Twice the Giggles, Half the Work

Why didn't I think of this before? Having two of my kids birthdays 10 days apart so we could celebrate them on the same day - I mean, come on - only ONE cake, ONE set of decorations, straightening the house ONCE instead of twice, ONE mess to clean up - the list goes on. My two youngest celebrated their 2nd and 4th birthdays together at a rockin' party with our friends the H family. I even went so far as to decorate our front porch - just a bit :)
We had a yummy steak dinner (even though I over cooked the steaks... a tad) and a really yummy ice cream cake that I made from this recipe from Lynn's blog:

OREO & Fudge Ice Cream "Cake"

1/2 Cup Fudge Sundae Topping, warmed (I just let it sit in the heat of the summer kitchen)

2 cups thawed Cool Whip topping, divided (I like lot's and so I used 3 1/2 cups)

1 pkg. (4 serving size) Jello Chocolate Instant Pudding

8 Oreo Cookies, chopped (about 1 cup)

12 Vanilla Ice Cream sandwiches, unwrapped

MIX Fudge Topping, 1/2 of the amount of Cool Whip and the dry pudding mix together until blended. Stir in chopped cookies.

ARRANGE 4 of the ice cream sandwiches on the a cookie sheet covered in an extra long and large sheet of aluminum foil. Top with half of the whipped topping mixture. Repeat layers, ending with ice cream sandwiches on top.

FROST or ice the entire "cake" with the remaining amount of Cool Whip.

WRAP loosely in foil. Freeze at least 4 hours.

This recipe can easily be doubled or tripled.

I doubled the recipe and it fed 4 adults and 9 kids with at least half of the cake still left over (perfect...tee hee hee)

We visited and opened gifts. I'm not sure why my older kids think the younger ones needed so much help opening the gifts - they were quite capable. TJ read the cards out to BB and JJ, though they weren't really all that interested.

I love the look TJ gives when she's trying to pronounce my friend, K's, first name. LOL!
Our friends gave JJ a small toy horse, which was the hit of the day. She immediately grabbed it and started a high pitched screeching, which we later realized was her version of neighing. LOL! She didn't stop all evening - and today she is still going at it! I'm going to have to get them back for that one...
BB has wanted a baseball glove to play catch with her dad for a long time. We had two problems - 1. none of our gloves fit her properly, and 2. she is left handed. Hubby found an awesome PINK baseball glove AND it's left handed - PERFECT! She's been carrying around that mitt for 2 days.
The party was fun - casual (even though K would disagree with my idea of a 'casual' evening). The girls loved it - including the pinata filled with small candy-filled treat bags. Nothing like filling kidlets with sugar and sending 'em home! LOL! JJ spilled a small box of nerds all over the carpet - and started picking them up, one by one, to share with everyone - especially R (our bishop) - who politely declined. Especially after she had licked one of her oreos and offered THAT to him. Yummo. Soon S (their little boy) was down on the carpet with JJ eating those nerds like crazy. No need to vaccum, I guess :) Ew.

It's a tradition at our house to take pictures of the girls on their birthdays - with mom and dad and alone. I'm a scrapbooker, remember :) I document and OVER document every.thing. LOL! I love the pics, but I'm actually a bit lost as to how to scrapbook them. I need some fresh ideas for titles, themes, whatever. CAN YOU HELP ME?? I'd love your input on a fresh way to scrap these babies. Lucky thing this coming Monday there is a new challenge at the Goodiebox to help inspire me, too :)

Oh! And tomorrow is the first day of school. It will be a sleepless night tonight!