My little baby's growing up!

Nuggetpalooza has officially ended and my baby is now THREE!!! It's hard to believe that three years ago, my little Nugget and Strip were so tiny and sweet (especially when they are now constantly pulling each other's hair and trying to drop kick each other).

His birthday coincides with spring break, so we actually did his party on Good Friday in an attempt to avoid the spring break bounce house maddness. I'm a big birthday at home kind of gal, but I must say, baking a cake and writing a check was pretty sweet. He picked Cars (shocking!) for his cake theme, and I decided to make his cake Thursday and decorate it on Friday morning because I am a slacker so it would be fresh. There were just a couple of problems with this.

(1). Nugget picked the cake flavor, yellow cake with chocolate fudge marbling. I can star a cake like nobody's business. Everyone is always impressed, but really? Wilton does all the dirty work. Bake the cake, ice over the lines and star in the middle! However, McQueen had a lot of little car detailing, and EVERYWHERE there should have been a line guiding me where to pipe, there was a fudge ripple, so I was forced to freehand most of the body work.

(2). Icing colors. Mcqueen is red. No big deal. What did I need for this cake? Two batches of homemade icing, split into 9 different colors and three different consistencies. Add to it, the main colors being red and black which are the HARDEST colors to mix.

Why did i not learn my lesson?! This is Nugget's First Birthday smash cake:

John Deere Green tractor with BLACK wheels. This was stupid on 2 parts because not only was the icing a pain to mix, what person gives the most staining color cake to a 1 year old to rub all over himself?! (This was also the day I fell in love with OxyClean. RIP Billy Mayes!).

But, I guess cake decorating is like pregnancy, and you forget what a pain it is until you've already committed to it and are 1/2 way into the mess. After an additional trip to find MORE red icing gel, I told myself he loves pink, so who cares if McQueen looks a little sassy. Fortunately, it darkened as I was starring, and turned out pretty McQueenie looking:

Not too shabby.

Nugget partied like a college kid. He has had a little cough for a few weeks, which gets worse when he's running around, so no surprise, he partied 'til he puked ( not IN a bounce house, thank goodness), but just popped into the bathroom with Hubs, hosed off, stripped off his party shirt and kept on rocking like nothing happened!

Ma spent a good 2 weeks with us, and Hubs and I took an early anniversary trip to Chicago (more on that later), so yesterday was all about Nugget day. Ma was catching a late afternoon flight, so we had to keep an eye on the time. We had gone to the Children's Museum earlier with her, so were toying with the idea of the zoo. Strip told me, "I really want to go to the zoo. I told Ma just to stand up straight and she'd be fine." I asked for a little more clarity because this made no sense whatsoever. "Ma said we probably shouldn't go to the zoo because she had to fly home later that day and she didn't want to get her nice clothes all messy. So I told her just to stand up straight and she wouldn't get anything on them!" Ahhh. It all makes sense now!

To celebrate his real birthday, we took him to the Children's Museum because they have a carousel and you have to be three to ride a jumper. He picked his horse, and the carousel operator came over and carded him. I was happy to tell her that he was three TODAY and when she made the announcement to start the carousel, they gave my little buddy a shout out and everyone said, "Happy Birthday" to him. We rode it three times to celebrate being three, played for a couple of hours and took Ma to the airport.

As we were heading to dinner with Hubs, Nugget asked, "Mommeh. Where my birthday cake is?" which broke my heart. I didn't have a chance to make him another one, and I felt so bad! Hubs reassured me, as he looked in the rearview mirror, that Nugget was fine. He joyfully sang, "Happy Birthday to ME!" the whole way to dinner.

So cheers to Nugget! And cheers to the mommychick fam. Nugget will always be referred to as Baby Nugget or Nugget Baby, but the reality is, we're pretty much baby free (and I'm pretty much ok with that now). No more diapers, bottles, formula, sippy cups, cribs, baby swings, pack-n-plays, wipe warmers, bottle warmers, special food, special milk, little spoons, little forks, diaper bags, the list goes on and on.

Right now, the only down side to being baby-free is we ALL have to pay for a ticket to Disney World! Oh well!

Happy Birthday, Nugget!