Making Lemonade

Last week started off so great with a Birthday party for Pepe at our house. Gran and Papa even made the trek down to join in the celebration. A few days prior I had asked Pepe what he wanted for dessert and he had said he didn't think Reed could have his favorite, Earthquake cake, because of his allergies. I told him we like challenges and that I would do my best. Searching for recipes I quickly found out what a challenge it was going to be. The cake has eggs, butter, cream cheese, and pecans in it, all of which are huge no-nos for the Monkey. I was bound to make it work and on last Sunday morning Reed and I created what we have since dubbed "Reedquake cake." Reed loves baking with me so we ended up having a great time, the cake was actually pretty darn good, and was our first "making lemonade" moment of the week.

I was home with the boys last Monday and talked up our planned visit to meet Cameron and Bri's newborn daughter Cambria the next day. We wrapped presents for the baby and big sister Daylynn and were a little disappointed when Dad came home from work and told us Cameron had come down with a bug and our visit was going to have to be delayed - lemons! Luckily yesterday we finally got to meet Little Miss Cambria - lemonade!!!

 

We had decided to take Reed to the Farm Show this year but unfortunately I had a ton of work to catch-up on so decided to stay home with Kieran while Jon and Reed went to the show - lemons. On Thursday morning they left around 8:30 but unfortunately there was a huge accident on the freeway and they were stuck in horrendous traffic for almost 2 hours before turning around and heading home. The drive to the show should take about 35 minutes and instead they made it about 10 miles down the road - major lemons, especially when you've been talking up big tractors and cows to a kid that easily gets his heart set on things. When they walked back in the door, Reed's eyes were brimming with tears and he told me he was so sad and needed a cuddly guy. He then went and got one for himself and one for Dad because he thought Jon needed one too!!! Apparently he was a Super Trooper in the car and Jon felt so bad we tried to make up for it by taking the boys out to the ranch to look at tractors with Tio yesterday. Reed of course had a great time - lemonade!!!

 

As I've talked about before, Jon and I don't celebrate Valentine's Day, but now that I have kids it is fun to do something a little special. After a week of disappointments it was nice to have a pleasant day at home. I surprised Reed with strawberry milk with his breakfast. He loved the milk, but not the glass I served it in. Luckily that was our only real hiccup and the rest of the day we spent making cookies, having lunch with Auntie Amanda and Auntie "M," (during which I got to find out the sex of Amanda and Steve's baby and wrap a pair of ballet slippers in a box for them to open later that weekend - so neat - I was freaking out during the whole process), playing games, opening a bottle of wine, and making a yummy dinner.

To round out our rough week, on Sunday Reed and I discovered our beloved garden gnome had been broken by (we think) some bratty neighborhood kids. Reed was beyond devastated by this and we felt so bad for him. He broke down crying over the gnome pieces at least half a dozen times before lunch. While he napped I tried to glue the thing back together, but we are still missing a few large pieces. Again with the lemons! We decided to let him pick out a new gnome on Amazon and told him we would put the new guy out in the garden with the old guy to keep him company. This seemed to really appease him but then when Jon searched the website out of all of the choices that popped up Reed chose the gnome flipping the bird and with his butt sticking out of the top of his pants. We had to break it to him that this was not an appropriate choice for our veggie garden and so he reluctantly decided on a gnome holding a flower - lemons? lemonade?

So I don't end this post with our poor broken gnome I will share one more "turning lemons into lemonade" anecdote. We've been putting Kieran in a Bumbo chair for the last few days. He seems to like it which is awesome. Reed decided he wanted in on the Bumbo action the other day but when he tried to stand up the chair was stuck to his bum. He quickly assessed the situation and declared that he was now a snail. I love this boy and his imagination!