Christi Johnstone ~ Sentimental Silver Personalized Jewelry

So I came across the cutest cake online, it was a rainbow cake, with a layer for each year (so seventh birthday, seven layers). I’ve taken on some pretty challenging baking tasks before, so I thought this would be simple. It’s simply making more layers, smaller, and with a ridiculous amount of food coloring. I thought I’d make and frost it while Bella was gone, so when we cut in to the cake it would be a huge surprise, and everyone would cheer and balloons would fall from the sky. Okay, maybe that’s a bit of a stretch, but she would be thrilled.

Than. I. Made. The. Cake.

Oh boy. First few layers were okay, but than it started to get a bit wobbly, than a bit uneven, than layers started splitting. I did what any desperate baker would do, doubled my batch of frosting in a desperate attempt to seal that sucker in so much buttercream that it wouldn’t go anywhere. Yeah. Not so much. The frosting started falling off the sides of the cake, and taking chunks of cake with it. It just kept going from bad to worse, so I threw my hands up and accepted baking defeat. I felt like the poor contestents on Cake Challange. The bad loser ones.

So I showed it to Bella (no big reveal) and God bless this child, she told me “it’s the prettiest cake I’ve ever seen, and that frosting, it’s just like clouds with the rainbows”. She’s the best. Well that and she really loves cake and probably wanted to secure a piece. But either way. Here is the “creation”.

Cake from the front - not pretty, but not completely terrible.

And this would be the "bad" side. Emphasis on BAD.

In Bella's eyes, cake is still cake, and cake is GOOD.

While not what I wanted it to be, it is quite colorful and cheery.

And she was happy. And really, that's what mattered.

It’s been a busy few weeks around here.   The end of January we celebrated my husband’s 40th birthday.   We had a party with family and friends at Dave and Buster’s, and hopefully everyone enjoyed themselves, especially the guest of honor.

And not long after Rick’s birthday, it was time to celebrate Bella’s 7th Birthday.  I don’t know how my baby is growing up SO FAST.  I sure wish she’s slow up a bit!

I’m pretty sure she enjoyed all the celebrating and attention that came with her birthday!

Now we head in to Valentine’s Day.  All of our Valentine’s Day orders have shipped, and I’ve even picked up some Valentine goodies for Bella.  Now to fill out 26 cards for her class tonight!

Save 30% off your entire Sentimental Silver purchase with discount code TGIVING at checkout.

Sentimental Silver Black Friday Sale

HAPPY SHOPPING!!!!

Our puppy Jack.   Yeah.  He’s that cute.

Cute cute cute.  And ornery as the day is long!   But he is a puppy.  And very a cute one!

We’ve managed to have a somewhat relaxing yet very productive weekend around here (always an easier task when you don’t have anything planned and can stay home most of the weekend).   We put the tree up earlier in the week, and have been decorating it a little at a time the past few nights, finishing it up last night.  Bella LOVES decorating the tree, and will sit and play with the ornaments for hours.   She’s a kid that in general likes a lot of interaction, but when those ornament boxes come out she will sit in the living room and get lost in her own little make believe world.   I remember doing something similar as a child.

I love the tradition and memories tied to Christmas ornaments, and have a few of my special childhood ornaments on our tree.   I am Sentimental after all!  While I have  few pretty “decorative” trees, our main tree is always stuffed full of memories.    A few pics of our trees…

We also had a visit from my brother Danny, his wife Meghan and our adorable niece Molly.

Santa also brought one of our gifts a little early.   The past few months I’ve been watching Craigslist for air hockey tables.  It’s a game we all really enjoy, and you just never know what you can find on Craigslist.  I’ve found some good deals, but often way across town, so I’ve never really bothered to pursue them.  Well on Friday I found one for a great price, at a thrift store about a mile away from us.   After a quick look online, I found that the table that was up for sale was a really high quality one (so I than assumed it was probably quite beat up or didn’t work).   Rick went over to take a look at it, and it was really REALLY dirty, and you couldn’t turn it on to test it, because the power cord was broken.   He checked out the motor, and had a feeling it worked fine.  They offered to hold it for him, so he could come back with tools to fix the power cord.   He did, and it fired right up.   We got it for a ridiculously low price (less than I spent this weekend at Costco for a bag of potatoes, a pack of razor blades and some apples).   My Dad helped pick it up and bring it home, and after a few hours of cleaning and some minor repairs, we had a fully functioning air hockey table!   It’s already seen a lot of play this weekend.

Oh, I can’t forget my favorite treat of the weekend.  Peppermint Ice Cream!   I think it tastes like candy canes, and since it is a seasonal flavor, I tend to refer to it as Candy Cane Ice Cream.

And just to add a little something extra, I prefer mine with some mini chocolate chips.  Oh my.  It’s good.

I think that’s a pretty good way to finish a nice weekend.  I have a feeling the coming weekends leading up to Christmas will be quite a bit busier, but I’m sure we’ll still find time for some air hockey.  And ice cream.

Last weekend was a busy dance weekend for Bella.  The weekend itself wasn’t too busy (nor was the actual dancing) but the driving sure was – almost an hour drive across town!   She performed two different dances, one on Saturday and one on Sunday.  She did great, and had a great time, which is what matters most.  She loves to perform, and just shines on stage.   I’m not sure where she gets it from, it certainly isn’t from me!   It makes me so proud to see her get up with such confidence, grace and poise.  It is really remarkable to me, and I hope she will always that wonderful confidence and belief in herself.

From her group dance “Splish Splash”

“Splish Spash” won a Top First & High Point Award

Enjoying lunch after at Rainforest Cafe, one of her favorite restaurants

Early morning check in for her very first solo performance

First Solo – Lyrical – “Catch Me” by Demi Lavoto

We were SO proud of her.  Rick and I both had tears in our eyes watching her perform up on that great big stage.  I’ve never liked getting up in front of people doing anything, and to watch her get up there, perform and have a BLAST – it’s just fabulous, and makes all the time (and money!) we spend at the dance studio completely worth it.

My daughter is probably the pickiest eater I’ve ever met.  I’ll admit, I’m a picky eater myself, but she has me beat hands down.  While I have always complained about it, this past month we did discover that she has a severe tree nut allergy.  We were having her hay fever allergies tested, and they included a food panel.  I had no clue (or even reason to suspect) any food allergies, but they were the strongest reactions she had.   So, her pickiness and avoidance of new foods may have actually been a pretty good move on her part, as she has ALWAYS avoided any nuts like they were pure poison, just because she doesn’t like them (even though she’s never tried them).    I’ve been known to not want to share a cookie here or there, and telling her it has nuts in it does the trick.  Maybe it was my maternal instinct (though probably more my love of cookies).

But each and every day my challenge is to get her to eat somewhat healthy foods, and maybe, just maybe get a new food or two in her (highly unlikely).    After too many lunchboxes coming home in the afternoon as full as I sent them in the morning, I went online to look for some ideas.  I came across the concept of bento, and figured it was worth a shot.

While she doesn’t always eat everything, the bento lunches seem to go over really well with her.  By no means will I be carving Hello Kitty’s face into a hard boiled egg anytime soon (she doesn’t like eggs and I lack carving skills, but I am totally cool with Hello Kitty),  it’s pretty easy to come up with quick and easy things for her to eat, and throw in a few cute and whimsical touches.   It’s also nice in that I’m not spending money buying individual snack packs of everything, or using a Costco size box of Ziploc bags each month.   A few cute silicone baking cups, some cookie cutters and a few cute baking picks every now and than are about the extent of my bento toolbox.

Here’s today’s lunch…

Simple Bento School Lunch For My Picky Eater

Turkey, grapes, cheese (cut into dog bones – we are on a puppy kick in this house) carrots, apples, goldfish and a brownie.   Yes, the brownie may not seem to fall into healthy, but it’s a special recipe from The Sneaky Chef Cookbook (though I just doctored up a box mix, I used her puree) – hidden deep inside is a puree of spinach and blueberries.  Yes, it sounds GROSS.   I was a bit grossed out making it.  But somehow you can not taste it.  I can FAINTLY pick up the blueberries, but Rick and Bella have NO clue.   Well unless Rick reads this, and if so my cover is totally blown.     Bella however is just giddy that Mom packs a brownie in her lunch.  Whatever it takes…

While it’s still far from actually feeling like fall here in Arizona, having a day under 100 degrees yesterday felt fabulous.  I love fall.  Love. Love. Love.  I love the holidays, I love the events but I think most of all I love the end to the brutal summer heat.   It is my FAVORITE time of year.   As soon as it starts to feel like Fall, I get the urge to bake.  While I do not really love to cook (nor am I probably very good at it) I really enjoy baking, and sometimes do a decent job at it.

So the baker in me was THRILLED to stumble across this website this morning…

Layer Cake Bake Shop

They have the CUTEST baking supplies.   Zebra and leopard print cupcake liners – I’m in baking heaven.

Super cute cupcake liners

How ridiculously cute are those???   I need to go shop now…

It’s been forever since I’ve blogged!   Life is busy, but isn’t that always the case?   Business wise things have been good, we’ve had lots of great giveaways running around the web on different blogs.    Mother’s Day was crazy, but it always is!  I hope all the mamas that received Sentimental Silver for Mother’s Day are enjoying their necklaces.     Ugly Betty’s Ana Ortiz received a a Sentimental Silver Necklace at her baby shower recently, and from the looks of it, she likes it. 

Ana Ortiz from Ugly Betty with her Sentimental Silver Necklace

On the home front, Bella just finished kindergarten yesterday.  I can’t believe it.  Everyone tells you how fast time goes by, and than one day it hits you that it does indeed fly, at a pace you never could have anticipated.    I need to be better at blogging, and recording all those moments while they are fresh in my mind.

Make sure to check out Sentimental Silver on Facebook and Twitter.  I’m a bit more Facebook savvy than Twitter, but I’m trying!   I use both to announce sales, special discount codes, new products and giveaways.    I’m a bit more regular on those than on my blog these days. 

It’s off to breakfast for us, I told Bella we could kick off summer vacation by going out to breakfast, and she picked IHOP.  The girl loves her pancakes… 

My little Bella Dancerlla (as I call her, much to her annoyance sometimes) had another dance performance yesterday.   The girls all did great and hopefully really enjoyed it.  I know as time goes on she will start to understand the competition aspect of it more, and that I don’t really look forward to.  At this point, she’s happy to go out and dance, do her best, and get her pin or ribbon, and really gives no thought to how they placed or where they were compared to other dancers.  I don’t think she knows or cares what the scores mean, and I have to admit I hope it can stay that way for a while.

A few pics from the day – given how far back Rick was sitting, I think they came out pretty decent.