Hoedown Throwdown

So I am in charge of teaching a line dance at girls camp next week, and I decided it would be fun to learn the hoedown throwdown from Hannah Montana movie (I know it's not technically a line dance, but I'm in charge of it so I'm choosing this dance!). I spent the last hour and a half doing it over and over in my living room. It is a fun dance, and a fun song. I think the girls will have a lot of fun with it. I'm sweating like crazy though. If anyone is looking for a fun way to exercise I would recommend learning it (via youtube with Miley teaching it). She teaches it kinda fast, but thanks to my dancing roots I feel like I picked it up quickly. Boy was it nice to dance again-I forgot how much I love it. I'm thinking I'm gonna have to sign up for a dance class this fall!
As a side note-I watched the movie Dear John tonight and wasn't happy with how it ended-was anyone else really mad?

NYC

So our stay in New York City is over, but we are still vacationing. The kids and I are now in Georgia, and Ryan is currently in Idaho. He is having a family reunion all next week and I'm spending the week with most of my family here in Georgia-so we kinda have our own separate family reunions. Anyway...New York was AMAZING. We are already planning our next trip back (this time without the kids...although they did Great!). I'll talk all about our time there in an upcoming post, but I just wanted to share a short story...
So we stayed at this fancy hotel just off Central Park and the shower in the bathroom (shoot i should have taken a picture!) had glass covering half of the shower. So there was a big opening to get in, but no door to close up the shower. So the first night Ryan got the kids ready for the shower and put them in then thought where the heck is the door. So he called the front desk and said "my shower doesn't have a door." The receptionist informed him that it was the way it was designed. I laughed so hard when he told me that-I bet that wasn't the first time someone has called wondering where their shower door was.
It was a really cool shower though-the shower head was on the ceiling, and there were bamboo planks on the floor of the shower so you weren't standing in water - so there wasn't a ton a splash out the door. I'd like a shower like that in my house plus the other half of the door though so I didn't have to clean up a wet floor every day.

City of Bones

I don't really remember what books I read last month and what ones I read at the beginning of this month, so I'll just report on what I've read recently...starting with City of Bones.
My totally awesome brother-in-law, Daniel, recommended this book to me and I really liked it. I will relay what he said to me...read it! I promise you won't be disappointed. I'm waiting for someone to return the second book (City of Ashes) in the series so I can borrow it from the library.

I also read the third book in the Fablehaven series-it was just as good as the first and second books! I'm excited to read the forth one...I just got it from amazon on Tuesday.

I'm in the middle of all these series and it is sometimes hard to keep them all straight, but I am really loving all this reading I am doing. I'll be finishing another book tonight-book 4 of the Percy Jackson series.

Please, keep bringing on good book suggestions all you friends out there!

The number 2

Today's post is brought to you by the number two. Yesterday was Miss Halli's number two birthday. I heard her two little feet running into my room yesterday morning to wake up up at 6:15. The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes were her two big beautiful eyes staring into mine. I laid her into bed next to me and thought of the past two years with her in our lives. She is one crazy lady, but we sure love having her in our family.

In honor of her big day here are "Halli's top 2's"

2 things we did for Halli's Birthday1. Crowned Halli princess for the day
2. Ate a delicious fondant cake made by Lindsey (my sister) and I(Tiffani)

2 things Halli said today
1. What the....heck
2. Oh cute (said after she saw a picture of herself)

2 times Halli made ma laugh today
1. When she bit into her birthday cake after we sang to her (I guess that was actually yesterday-oh well)
2. when she said what the....heck

2 things I remember when she was born
1. Her pink pink skin (Carson was really yellow)
2. having her sleep on my chest-I love snuggly babies and she TOTALLY was...what happened?

2 things we love about Halli
1. I LOVE that she loves shoes...a girl just like her mom
2. She loves us

PS...My photos were loading, and then they stopped. So as of now I only have 2 photos-fitting I guess.

Hoping for a Prince

Yesterday we went into downtown Wichita to do some shopping and while we were there we found a cool little cove of bronze statues. There were probably 10 separate statues, some small water fountains coming up from the ground, and then a little water wall thing where there was a small frog statue. We let the kids play for a little while then Carson had to go to the bathroom. Ryan took Carson away and I took Halli over to see the water wall. She walked over with me, found the little frog, and walked right up and kissed it. I don't know why she did it...I guess hoping for a cute little boy to play with. Luckily I had my camera in my purse so I made her do it again and snapped a shot.Here are a few other photosAnd here is my AC project from last week #22. I've heard of diaper cakes, and my friend was having a baby shower so I thought I would try one out. It was easy to do, and something I'll probably do again next week because I have another friend having a baby shower. Tis the season for babies around here!

Backed up....

Oh, but not like that! What I mean is with my AC projects. I am so behind on posting about them. I'll see if I can get photos to load. I have been working hard this past week and I got 4 projects wrapped up just this week. I've been working on a handful of things for a while, but they all got completed this week. So here they are.
Attempting creativity project #17. This was from a couple weeks ago. My friend Kristen turned 30 and had a small party with some friends. I told her I would bring the cake. I decided to try fondant again and had a fun time doing the cake. I need to get some different paste food coloring though-it looks more like a circus cake with the colors I used (they were all I had though!). So before I do Halli's birthday cake in a couple weeks I'll get some different colors! It did taste awesome though...if I may say so myself. Ryan was glad I brought a piece home for him to have.
project #18I have a handful of friend who are all about to or have just had baby boys. I made some bibs similar to this (but girly) for Halli and I love them because they actually cover clothes not just her neck and collar of her shirt. So I decided to make some boy ones for my friends. They are all double sided. One side has the patterned base and plain brown tie cutout then the backside has brown base and matching patterned material from the front material.
project #19I had my first piano recital Thursday night. I made the programs for the evening. This was my first year teaching piano and I had 4 students so a couple of them played 2 songs. They all did great! (Look closely and you can see the 4th student playing was Mr. Carson...I'll post photos of him playing tomorrow...so cute!)
project #20I got this lovely yellow covered piano bench with the piano I bought. I've been wanting to re-cover it for a long time. I've been looking for the right material for months and finally found this last week!!! I'll be doing curtains to match next month when I have the money to buy all the material. I totally LOVE the colors of the new material, and love how the brown of the flowers is the same color as the piano is stained!
Project #21 First is a photo of the house a little over a year ago...what we're focusing on here is the "landscaping" excuse in the front yard.Here is the work we did yesterday! It has taken us a year to do, but it is coming along great! It still looks a little bare because there are bulbs planted so I'll have to post some more photos next year when things are up and it is covered better, but we love the improvement from what it was!
So this is what I have been up to lately! I have two more projects that I'll have done this coming week that I'm excited to get done too!

Tanganyika

We went to the coolest zoo yesterday. It is a small private zoo where you can interact with some of the animals. We got to feed and pet lemurs, pet kangaroos, turtles, camels, and giraffes. It is a really cool place-somewhere we will definitely be going again! And if anyone comes to visit us here in Kansas we'll take you there if you want!!! Here are some fun photos.