happy days will come to you all year.
if i had a wish then it would be:
a happy, happy birthday to you from me!
monday was mary's 2nd birthday. the terrible twos started out...well not terrible, but not as planned. that's for sure.
the day dawned bright and warm, despite the weather calling for rain later. after a breakfast of cupcakes and some barney watching, we got moving on birthday festivities. first on the list? cornbelly's. we get there and the lot is completely empty. Brent kept saying, "i think it's closed." to which i replied, "how can it be closed?" because really, does it make sense that it would be closed at noon? of course not.
too bad it was really closed.
seems cornbelly's doesn't open until 4 pm on weekdays. what is that nonsense? i mean really, why wait until 4 pm when the little ones want to take advantage of early day sunshine and warmth? *sigh* we took some time to snap a few shots of mary since they had a big sign on one barrel of hay about birthday girl parking.
sometimes i wish we could just have a professional photographer follow us around so that there wouldn't be several of the same shots, just with different parents standing with mary...:
mary was captivated by the candles for some reason
then we moved on to pumpkin pictures. mary was already getting restless at this point. and the dainty behind that emits gases like a grown man did not want to touch the hay. i just love how she picks and chooses when to be a girl.
mary's new fascination moved to rocks. and since the entire ground was gravel city, she kept bending over to add to her collection (which i somehow convinced her to leave there)
after the picture taking, gma koz and uncle ty-ty met up with us for lunch at the cafe at thanksgiving point and a quick tour of the dinosaur museum (which is kind of expensive fyi). we vowed to come back after 4 and play at cornbelly's because it all looked so awesome.
mary was super tired by this point and unfortunately fell asleep on the car ride home. that means no napping. because for some insane reason mary thinks a quick 20 minute nap is sufficient. you're not a cat mary. no cat naps. we tried to get her to go back down for a real nap once at home. she kept jabbering away, until eventually falling asleep. only to wake up about 45 minutes later. i kept thinking of that one disneyland/world commercial with the little boy, "i'm too excited to sleep." that's our mary. too excited.
during her nap i had a mini melt down of sorts over her cake. see, i decided to take on a rather large challenge and use fondant...for the first time ever. to explain accurately, i need to go back a bit:
kara let me peruse her book of recipes that turn boxed mix cakes from drab to fab. i chose a rather simple chocolate cake, made tastier with the aid of chocolate pudding and chocolate chips (mary likes chocolate like her mommy). and then decided to go that extra mile (as if i wasn't already) and make a banana filling for it. oh em gee, i took a little nibble and it was good. if i do say so myself. all of sunday i spent actually making the cake while brent was away dealing with car fail (more on that later). anyway, i got the fondant on easier than i thought, especially considering lack of "proper" tools and knowledge. i chose which colors i wanted and how i wanted to design it and went to work. it was all done, except i needed to "finish the seams" or clean up the bottoms of each tier, or however you say that more succinctly. in hindsight, i should've done that first. i was in such a hurry. i told myself, i'll go get the rest of the supplies on monday morning to fix it.
well, monday morning came and went. i was planning on going during mary's nap, which proved to be non existent. so as i was rushing to the store to buy some premade icing and be done with it, i accidentally picked up red that looked pink on the front. and of course i didn't notice until i got home. ugh. ugh. ugh. i had to improvise. i wasn't happy. i freaked out. brent tried to console but really, at this point i am inconsolable. i just am. this is why i try to stay away from any kind of crafty thing. i am, in the words of somebody on the cable guy movie i've never seen but hear brent quote all the time (sorry run on), perfectionish...perfectionish...perfectionist (this will make little sense if you haven't seen the movie. i apologize for the lame quote). anyway, see for yourself. ladies at work were very nice about it. i almost want to make the picture
super tiny so you can't see it well.
it really wasn't supposed to look that bad. it was supposed to be awesome. awesome as in, "we at foodnetwork love your cake so much we want to give you a show all about making them." okay, so not really.
when mary "woke up" we headed out to lehi for cornbelly's. again. we get there and guess what? it starts raining. and the temp dropped. i was so MAD. because it looked so fun and mary would've had a blast. and i missed out on so many photo ops. can you imagine the cuteness that is mary playing in a cornmaze? oh well.
off to pirate island...only mary fell asleep. and we were running late for cake, though some people that we planned on weren't able to make it anyway...so we decided to just order some pizza and do pirate island later, when we'd have more time to enjoy it. alas, no yars from mary that day.
when we got home, brent asked me, "is it ok to pull out the b-u-b-b-l-e-s since it's mary's birthday?" you dont' mention bubbles unless you expect mary to play with them for hours. pretty sure she learned that from cous brendan or something. but being her special day, how could i say no?
then it was cake time. mary was feeling a bit overwhelmed. too much pressure to perform while we all sang:
she got over it when presents appeared
mary didn't want to stop playing with toys in order to eat cake. she was enthralled with the kitchen set from gpas koz. she did take a few bites, though only after being allowed to use her new plate and flatware first. 
tomorrow mary and i are gonna go pick something nice out thanks to gpas lub. they insisted i get her something she wants and not needs. but mary wants everything. how do we narrow it down? it should be a good time all around.
um...this has gotten completely too long. so i'll explain car fail on a later date. besides, i dont' want to taint mary's bday post. just know that brent's car is dead and gone. may it RIP. thanks to all who wished mary a happy birthday and gave her cute little loves in any form. she thanks you, and so do we :)
this is completely random. but you need to watch it. like right now. quite literally the best thing ever. you'll thank me later.
kittens inspired by kittens
putting the boots to good use:
then mary threw some snow up in the air and got me right in the face. surprise!
trying to catch a snowflake on her tongue. so adorable: 
after awhile, mary decided daddy had done enough work. she went to go get him so he could play too.
brent decided it would be a good idea to teach mary to throw snow at me. good thing it didn't pack well or else...
or when she yelled and cried at the poor lady who tried to give her a bag of microwaveable popcorn instead of candy (seriously, she yelled and refused to thank her for something that was definitely not candy, despite her love of popcorn.).
brent felt a little awkward about being dressed up in the orange dj lance rock get up, but the following day, i was sent this:
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