Gracie's birthday and other "stuff"

It is that time of the year again, where I go totally crazy: making Easter dresses time. Total count: 7, but then it turned out that the stupid patterns are so messed up, and I inadvertedly made the ones for Grace and Gwenny way too big, so I guess I'll be making two more. Here is Mr. Max, exploring the great outdoors. I put this harness on him, and he just went limp and flopped over. It was too funny. He absolutely hates it. So we left the harness off and attached the leash to his collar. That was better, but he would dive under the bushes and we had to let go of the leash and I worried that it would catch on a branch or something. So Sam has been taking him out without a leash... he loves it. He races up and down the yard and tries to catch flies and has a great time. He even came back in the house when I whistled and called him and offered a treat.

May I introduce our "other pets". It seems a family of voles (Wuehlmaeuse) has taken over our back lawn. They dig little furrows under the snow, eating the grass roots. We are just so delighted to have been able to have made their winter more bearable. Next fall we will be prepared with "MOLE Vax... eh, Vole Max, I mean.

Ellie and Max had lots of fun together. They actually played together, sharing toys, easter eggs (Max knocks them down from the tables and bats them thru the house, I find them in the strangest places the next morning.) and kitty toys. Max would pounce on her from behind the curtains, and she would try to catch his tail, which he would move at the last moment, and then gently swish along her face.

Good thing she is so short, or she would have emptied my fridge.

Here she is again, trying to share some fun toy with Max.

Darling Emily, seeing that only the girls were getting new Easter dresses sent me a web site with a tutorial on how to make cute little sweater vests for the boys, using men's sweaters. Since there is no shortage of men's sweaters at out house... I got busy:

Max, checking out Ellie's lunch

Ellie checking out Max's bed. This is a great improvement. Before we had this nice cat bed, he would sleep curled up right next to my legs, if possible between them, and I was unable to move. Now he is contained and I can turn over in bed without running into a sleeping cat.

Oreos in Milk.... they are the best.... it must be in her genes, since this passion runs in the family.

Look! my Daddy dressed me and took me shopping like this! At least she was nice and warm.

This is what we did for Grace's 2nd birthday.... do we have to top this for her third???

The total Princess cake in the making. Having never worked with fondant, I was a bit concerned, but then I had watched Linda a couple of times making Kira and Kayla's wedding cakes, and when all fails, frosting covers a multitude of mistakes.

Yes, the thing actually has a draw bridge.

Alysia is rather handy with the frosting bag. Considering she had never done anything like that before, she was great. And we sure had a ton of fun with it. The only problem was moving the thing from Buggy's house over to Topher's parents house, where the party was.... There were quite a few speed bumps to navigate. But we made it without any problems.

The finished product, in all it's glory!

Alysia had all Gracie's favorites on the menu, and all the little kids loved it. Gwenny decided the spagetti were esspecially good.

Dacia brought some PJs for Ellie that had either shrunk or Ellie had outgrown them since she wore them last.... emergency measures were in order.

Our home teachers came to visit the other day and Max was totally intrigued by Kendall's cologne. He couldn't get enough of it and had to go for just one more sniff.

The other day when I was visiting with the girls, we all went to Ikea. We had lots of fun and spent all our money, and then Dacia found an isle where they had super cute sleeping babies for sale. Unfortunately she got the last one.... I had wanted one too, but she said she'd share.

yes, these are a little bit out of order, because I forgot to do last ones first.... oh well, they are still cute. Here is Grace, discovering that you can actually touch "kittymax".

Emily had decided that I needed some fun toys at my house for visiting grandkids. Grace was the first one to discover all the new neat stuff that we had bought. She was so excited about the fairy outfit that she actually wore it over her jammies and slept in part of it.

There you have it. We've been busy. We've had fun. Live is still great. Love you all.