3 Months Worth of Kennedy Fun

Halloween

From left to right

Jenna(Rapunzel)-Emily(a witch)-Isabelle(Abby Sciuto)
Charlie(a fireman)-Ben(a knight) & Joseph(a dragon)

I made this Belle birthday cake for a friends daughter.

Didn't it turn out cute?

                

Our Piano Recital

Robyn and I had a piano recital for all of our piano students. One of the songs Jenna played was "Frosty the Snowman"

The Cast of White Christmas

I spent the last 3 months with these wonderful people at the Old Opera House in Charles Town doing White Christmas. I was in the ensemble and had a great time singing and dancing.

 Andy and Katie in front of the Christmas Tree

The obligatory Christmas morning photo on the stairs. As you can see, Joseph is just a little bit excited about going down to see what Santa Claus has left him.

Disney World Day 6

Day 6 found us at MGM Studios, which is now actually called Hollywood Studios.  Ben and Charlie met Lightening McQueen, which was the highlight of their trip.

We did many fun things at Hollywood Studios, like ride the Rockin' Roller Coaster and watch the Muppets 3-D movie.  Jenna's favorite was The Great Movie Ride, especially the part with "The Wizard of Oz".  It rained most of the day, so we were only able to do things indoors, but this park had many indoor options. My favorite was the performance of Beauty and the Beast live on stage. It was fantastic!

Disney World Day 5-The Magic Kingdom

Today we went to The Magic Kingdom!  We were able to see all of the kid's favorite characters, too.  Joseph was a little sceptical, though. When we first entered the park, Pluto was dancing around for the crowd. Joseph said, "He's fake! I can see his zipper!"

The girls were thrilled to meet some of the Disney Princesses.

 Sleeping Beauty

 Cinderella

And Belle!

We were shocked that Ben and Charlie, being only 4 years old, LOVED the Thunder Mountain Railroad roller coaster. Here is a picture of Ben with his hands in the air (while I hold on to him for dear life).  You can also see Emily sitting in the seat behind me.

And this is Charlie, completely thrilled and not at all scared to death as we would have thought.  Both of the boys wanted to ride the roller coaster over and over again. The beauty of going to Disney World during the off season is that there are no lines! So we road the roller coaster several times, as well as Splash Mountain.

Disney World-Day 4

Today we visited the Orlando Temple.  I love visiting the temples of our church when we travel. They're always so beautiful! The temple grounds showed off the plants of the region, with palm trees and even several orange trees with fruit. There were even little lizards running everywhere, too!

Back at the hotel, they had some fun activities for the kids.  Face painting and balloon animals were their favorites.

My favorite was the hotel's Lazy River! Here we are, linked like a big inner-tube-convoy.

This is a video of Andy playing "Minute to Win It".  Without using his hands, he had to put 4 pool noodles on top of a table. I wasn't sure how in the world he would do it, but as you can see in the video, he has proven his creativity. I was very impressed!

Disney World Day 3

On our first full day in Florida, we went to Cocoa Beach.  The water was great and everyone had a wonderful time!

Here are Ben and Charlie playing in the water.

Emily, Isabelle, Jenna and Joseph running away from a wave.

It was a great way to spend an afternoon!

Our Disney World Trip-Day 1 & 2

This past week we've been in Disney World! We had a wonderful time, even on the drive down. We rented this 12 passenger van for the trip, so that we could all travel together. The 6 of us and our friends the Liddells, who have 3 children of their own.  We took 2 days to drive down, stopping overnight in Florence, North Carolina.

The girls all took a nap on the way down-So Cute!

I couldn't resist taking a picture of this souped-up ride.  By the way, if you think this is great, you should have seen the owner of this beauty as he cleaned it up the next morning with no shirt and a pair of suspenders.

Memories to never forget!

Is Exercise Really Worth It?

I pretty much took off all summer from the gym, and started exercising again last week. This morning I took a class called Body Pump, in which you spend 1 hour and 15 minutes lifting a dumbell over and over and over and over. I'm pretty sure I won't be able to get out of bed tomorrow morning. I also know that they say "No pain, no gain" but I just wish that after almost 2 years of running, lifting, crunching, squatting, and lunging, I had somthing to show for it. Basically what I want is to have the body of the instructor that has been yelling at me to lift, crunch and squat harder. Oh, well! I just keep going and making the other gym-goers feel better about themselves.

Happy September!

Okay, I will openly admit that it has been a LONG time since my last post. I'll just say it was a ridiculous summer, full of doctor's visits and lots of antibiotics. Joseph gave me a get well card "to get me better from the 'Ramonia' "  Now it's over and I am happily getting back to normal. Yeah!

Here are the lovely flowers that all of the children at church made me. They sure helped get me better!

I did read an unusually long list of books during this last few months, which was very fun, the most enjoyable being "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies." As a stalwart Jane Austin fan, I put up quite a fight for the last year, absolutely refusing to read something that would make Miss Austin turn over in her grave (slight zombie reference), but the book was hysterically funny and every day I read passages to my husband and friends, as we all laughed together. If you loved "Pride and Prejudice", you're bound to get quite a kick (another pitiful reference) out of this book.

School has once again begun. Here are my 4 children on their 1st day. Our youngest, Ben is in preschool, Joseph is in 1st grade, Jenna 3rd grade and Emily is in 5th grade (I still can't believe it!)

Just for the record, Ben is not eating a corn dog for breakfast. It is a sausage and pancake on a stick (which is SO much more nutritious!)

Here is Jenna with her best friend Isabelle. They are in the same class, ride the bus together, go to Sunday School together, and already have plans to be college roommates and have a double wedding where they will marry the 2 most wonderful guys on the planet who will have to be brothers.

It has been a busy week for the Tooth Fairy at our house. On Tuesday, Emily and Jenna both lost a tooth, which was a fun coincidence. The Tooth Fairy came that night and they each got a dollar. Three days later, they each lost another tooth! It could have been another coincidence, or maybe they realized a very lucrative business venture. Either way, they each put a tooth under their pillow, but this time the Tooth Fairy didn't come. I told them she probably forgot, or thought they were trying to trick her. Luckily she came the next day, so all is well. For the past few days, Joseph has been aggressive wiggling his loose tooth to "get in on the action".

Busy-Busy Summer!

Wow! I can't believe how long it's been since my last posting!  Here's what we've been doing.

The kids are out of school for the summer and have enjoyed their time at home playing and swimming.  I've been busy making cakes, usually making 2 or 3 a week.  If you haven't seen my website yet, go to http://www.katiescakery.net/

We have some fun things planned for the next few months, and hopefully I'll be able to post some pictures so you can enjoy our summer fun with us.

Until then...

The Kennedys

SPRING BREAK ACTIVITIES!

During spring break, we had some friends come to visit.  We went site seeing in Harpers Ferry, went for ice cream at Nutter's, played in the woods, made smores in the yard, and all-in-all had a fantastic time.  Corinne is also a very talented photographer (and should someday do it professionally). This means we have some great photos of our fun.

HARPERS FERRY

The sites of Harpers Ferry are right at the spot where the Potomac River meets the Shenandoah River.  We took the kids across the bridge to play along the C&O Canal.  Their favorite part of the day was throwing rocks at the wall in the dried riverbed of the canal.  I guess that was more fun than the museums. 
Can you blame them? A huge wall? Rocks? It's the perfect combination!

Ben's favorite part? The train, of course.
What a nice train conductor!

 

Me and my friend Corinne.

(Her son Xavier is looking at a book)

 

NUTTER'S ICE CREAM SHOP

This was their window display. So cute!

It's set up like an old fashioned shop (and their prices are fantastic!) We love going to Nutter's!

Playing in the Yard

We had our first barbeque of the year. I love eatting outside on the deck.

After dinner, we went for a walk in the woods and played by the fort we built with the kids.

We built a fire in our fire ring and made smores. Yum! Any excuse to build a fire and make smores and we'll do it.

Busy Cake Day!

Yesturday was a busy cake day.  I made two of the most fun cakes I've gotten to do yet. 

PINEWOOD DERBY CAKE

The cars were solid frosting and the wood grain was white fondant streaked with brown food coloring using a paint brush.

ACCORDIAN CAKE

I went ahead and used the wood grain technique on this one too.  And of course you have to see the back. No accordian is complete without the buttons!

Next weekend I'm doing an Electric Guitar for Andy's birthday, a Dinosaur for Ben's birthday, tiny baby chick cupcakes for Jenna's birthday, and a Thomas the Train cake for Ben's friends birthday.  I LOVE MY JOB!

I'll be posting them on my website at KatiesCakery.net-so check it out.