That awkward moment when the number of pictures you post is more than the hours in the day...

Day 39:

Last night, I went to bed knowing I had tons to do today to get ready for Kees's birthday.  I gave my round cake pans to the church earlier this month when I taught the big fat failure brownie lesson, so I couldn't even make the cake right away.  I've been toying with the idea of getting up earlier. Here's the thing: I CAN get up early, but it's near impossible for me to go to bed early.  Which poses a problem...called lack of sleep. Anyway, last night, I purposed in my heart to get up early, so of course I woke up at 4 am, thinking it was 6 am.  Then settled for getting up at 5:30, about 10 minutes later Kora woke up, defeating the purpose of being up early. But at least I tried, after putting her back to sleep, I went back to sleep, then got back up at 7:45.

We made malt balls, cause we're out and then I made fondant, showered the kiddos, and we went to the school room. My language session is at 10. Today I did step by step procedure for applying make up. It was fun or funny, maybe both.  Lots of the words are similar to English, but with Thai tone and accent.  Those are always the hardest. We laughed, a lot, at my expense...but it was a price I was very much willing to pay!

Making malt balls! (Doug if you're reading this, Kora was insane, please move my table back! :)

Yeah, we moved to the counter after Kora got a little crazy. Excuse our bed heads and yesterday's clothes, it was a late night last night, after our church friends left, we crashed!

Fun times with Kruu Jeab

After Kruu Jeab left I felt a little bit like a kid on the last day of school! Yahoo! I'm just a stay at home momma in birthday party mode! My friend Alicia, stopped by with new cake pans for me because she is AWESOME.  So we went about the business of making cake and frosting.  Kees found some sprinkles on the spice shelf and really wanted to add them. I initially thought they might mess up the texture of the frosting and it's supposed to be a smooth base for the fondant, but then I figured, when it's my birthday, I'll do what I want. THIS is Kees's day, so we poured in sprinkles. Then, we sampled some frosting with our Fudge Brownie Graham Goldfish, mmmm...amazing!

I have a love/hate relationship with my Kitchen Aid. It shocks me on a regular basis, and most days I'd rather not die.  Also, for some things I'm not convinced it does a better job, but I'm guessing user error is involved.  However, it did a MEAN job on my fondant this morning, so I'll keep her. This is the butter cream frosting we made!

We had a fun time sticking all the fish in the "pool" of frosting.

I had just finished all the parts to the cake: fondant, 2 cakes (I had to bake them separately because they wouldn't both fit in my ginormo toaster oven that is now missing the front handle), and butter cream frosting (plus sprinkles!), when Pi Tone stopped by to tell us there was some type of celebration happening at the "Skills Center" in our neighborhood.  We've met the German owner, he has a few horses and hires Thai workers, then trains them in how to care for the horses and provides them with a certificate so they can get further employment.  We had tried to go a couple times before and thought they were closed, but when Pi Tone took us today, we realized we'd been going to the wrong place.  No wonder they looked closed!  Kees was deathly afraid of the horses and all the people.  Kora was fearless, trying to give me a heart attack. She kept trying to run up and down this ramp that had a deep ravine she could fall into.  Pi Tone asked if he could hold Kora, and ended up following the three trainers and horses.  We stayed behind, not really sure where they were going. After they were gone a while we tried to follow and saw quite a few interesting things.  When we finally met up with Pi Tone he told us that Kora LOVED riding the horse.  We didn't know she'd want to get on a horse!  He took pictures, but I don't have those. Later I had her get back on, so I could see her ride.  Pi Tone said she was squealing and waving her arms the first time. So sad I missed it, I was dealing with Kees's anxiety or believe me I would have been there!

She had just woken up from a nap, but she was happy to see Pi Tone. She loves him so much, he makes her laugh and laugh.

Hey mom, look what I found! I think Kees left this on the table for me!

Oh the sass she exudes!  Love her!

Kees says, "No thank you, I'll just hang out here"

Kora says, "Horsey, can I grab your face and bite it?"

Not sure if you've noticed her various hair dos through out these pictures, but she kept pulling them out and I had to chase her down to get them back in or in this case just the one.

By this point Kora had gone off on her horse riding adventure with out us and we were looking for her.  I teased Kees and told him these black pod thingys were poop.  He played along, guess maybe his potty humor isn't completely out of nowhere.

Saw this spirit house on our walk...

And this tractor.  And you better believe I was trying to figure out a way to take one of those bathtubs home with me.  Please, stop what you are doing and go enjoy a nice long bath for me, with bubbles, and a good book.

Love just doesn't do it justice.

We were very pleased to find these "poop pods" had been set into the concrete!

Walking over to ride the horse again.

She's so brave!

After Kora's second horse ride, they let us play on the trampoline, all the other riders went back to the corral (is that what you call it, I have country family members who are going to die when they read this post...sorry Aunt Nette.).  The trampoline was also scary for Kees, it took him about 10 minutes to break away from me, but once he did, he loved it and didn't want to go home.  We left because it looked like rain.

She wasn't sure what to think about this trampoline, but I'm pretty sure her motto is:"I'll try anything 5 times!"

I had to get on the trampoline with Kees.  I secretly love that I have a built in excuse to participate. Thankfully no one yelled, "You big fat foreigner get off before you break that!"

Catch me

Love her expressions

Now he's getting the hang of it.

Okay, bottom left, doesn't she look like a mean model with a weird model pose. "I am too cool for all of you"

After we got home, both our kids fell asleep!  I guess our little adventure wore them out.  We weren't even gone that long, but it was pretty exciting!  With both babies asleep, I was able to decorate the cake for tomorrow. It was peaceful and fun to do a project without helpers. Don't get me wrong, I love me some short people helpin' in the kitchen, but every now and then it's nice to be "in the zone".

I don't care if you don't like it, cause Kees picked out every detail and I know he'll love it.  Big reveal in the morning, can't wait, I hope I get SOME sleep. Ah well, that's what coffee is for and Doug makes a mean coffee!

And there you have it, another day in the books!  I really struggled this morning to study Thai, it just feels wrong to break up my morning with my kiddos. Doug and I discussed it this evening and we are looking to change up our routine a little so I can do my session earlier and be on about my day.  I'm excited about the change, but I'm sure it will be tricky at first.  Prayers for us would be very much appreciated.  Being a stay at home, work at home, home-school, wife, and mom is so messy sometimes! (If you think it's a lot of pictures, just wait, it's birthday pictures tomorrow!!!)