Elina is 11!

Elina just had her 11th birthday and it was easy and a blast!  Because of scheduling, this year she didn't have a lot of family come in for her birthday...but it didn't take away from the fun at all!

First J and V came in the weekend before her birthday to celebrate.  Elina was in charge of planning the whole day!  First we went to Subzero to have ice cream.  This is a neat place that uses liquid nitrogen to make ice cream in front of customers.  It's really for the experience...and the kids thought it was AMAZING!  And actually a lot of the flavors we got tasted pretty good!

Then we went to Clay Casa, a pottery painting studio.  Elina could spend hours upon hours at a place like this.  It always takes her quite a while to pick out the item to paint...then the paint colors take a long time...then the actual painting...it's an all-day event.  J and V hadn't painted pottery in a really long time so they had a blast!  It was really cute because they painted zombies for each other!

Then it was off to dinner at our kids' favorite spot--Sushihana.  Yum!

Then back home for cake and presents.  Well, since it wasn't her REAL birthday, we had a yummy cheesecake ice cream cake from Cold Stone and she only opened J and V's presents.  She got cool bluetooth headphones, a poop emoji notepad (her favorite emoji), and a bag of Swedish fish (her fave candy).  Thanks, J and V!

The day before Elina's birthday, she went to her good friend's (CC) birthday party.  It was a sleepover, but Elina chose not to sleep over because she wanted to wake up in her own house on her real birthday...plus, she actually didn't want to miss all the birthday stuff we do in the morning.  I was really surprised!

So on her birthday morning, she woke up to a balloon avalanche and then we all had blue birthday pancakes.  Yum?

This is the year that Elina gets a birthday date with a friend, so we picked up CC, got a birthday Frappuccino and headed back to the house for some fun.   Elina planned all the activities (she had too many listed so we had to narrow down by a lot)...so the first thing she wanted to do was a Chopped Challenge.  I loved the idea because I figured it would be a good way for the girls to make dinner for everyone at the same time!  I didn't do it as a competition because I wanted the girls to work together, so I just gave them a Mystery Box of items to make something together.  They had to create an appetizer and a main dish.  I didn't have them do dessert because I had already made a yummy strawberry cheesecake cake!

For the appetizer round, the box had tofu, cream cheese, peanuts, and ___.  The girls could use anything in the fridge and pantry.  They created this yummy salad with pan-fried tofu and this dressing that was similar to Ranch.  My little taste testers thought it was DELICIOUS!  The only things they wouldn't touch were the tomatoes.  Not a surprise!

Then for the main course, the box contained shredded chicken, frozen hash browns, a cucumber, and a packet of hot cocoa.  These girls made hash brown chicken wraps (seasoned with some cocoa) with a side of guacamole made with some cucumber.  The guac was actually really refreshing and different!  I loved it!  And the wraps were pretty good too...although I think they went too light on the cocoa.

Overall, everything they made was a success...they had fun cooking and we had fun eating!  Then we had cake...which was really really yummy!  It was the first time I ever made this one and it's definitely a keeper.

Then Elina opened her gifts.

CC got her a coloring book, watercolor markers, and a lot of stickers.  She also got a Pusheen, new fancy markers, a lucky cat, a marker organizer, wall maps with map pins, and a new book (which she finished reading within a few days because she couldn't put it down...thanks, Uncle Eagle and Auntie P!)

After all that, we headed over to Six Flags!  Elina got to ride all her favorite rides with her BFF and there was barely anyone there.   She even got on the new Fireball, which I would probably never ever ride...but Elina LOVED it!  It was great!

Then to end the perfect day, CC slept over.  Yay!

Happy 11th birthday, Elina! Keep being the sweet, honest, fun girl that you are!  You've grown into such a little lady, but you are still silly at heart.  We love you! 

A Little Austin Trip

We just got back from a fun 5 day trip to Austin!  I took the kids early and then B joined us Friday after work.  Here's a list of the things we did--

1. THINKERY
We checked out the children's museum, the Thinkery.  It's smaller than ours, but it had a few different things that the kids totally loved.  They loved taking their pictures, playing around with the picture, and then having it posted on a wall.  

They also loved making airplanes to shoot into the air.  They also spent a lot of time playing with the big Lite-Brite exhibit.  Evie and Elina worked really hard to make a fish!

2. MCKINNEY FALLS
We also visited McKinney Falls.  It was beautiful and the water felt so good.  Our kids are definitely water kids...when they see a body of water, they HAVE to get in and it is difficult to get them back out.

3. MOVIE
We took the kids to see Finding Dory at the Drafthouse.  Who doesn't like watching a movie while eating a bottomless bucket of popcorn???

4. ROCK CLIMBING
We took the kids rock climbing and they liked it so much we ended up there for 3 hours!  The kids were just little monkeys climbing up all the walls.  Eli is especially good at it!  B had a blast climbing with them, too!  He loves this kind of stuff.  We really wish there were more places like this in SA.  Our kids would be there all the time!

5. SNO-BEACH
Whenever we go to Austin, we always challenge ourselves to go to Sno-Beach every single day.  This time we missed one day, so we have yet to accomplish this daunting task.  But we had the best experiences we've ever had.  We never encountered a line, there were no bees hanging around, and it was breezy each time we went!  We had the perfect Sno-Beach days!

6. SPLASHPAD and ARCADE
On Sunday, we split up the boys and the girls for a little extra fun.  B, V, and Eli went to check out an arcade (where they won lots of tickets!)

and J and I took the girls to Sno-Beach and then to a splashpad.  I didn't even change them for the splashpad because I didn't think they would want to get that wet.  Boy, was a I wrong!  Eulee and Evie got soaked!  There was a spout pouring out a heavy stream of water, and those 2 little girls just put her head right under it.  Without hesitation.  They were so wet that Eulee's shorts were sliding off her little bum.  Like I said before, they are just water kids.

7. SHOPPING
We took the kids to their usual place, Nature's Treasures.  They love all the huge geodes and all the pretty rocks and minerals to look at.  It definitely wasn't Eli's first choice, but that boy is easygoing so he'll go along with anything.

We also went to Toy Joy, a toy store that Evie went to last time.  Evie loved being the "expert" on all things Austin during this trip.  If we mentioned a place, she would ask J, "Is that the place we went to last time?"  And when we were a block away from Toy Joy, Evie announced, "Oh!  I know where it is...I see it right over there...yeah!...there it is!"  It was so cute!

Our trip to Austin was way fun!  We just love spending time with J and V...exploring new things in the city...revisiting our favorite places...stuffing our faces with sno cones.  We love Austin and can't wait to go back!  Thanks, J and V, for a wonderful stay!!