Go Steelers

I made this cake today for a superbowl party tomorrow. I LOVE the way this came out! The football is cake covered in homemade chocolate fondant. It was a little challenging, but i did it!!

Oh yeah-GO STEELERS!

Another Littlest Pet Shop Cake

This is another LPS cake I made last night. The figures and accents are all done in fondant. The cake is yellow cake filled and iced in buttercream. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out :)

Sick again

Ayla is sick....again! She finally got over the last cold she had, and barely a week later she's sick. Ugh. I know it's all about building up immunities right now, but I am so tired of cleaning up puke and trying to comfort a very grumpy little girl. I think once she starts feeling better I am going to take a night off and get out of this house! I'm going crazy here!

Other than that things are going pretty well. I've picked up more hours at work, which leaves me less time to do everything else, but at least the pay check is a bit bigger.

I'm starting to plan Ayla's first birthday! We are keeping it small since we are limited on funds, but it should be nice. I can't believe my baby is almost a year old already. Time really flies by. She is looking more and more like a little girl and less like a baby every day. She is standing by herself now and I think she will be taking her first steps very soon.

2 days after Ayla's birthday, she and I are flying out to Michigan to meet up with some friends of mine I met through CHERUBS. I am soooo excited to see them again, I can't wait! I've been counting down for weeks now. It's going to be interesting flying alone with Ayla. I hate flying alone to start with, and I know having a baby will make it harder, but it is going to be so worth it!

Well, thats about it for now. Life has been pretty boring since I am pretty much stuck in the house besides work until Ayla gets better. I can't wait for Spring!

Here are some recent pics of Ayla:

Littlest Pet Shop Birthday Cake

Here is my latest cake creation! The birthday girl wanted those three specific littlest pet shop characters on her cake. I tried a new technique to copy the characters called a frozen buttercream transfer and I was really happy with the results! You trace or draw the characters in buttercream onto wax paper, freeze overnight, and than peel off onto the cake. It was so much easier than drawing directly onto the cake, and took the fear of making a mistake away :)

The cake itself was white almond sour cream cake with strawberry mousse (my favorite!). Thanks for looking :)

Happy Birthday Shannon

I wanted to take a moment to ask you all to remember another beautiful angel. Shannon Elizabeth was also born with CDH, and sadly passed away. Her memorial website was the first one I came across in my search for other CDH families. Later on Shannon's mom, Kate, and I met through CHERUBS and became very good friends. I feel so blessed to have Kate in my life. Shannon has touched so many lives, and although I never had the opportunity to meet this beautiful angel, she will always have a special place in my heart.

Please light a candle in memory of Shannon, and keep her family in your prayers this week as they celebrate the life of this sweet angel.

Shannon Elizabeth (01/16/07-01/19/07)

An Angel with the book of life wrote down our baby's birth.
She whispered as she closed it,
"Too beautiful for Earth"

Gabriel's Second Angelversary

Today was officially Gabe's second angelversary. Two years since we last held our baby boy and said our goodbyes. What a rough day. I can celebrate his birthdays even though they are very bittersweet. But how do I deal with the day I let me son die. Pretty badly as you can probably tell from this post. I think I dealt with it better last year. I thought it was supposed to get easier, but right now it seems to be getting much harder. I'm hoping that it's just the day, and after it passes I will start to feel a little better. I think that it's in part my faith. These last two years my faith has been shaky at best. I want to believe that Gabe is in heaven with all the other babies, watching over us, but I find it hard to understand what reason he was taken from me. I am praying for guidance, and signs from Gabe. I really need one right now.

I wanted to take a moment to thank all of my friends. I have received an amazing amount of messages from everywhere. Reading all the love and support have really gotten me through the day. Your words of love and prayers touch my heart and know that even if I don't respond to everything, it means the world to me.

I am off to go to bed. Tomorrow will be a better day.

Still sick

Ugh. Ayla is still sick, the poor little girl. At least she's not throwing up anymore, which means we are heading in the right direction. She can't lay down comfortably so I have been the lucky one to hold her most of the night this week so she will rest. The one benefit to this cold is she is all she wants to do is cuddle... and of course rub her snotty nose all over my shirt-ewwwww! Really I brought this all on myself. Last week I was complaining that she never wants to cuddle or be held anymore... When will I learn to shut my mouth?! I'm just hoping she is better by the weekend since I have to work and leave her home with Nate (who seems to be getting sick now too).

On the brighter side of things, I am actively working towards my goals. I decided that this year WILL be a good one, and therefore I need to be proactive! I have joined a weight loss challenge at work. We are doing teams of 4, kind of a biggest loser type thing. I need to lose 20 lbs to reach my goal, although I am hoping to lose closer to 30. I have also started gathering the information I need to open up my cake business. I've been in contact with the health department to find out the steps I need to become licensed... it's going to be a lot of work, and I still need to find a place that will let me rent their kitchen space, but at least I'm starting the process.

I need a vacation....

I am trying very hard to go into 2009 in a positive way, but it has been one thing after another leaving me with the question: am I cursed?

Last night Nate and I decided to go out for a few hours with a friend. We left Ayla with Nate's parents and received a call to come home as Ayla had gotten sick. I have to say that we have been very lucky with her, she has only been sick a couple of times, but I feel so bad when she is!

This morning I woke up early to go into work (I have been BEGGING my boss for hours). I got dressed and went to check on Ayla. After assuring myself that she was ok to leave, I attempted to go down stairs, and ended up tripping on a cat and falling down them... landing with a stair hitting the back of my neck. This afternoon since the pain was not getting any better, I went to the ER for x-rays. Luckily nothing was broken and it appears to be just bruised and strained muscles. I know it could be worse, but it still sucks! How am I supposed to take care of Ayla when I can't pick her up?! I am so frustrated with everything right now.

I know this is a whinny pathetic post, but tonight I am allowing myself to feel like poo. Tomorrow WILL be a better day....

Happy New Year

I can't believe 2008 is over! This year flew by and I can definitely say we did A LOT!!! So it's that time again to make those lovely New Year Goals... which brings me back to last years:

Goals from 2008

1. Bring home a happy and HEALTHY baby girl to spoil

She got off to a bit of a rough start, but once she got going there was no turning back. She is definitely one happy, healthy, beautiful little girl! I think I accomplished this one!

2. Clean and organize my apartment... and keep it cleaned and organized

Ummmmmm....well I have been able to keep my new apartment clean, although not very organized and I'm still not completely unpacked. O well, I tried!

3. Get back into a healthy weight range after Makayla is born

Can I rollover my goals? OK, starting today I'm back on a diet!

4. Start the process to buy a house

. With the economy right now, I don't see this happening any time soon. But we moved into a wonderful little duplex which is a step up from our townhouse, so I guess we are moving in the right direction!

5. Start moving forward towards getting a business plan done and seriously looking into starting it

Wow, I really thought I was going to have a lot more spare time! I'm rolling over this goal too!

6. Continue to keep Gabe's memory alive and honor him by continuing my work for
CHERUBS

With the bowl-a-thon, truffle sale, gift bag project, and all the other projects we have worked on this year-I think this is one goal I know I achieved.

Alright so here it goes~My goals for 2009!

1. Lose weight.... I even joined a weight loss challenge group at work today
2. Start my business
3. Enjoy the year no matter what life throws at me

Thats it! I'm keeping it simple this year, just 3 goals. Goals that I believe that with a little motivation (and maybe a good kick in the butt) I can accomplish!

Wishing everyone a very Happy New Year!