Birthdays and Blessings

Saturday, November 1st, we (Chad's family and I) loaded up and drove to Dallas for some big events...

 Presley's 3 year old birthday party and Emersyn's Blessing.

Unbeknownst to us...the Texas highway department decided to shut down a section of the freeway we were on just on the outskirts of Houston.  After a frustrating hour+  of crawling traffic we maneuvered an exit, executed our own detour and were finally on our way.

Good-bye Sam Houston.
[We did keep ourselves busy getting out of Houston playing a kind of "I spy"...I would make of lists of things to watch for (i.e. American flag, yellow car and huge turkey balloon)  and Violet and Lucia would watch if it.Then they would make up a list for me.]

 Bucee's was a welcome place to stop, stretch and get a bit of refreshment.

We arrived at Jeff's alittle late for Presley's party

but just in time for  the cake and ice cream.

 The birthday girl sporting her fairy wings.

 Bounce houses always make a party fun.

 ...but Presley's playroom was really where the fun was at.

 About this time Karl pulls up in his rental car.

That is NOT the little Hyundai I had reserved.

 Cousin Time!

Emersyn's Blessing

 Sunday November 2nd

.

 Emersyn all decked out in her Blessing Day best

...a blessing gown made by Gramma Jan.

 

 The Tobler group...just keeping it real :)

Now time for some serious jumping.

 and bouncing

 and sliding

and a little visiting.

So thankful for family
 and events that bring us together.

Wrapping up the Fun

Sunday Morning we discovered that Sebastian the Elf had come

... bringing lots of yummy goodies.

 

 

 Ummmm....Chocolate for breakfast.

 

 Janet had also gotten matching outfits for all of the cousins.

Geez Janet you think of everything... you're awesome!

 

 Katarina Salsa (the cat) checking out the little person.

 Sunday was Benico's Blessing Day.

Yeah...

he's almost big enough to walk up to the front of the chapel by himself

but Chad and Janet were waiting for a gathering of brothers for the event.

 

 

 Sunday evening it was time to officially welcome the the 

Christmas season and hoist the Christmas tree.

 

 A couple of technology addicts.

Monday Chad, Dad and Jake searched out a BBQ grill

...bring on the "Man Food".

 Ribs!

They were GOOD!

Silly Gramma Sews

 This Gramma has kind of a tradition 

of sewing a special blessing outfit for the grand kids.

Well...she tries. 

  Steph had her eye on a darling Nautical outfit...

being  "super gramma"  I assured her... no problem,

 I can make this "easy peasy".

 And that was correct...in theory.

Except for the small detail

...there are NO nautical style patterns out there for children. 

 And most baby patterns are sized

...well just wrong. 

So (sew) coming up with this pattern

 and the correct size  for this darling outfit took

...well a few hours and multiple design tries.

I also had the brilliant (?) idea

 of adding onies bottom to the shirt so the shirt would stay nicely tucked in.   And it did.

It turned out beautiful...absolutely perfect...simply darling.

With one minor flaw that we didn't catch until "showtime"  

... the poor child has to have his shouldesr dislocated or arms broken to get into it.

 Here's poor Duke having "flashback dreams"

of being put into the shirt.

 Oh dear...

his arms had been rendered useless.

 Of course...the outfit we copied can be purchased for only $29.00 online and probably doesn't require breaking the child's arms to get them into it.

But this one IS special.  

It was made by Gramma

with A LOT of love.

( I do like to think mine is really cuter and much finer quality :)

P.S  I've got a quick fix that will solve the shirt problem

...now I just get back from Dallas to do it.