Dessert and Gardening

From first look on my blogs, if you didn't know me, you might think that Cameron was my favorite child. Seems like I am constantly putting up pics of him.....I in fact do not have a favorite child, however, Cameron is just the one in my family that is constantly either getting into something or doing something really cute. He is at that age right now, I guess! The other night for dinner, I made an ice cream cake (which of course included lots of chocolate inside) and by the end of dessert, he was wearing most of it. I know a lot did make it into his mouth, but you really couldn't tell that by looking at him! Shane and I just laughed harder as dessert went on and he kept getting messier. It really was so funny. These pictures really don't do justice to how dirty he really was! I thought it was cute when I read the blog of a friend of ours who said, talking about her own almost 2 year old, "I don't always know what he gets into...I just know he is constantly dirty!" ....and that statement reminded me so much of my Cameron.




Here is a shot of the boys and Shane from last night....we went and picked the first zuchinnis from our garden, and it was really exciting! Now all the baking begins! I will bake zuchinni bread all summer long as the zuchinnis grow and then freeze the loaves, and we eat off of them all year! It is one of Colin's favorite treats...."Can we have keeny bread today?" he will say. :-) Gardening really is hard work--lots of things involved, and I really don't know that much of what I am doing yet--but it is so neat when you get to pick your own fruits and veggies. This year we did tomatoes, green beans, bell and jalepeno peppers, lots of fresh herbs, and even sweet corn! I am really excited for that one to be ready. We also have a giant raspberry bush in our backyard from the previous owners that has been so fun to eat off of--the boys just get such a kick out of picking them and popping them into their mouth (while unsuccessfully trying so hard to avoid the thorns! They are both so scratched up from "helping" me pick!) Yesterday, Colin was absolutely covered in raspberry stains after helping me pick them, but he was so cute. He kept saying, "Ouch! Watch the prickles!" I know more ended up in his mouth than in our basket, but such is life...we really enjoyed ourselves!

I love my hubby!

First off today, I want to recognize my wonderful husband and wish him again Happy Father's Day! We celebrated by Colin and Cameron waking him up with gifts and cards. He got a Lowe's gift card and a homemade shirt from the boys. The front says "Our Daddy is PRICELESS" written around a picture of a sku (drawn by yours truly--Lynette, Karie and Aimee should appreciate that I am getting craftier as the days go by!) and the back has all of the boys handprints painted on it in different colors (Ethan's footprints) with their names and it says 06.17.07, Father's Day. He loved it and we all had a great day....we went to church, came home and had one of Shane's favorite meals, played with the boys and rested, then went back to church later that night. It really was a great, relaxing day for all of us!




I also wanted to let all of you know the wonderful progress that Shane has made on our Kitchen/Dining Room remodel! If you saw the snake pictures, you know that Shane has been working on the kitchen/dining room project for a couple of weeks now, and he just recently got a HUGE hunk done while the boys and I were in Chicago. Here is a shot of the old kitchen, which no longer remains!!






Here is a run down of what Shane did in about 10 days: all new wiring/electrical, all new plumbing, new lighting (recessed lights completely in, with a new ceiling fan with lights and two pendant lights over the island still to come!), that hideous teal panelling torn down and new drywall installed, drywall finished (doesn't sound like much, but that one is a three day project in itself!), walls and ceilings primed, cabinets installed, new appliances--including my most favorite appliance, the DISHWASHER!--finally in!!, new sink and faucet installed, garbage disposal installed, countertops installed, new slate flooring installed, and both windows torn out and a new sliding glass door put in! That door will someday step out onto a deck! It is so beautiful NOW, I just can't imagine when everything is completely done!! There are still small things to do, of course...paint and decorate :-), all the cabinet hardware and trim put up, built in bookshelves installed....but as of now, the kitchen is fully functional, and it is so efficient! I love it, and I can't thank Shane enough for how hard he worked getting it all done for me while we were gone!

There is still much that Shane wants to do with this project....the dining room is actually going to be extended about 5 feet backwards, so that will make things lots more roomy!

There will be stools put up at the bar area, and archways in all the entrances, which are so beautiful and one of Shane's signature touches. There is much more I could mention, but I will let you all be surprised to see everything once it is completed! The last picture here is a picture of my most FAVORITE cabinet in my kitchen, what I call my "fancy" cabinet. I love the seeded glass doors, and how it just adds that extra something to the kitchen as you walk in. I had to beg for that one, (not the most practical, money wise :-)) but I am so glad Shane agreed to it. I love it!

Honey, I love you so much, and I appreciate all the hard work you did. You mean more to me everyday! Thank you so much for being such a wonderful husband, and an amazing father to our boys. I LOVE YOU!!

Slides of our first Chicago trip!

Our FIRST Chicago trip of the year....

Needless to say, I am a little behind in blogging the events of our lives in the last few weeks. The boys and I (excluding Shane) just spent a week in Chicago with my mother-in-law, father-in-law, and my sisters-in-law ( WHOA--that is a lot of in-laws....I sure am glad I LOVE mine and get along with them so well :-)!! ) while Shane stayed home and gutted our old kitchen and put in a brand new one! (Pics of that to come soon!)

However, these pics are NOT from this past week....no, in fact, these are from Mother's Day weekend, which, yes, I know, was a month ago now. I have been trying to get them on the blog, but stuff just kept coming up that took priority over me being on the computer. Anyway, we really had a great time that weekend. On Saturday afternoon, Shane and I took the boys to Midway Airport to watch the planes take off.

We got to see lots of planes, and we discovered that we were parked right by a private jet. Shane made small talk with a man who was near our car, and he asked us if we had any "future pilots" in our car, and would they like to see the inside of his jet?

How cool! We got to go inside the jet, which turned out to the be the private jet of the governors of Illinois, past and present. It was the taxpayer's plane, and this man was the pilot. He basically flew around all the important people in IL. He gave Colin and Cameron the tour (us too) and the boys just loved it.

After that, we went to our most FAVORITE pizza place in all Chicago--Giordano's Pizza! The boys loved the pizza, but I can honestly say that they didn't love it quite as much as their mommy and daddy! Ethan was a gem the entire time as well. All in all, it was a GREAT weekend in Chicago!