As you all know, Wesley birthday was on Tuesday and for his birthday we decided to take him out for lunch and a movie. The movie that he wanted to see was, of course, the newly re-released "Star Wars: The Phantom Menace-Episode I".

 I can still remember the first time I saw this movie in the movie theater. It was so big at the time my high school newspaper did an article on it (in fact, I still have a copy of that issue).  I was a senior in high school (or actually I had just graduated when it came out) and my boyfriend at the time (like all males at that time) *had* to go see it. So, like a good girlfriend I went with him. I had seen the original trilogy and I was very interested in seeing what made Darth Vader turn to the Dark Side. Of course, you get none of that in this movie and not having seen the original movies as a refresher on everything before I went I was a little lost as to how it fit into the whole series. This time around it was so much better to watch it for many reasons:

 1. It was Wesley's birthday present and it is fun to take your kids to do stuff you know they will love and are excited for.
2. It is the only movie in the prequels that does not have Hayden Christensen (AKA worst actor EVER) in them. His acting makes what would be a good movie barely tolerable. It is very hard to believe such a whiner ends up as Darth Vader. When those movies come out in 3D I will graciously agree to stay at home with Henry while C and Wesley have a father/son day out.
3. The movie does contain a REALLY good actor-Ewan McGregor. Even though he has horrible hair and is not standing in a field of daffodils (Steph C. you know exactly what I am talking about!):

4. I had already seen this movie about 5 billion times at home so I knew the story line and could focus on other stuff going in in the background and whatnot.
5. Knowing ahead of time what Jar-Jar Binks is going to say means you can tune him out thus making him less annoying. I actually laughed at some his slapstick actions this time around instead of being annoyed every time he opened his mouth. 
6. I had Wesley reassure me every time something was going to happen so I wouldn' t have to worry about the outcome ("Mommy, this is the race but don't worry, Anakin is going to win!"-sorry for spoilers to anyone who has been living under a rock for the past 11 years). 




There were a few downsides though.It was in 3D. Now, normally I don't like to see 3D movies because:

1. You have to wear glasses.

2. It never looks like it is jumping out at you, it just always looks like the background is further away.

3. It gives me a headache. 

Also, they added a bunch of stuff to it and it made it quite a bit longer. Because the movie is slow on action anyway it had Wesley begging for a fast forward button. Ah, if only....

Overall, good experience. 

The big 3-0!

I had about a million things to blog about in the past week but every time I would get on the computer my mom would yell at me for being on the computer "all the time" even though it sat in my room, untouched, for most of the week except when I was giving away all her stuff for free on craigslist. So, really, most of my computer time was spent doing stuff for her but whatever.

It was a very exciting vacation. You have already heard about the wedding and the found wedding photos. Then came the most exciting event of all: My 30th birthday weekend extravaganza! I know, I can't believe I am 30 now. Thirty. 3-0. Three decades. I remember thinking as a kid that 30 was sooooooooo far off, that I would never reach it. And now, here I am. I am excited though. I think the next decade is going to be a good one. Even if, by the end of it I will have a teenager who is getting a learners permit and an 11 year old (no, that can't be possible). Ok, enough scareing myself with visions of the future. Lets get to the really important stuff-my birthday loot.

My dear, dear, husband got me an iphone for my birthday a couple weeks ago. I call it my "ihusband" because it does everything for me except take out the trash. I love it. We will be celebrating our one month anniversary next week. Ah, new love. My mom sent me out for a manicure and pedicure while she watched the boys (and she took me out to lunch). I decided to rebel against turning thirty and got my nails painted a lovely lavender color. However, it backfired on me because instead of my mom complaining about the color I pick (Why do you pick those crazy colors? Why all the dark shades? Why can't you pick out a nice pink?) she said it looked nice. Now, I know my mom and she wouldn't just say that because it was my birthday. I am actually picking colors my mother approves of now. Oy. I am getting old!

My brother Kyle and his wife-to-be Ashley got me a very nice card, $30 in itunes gift cards and a Peppermint Patty. Yum. I had to hide it from Wesley so the little weasel wouldn't steal it. They then went with me to see Wesley sing the songs he learned at Vacation Bible School. That was a gift in itself, it was awesome to see him up there singing and dancing and then, of course, Henry would NOT be left out so he toddled his way up there and started dancing and trying to do the hand motions too. So. Frickin'. Cute. Wesley also made me lots of post-it notes with "I love you" written on them. I will be keeping them forever. Then my brother Brad stopped by and gave me my gift from him and his girlfriend Lauren (hi Lauren!) -a cheese dish from Crate and Barrel. I love it and have already used it. It made the cheese taste MUCH better.





My dad pays for my XM every year, so that is my brithday present from him. Then I went to Sephora where everyone wished me a Happy Birthday and I got a FREE bottle of Philosophy shower gel in Vanilla Birthday Cake. Love it.


On Saturday I had a small get-together with my family:Christopher, Wesley and Henry, my mom and dad, Debbie (my mother-in-law), Brad and Lauren, Kyle and Ashley, and Seth and Kaelee (they are my brother and sister also). We had steamed crabs, if you are ever in Maryland you have to try them.

Now that is a bushel of crabs!

Ready to feast! Just look at all that Old Bay.

Christopher looking a big evil here.

Just get someone to teach you how to open them. Or, better yet, invite me to show you how to open them. ;) We grilled out and had Utz potato chips and sodas and "Boh-tinis".

Lauren and her "Bohtini". Take a Natty Boh, rim the top with Old Bay, pop open and enjoy!

Three Amigos. Brad, Kyle, Christopher.

'Cause babies taste better with a little Old Bay on them.

Ashley, me, and Lauren.

Me and my future sister in law!

Naked baby. If you are wondering where Wesley was, he spent about 95% of the time holed up in Seth's room playing XBox. He came out for cake though. 

After we had gorged ourselves on crabs and it started to drizzle we all headed inside (and out of the heat!) where we had family sing along time.

Just like the Von Trapp Family. Minus the Nazis. And the ability to sing together, in tune.

Henry's first guitar lesson.

Then is was time for CAKE! It look forever to light all the candles. Which we didn't have enough of and had to use a number 7 candle to have a total of 31 (30 + 1 to grow on).

Lighting the candles...

...and still lighting.....

Finally! Done!

Hilarious picture of Brad singing "Happy Birthday" to me. 

Other random pictures from my big day:

Dad and me.

Mom leaving with Henry.

Bros before....wait, that doesn't apply here.

Ashley looks like she is going to shiv Kyle. She is definetly ready to be his wife! :)

Brad looking a bit dazed. Too much Old Bay perhaps?

My mother-in-law brought me my gift: two jars of "Oh My Gourgeous" body cream and-wait for it-and "Peaches and Cream" Barbie doll.


I still have my original one-except she is missing all her accessories and he hands are all chewed up because of our stupid dog. But she was my favorite and the only one I kept. I was telling my mother-in-law about it and she remember and got it for me. I seriously wanted to take it out of the box and play with it but 1) my brothers would have totally made fun of me 2) I would have had to share with my little sister (she is seven, and it would look bad if, as the older sister I did not share or play nicely and set a good example) and 3) I am thirty and thirty year olds don't play with Barbies......right? Maybe. I am still thinking about taking her out of the box, dressing her up, brushing her hair. I am sure I could find a way for Peaches and Cream Barbie to play along with Darth Vader and the AT-AT. Riiiiiggghtttttt.......

Domestic Goddess: Rainbow cakes and one year old birthday parties.

As a faithful follower has pointed out to me, I have had a lot to blog about int he past couple of months. There was a lot of times when I wanted to blog about what was going on but I was either too busy or too tired or didn't have internet and it just didn't happen. So, I figured, why not just do it now? It is still interesting stuff even if it happened a while ago and it will give me something to write about on days that NOTHING happened (well, unless you would like to hear about how I disinfected the toilet or did 10 loads of laundry because the cat decided to pee on everything we own or how I didn't do the dishes all weekend and ended up with a whole counter of dirty dishes to wash-epic stuff, let me tell you).

So, today I will talk about Henry's FIRST birthday party and the totally awesome cake I made for him. He turned one on June 10th and took his first few steps that day too. He was SO proud of himself.

We decided that since we were so close to Maryland and all our family and friends (well, not all our friends, such is the life of an Army family) we would travel up there and have a party up there. We got lots of cute sock monkey decorations, balloons, put together a taco bar with all the fixin's and sides of rice and beans. I made my totally awesome guac that people (literally) fight over and that I had to ban my brother from touching it until the party started beause I was afraid it would all be gone before anyone arrived (yeah, it's that good).

Don't eat all the guac!

However, the cake was the special surprise of the day. From the outside it looked like a normal, everyday monkey shaped birthday cake that any 1 year old would love to dive into:

Cute, no?
But the real surprise was when I cut open the cake. I really wish I had had someone videoing everyone reactions to it because this is what they saw:

 Awesome, right? I mean, who does not want to eat a RAINBOW cake? So, the next questions was "How did you do that?" Well, it actually very simple and anyone can do it. Seriously.

You will need: 1-2 boxes of WHITE cake mix. The amount of cake mix depends on how many cakes you are making/what kind of pan, ect. Follow the instructions on the back of the box and mix up the batter. Then split the batter into 6 different bowls. You will get a little less than a cup per color. Then you will need GEL food colors. You can get these at any place that sells cake stuff like Micheal's or A.C. Moore. I recommend getting one gel of every color you will need (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple). I guess you could do the whole "mixing colors together until you get orange or green or purple but really, who has time for that?. Mix a little of the right color gel into each cup of batter. It will end up looking like this:

Wesley, big brother and "Cake Boss".

Ooohh...pretty colors....

After that is done, just pour the colors into your pan, one of top of the other. Center the colors as best you can, as you pour in the next color pour it right into the middle of the previous color. Don't worry about spreading it around or anything like that. It will bake up like a rainbow on it's own. Trust me on this one. I have done this before, I am a professional. Once they are all in the pan it will look like this:

Bake as directed on the back of the box. When the cake is done (stick a tooth pick or your mom's really old Mickey Mouse cake tester in the middle and if it comes out clean it is done!). Let it cool a bit in the pan (hopefully you did not forget to coat the pan with a layer of Baker's Pan Spray or with a bit of shortening and flour. If you didn't good lick getting it out in once piece) and then turn it out on a cooling rack to cool down. It will look like this:

After the cake cools, decorate it as you see fit. If you just do a plain round or rectangular or square cake then a really simple icing to do is 1 pack of vanilla pudding and 1 8oz package of whipped topping. Mix together and decorate the cake. It's really yummy, we used it on the rainbow cupcakes we made, as seen here:

This is the first time in a really long time I have made a cake (and cupcakes!) and all of it was gone before the end of the party. I can confirm (based on information given to me by Wesley) that this cake will NOT make you poop rainbows. Just in case you were worried about that.

Finally, I will end with a picture of my brother in my grandfather's wheel chair because it is hilarious. At least it is to me.