooke, Andrew, Jayden, Abby and Jack.  Andrew loves nothing more than being here with all his cousins!  It's his absolute favorite thing and they are all his favorite little people!

There is never a dull moment with Daddy and all the uncles!  Ha!

A couple days later we celebrated Ga Ga's birthday (Kerigan was born 4 days before... I always wanted them to have the same birthday!) at our house.

We were in the middle of moving and daddy and Papa were loading the U Haul this evening and Kerigan was all out of sorts.

Look how sad she looks!  I have no idea what was wrong.  Something very minor I'm sure (girl drama!)

Ha!  I love how mom just keeps smiling and Kerigan is throwing a fit!  What a struggle!  But wasn't her little beach cake adorable?  And it was delicious too (the same lady who make Kerigan's made it- my mom's friend from work).

After this is when things just got crazy and the move was underway.  I have a few more updates about our summer before I start posting some pics from the new house!  Stay tuned!

best day ever

Kerigan's 2nd birthday was the best day ever!

I set up a little princess dress up area and we had a few of Kerigan's little friends come over for a party!  I was kind of nervous about this one because I kind of threw it together last minute and mostly on my own.  Craig was working that night (but we didn't want boys there anyway!  Ha!)  My good friend Emily who doesn't have a daughter, but 4 adorable boys, actually drove to my house to pick up Andrew, take him out to eat and to play, and then brought him back so I didn't have to worry about him.  You were a life saver- thanks Em!   It was important to me to have a party because it was our last party in our old house.  A week before we moved!

Many people thought I was nuts to go to all this work right before we moved, but I really wanted to make the day special for my girl.  It's not her fault her birthday landed right in the middle of the busiest part of the summer for us!  I had fun making the invitations, although braiding each braid was a bit tedious, but it was totally worth it!

I wanted to do so much more than what I had time for, but I tired to do the best I could with what I hadn't packed yet!  I thought this looked like a lantern so I strung some lights inside it and found the "Dream" sign on clearance at Target (there's a song in Tangled called "I have a dream" and Rapunzel dreams of getting out of her tower to see the world).

We had the perfect house to throw Rapunzel's braid over the ledge in the entryway!

I served the food in frying pans (what Rapunzel uses in the movie) and the kids had fun building "Tower kabobs" and eating off a stick!

We had bread braids (and no, I didn't have time to get creative and bake them from scratch like the moms on Pinterest, so we just braided the pilsbury stuff and they were delicious!).  We had ham, cheese, summer sausage, fruit and pretzel braids.

This was my favorite kind of party!  We asked the little girls to come dressed as their favorite princess, and we also had dress up clothes to play in!  They decorated a picture with stickers and princess foam shapes, which is something all little kids enjoy at this age!  Each girl got a wand they could decorate too.

 We had a couple of princess tents (one I borrowed and one I got super cheap) and they were a hit!

The girls loved playing in them!

What is it about a tent that's so exciting?  Ha!

This is Kerigan's sweet "big girl" friend Norah, my friend Andrea's daughter.  She is so sweet and fun to have around, and a huge helper with the younger kids (she and Andrew are the same age, 3 months apart) and Kerigan loves her.  I love how she's looking at her!

The girls had so much fun eating in the dining room!  I don't think in the 8 years we have lived there that I ever let the kids eat in there.

At least not a whole bunch of them at a party!  Ha!  I figured oh well, we might as well enjoy our house since it wouldn't be ours for much longer!

The food was so easy and the kids all loved it.  It was definitely simple, and if I had more time I would have probably done more, but this was perfect!

Kerigan got lots of nice gifts from her little friends.  Lots of princess stuff, which she loves!

The cake was my favorite part.  A teacher my mom works with does cakes and I've started asking her to do my kids cakes because she is fabulous!  I hadn't seen a more perfect Rapunzel cake.  Kerigan was in awe.

She said "sing happy birthday to me!"  Ha!  She loved hearing everyone sing to her.

Mt friend Erin took this and I love it because it shows the cake really well and my attempt at decorating the island.  I just put twinkle lights under it and covered it with a purple tablecloth and it looked really cute.

She was talking about Rapunzel being up in there!  Ha!

I loved this little sassy look!

My little princess

This is Kerigan's little friend Lainey.  Her brother is also named Andrew and has the same heart defect as our Andrew.  Their family has become friends with ours through our heart boys!  I love that Erin and I had our girls a month apart!

This just cracks me up.  These are two of her best little school friends Isabelle and Irish.  I love how they are smiling and Kerigan is making a face!  Ha!

More tent fun!

Peek a Boo!

My mom got Kerigan this beautiful Rapunzel dress and shoes from the Disney Store.  Kerigan loves it and wants to wear it every day!  I realized I didn't get a picture of her shoes, but her dress covered them up!  I'll have to get pictures another time.

This was so funny, after everyone left Erin and Lainey stayed later and the boys had a rocket launching show for us in the backyard.  Lainey and Kerigan were topless and cheering for them with dress up shoes!  Ha!  Funny girls.

Thanks to my mom, all of my friends and Kerigan's little friends who helped make it special!  Our last birthday party in our house was one we will always remember.

As Rapunzel would say... it was the BEST DAY EVER!