kids – Casa de Berry

2014, accessories, boys, clothing, jewelry, kids

Unexpected dinner date

May 5, 2014by casadeberryLeave a Comment

The thing with autism is, the unexpected becomes routine.

We were thinking of going to an Italian restaurant for dinner last night, the boys both love filled pastas and we’d gone there before and had a good time, but nope, Alexander wouldn’t have it. So it became my husband staying home with him and me and Aidan going out to dinner and bringing food back for the troops.

Thanks to this super cute and comfy dress from Old Navy and my trusted Sutton necklace, I was dolled up in five minutes, ready for a dinner date with my sweet son. We had a good time and actually worked out a solution to store his assortment of Nerf guns. He loved the pictures I showed him from Pinterest (if you look up Nerf gun storage you’ll see many ideas using pegboard) so I think that might be a project that is tackled soon. He inhaled his adult-sized portion and then we drove home.

As a busy mom, I value pieces that let me get dressed and feel like I am put together without a lot of fuss. Steve picked out the dress for me, and I got it in the gray as shown and in a stripe as well. When I call him my own personal Tim Gunn, I am not kidding 😀

It was an unexpected chance to spend some one-on-one with Aidan and I loved it. Hope your week is a wonderful one!

2013, birthdays, blue, boys, kids, parties, yellow

Alex’s 7th birthday party

August 12, 2013by casadeberryLeave a Comment

I’m still going through 400+ pics from our Pacific Northwest adventures, so for now I will share a few pics from our youngest’s birthday party. It was a small, sweet gathering:

The birthday boy requested vanilla cake

AND brownies!

Aidan quality-tested the buttercream and declared it good.

We inherited a pool from some friends so our boys and their friends had a blast playing in the water:

After the party it was time to clean up and get ready for our road trip, which started the very next morning — stay tuned!

2012, boys, california, family, friends, kids

Camping in Yosemite

August 29, 2012August 29, 2012by casadeberry6 Comments

We spent a fabulous four-day weekend camping in Yosemite — it was the boys’ second time camping and they had as much fun as the first time, which is to say, A LOT!

Our day started early on Thursday, I think our oldest could have used a couple more hours’ worth of sleep 😀

Our youngest got right into the spirit of the thing and started carrying manly amounts of fire wood:

He also loved helping daddy set up our tent:

Dinner that first evening was basic camping goodness:

With one twist:

Dear auntie L. had a birthday so we got her favorite cake – German chocolate!!!

Friday was Dirt Day. Or Filthy Friday. Or Messy Monkey Day. Or something.

I swear I wiped them down about 56 times that day, but five seconds later they were filthy again.

It was a losing battle.

But the food was awesome.

Breakfast rocked — hot and fluffy pancakes, yummy fresh fruit, and bacon, lovely bacon.

Dinner was delicious flank steak, asparagus, salad, and baked potato (I didn’t have one).

The squirrels were in love with our food:

Even diving into the trash can to retrieve bits of it!

Our friend K made the most stunning, the most amazing (yes, I love MasterChef!) the most refreshing gazpacho. Seriously, it took all my willpower not to grab her plastic container and run with it into the woods:

But the tracker jacke–, I mean, the wasps, were kinda scary.

Lovely port.

Don’t remember much after this shot ;D

More camping adventures later this week!

2012, birthdays, boys, craft, entertaining, kids, parties

Lego Birthday Party

July 31, 2012August 6, 2012by casadeberry12 Comments

My youngest turns six today. We celebrated on Sunday with a small birthday party in the theme of his choosing — Lego Dinosaurs. I did a simple invite based off the Dino Lego website, using the Legothick font I downloaded for free:

The day was beautiful, a little warm for my (arctic) taste, but my in-laws lent us their canopies and we had a great time chatting in the backyard and watching the kids play.

For the cake, we chose to do a Lego brick cake — actually two, since I made one chocolate and one vanilla cake. My son’s choice was blue frosting on his vanilla cake, so I made the buttercream, too. First time, and I think it tasted pretty good. The chocolate cake was covered in green buttercream. We had liquid food coloring at home so I used that, but it took so much coloring to get the shade I wanted that I think next time I will use gel food coloring. My son saw the blue buttercream and gave it a thumbs up. Then he tasted some and wanted to eat the whole container so I had to refrigerate it for a while ;D

A couple of friends suggested Ding Dongs for the Lego studs on the cake:

Here’s my sweet Alex blowing out the candles:

It worked out perfectly that I made a six-stud brick and he was turning six, I just stuck a candle into each, uh, Ding Dong stud. Man, that sounds bad, huh? lol

For the piñata, my husband made a fabulous, Alex-sized version of one of the Lego Dino wranglers:

Here you can see the “model” on the shoulder:

Clothing details:

It’s alive!

My husband gazes at his creation one last time before the kids go at it!

Alex with his piñata:

After the carnage, my oldest made sure to save the head for our future “trophy room” — seriously, we have saved the heads off a few piñatas and costumes, and I told my husband we should mount them on the wall the way others mount moose and tiger heads 😀

Hope you’ve enjoyed looking through our Lego party – have a great Tuesday!

2012, chocolate, family, husband, kids, outdoors

My mother’s day

May 14, 2012by casadeberryLeave a Comment

Our Sunday was a relatively quiet one, the boys ran around and did their own thing while we (me and my in-laws) enjoyed on the wonderful lunch my husband put together.

But first, it was present time!

I got a sweet, handmade “vase with flowers” from each of my boys – one was on a paper plate and the other was made out of a pasta sauce jar. I’d asked my husband for light summery jammies and he bought me a bunch – thanks, honey!

The food was delicious – the corn on the cob didn’t even need butter!

My burger:

My husband’s burger:

His momma’s burger – she was very adventurous!

Enjoying lunch under our little gazebo

And then — oh my goodness, came the dessert tray:

Strawberries, mango and kiwi dipped in chocolate, and fresh-from-the-over brownies. So good!!!
I had asked for something chocolatey for dessert and boy, I got it!

It was a wonderful day, full of love, and I hope you all had a great Mother’s Day, too – or a great Sunday, if you did not celebrate.

2012, birthdays, boys, craft, entertaining, husband, kids, parties

Superhero Birthday Party – Masks & Capes

February 28, 2012March 7, 2012by casadeberry13 Comments

Our original plan had been to make fabric masks and capes for the kids so they could be “superheroes” all afternoon — but then my husband decided to shape foam sheets into masks and off he went, making a ton of them in a variety of colors and shapes.

This one was my favorite:

I loved the sparkly rose gold color and the heart shapes!

My son chose this one:

Here he tries on another mask for size:

The kids loved choosing a mask and cape and wore them throughout the party – here are some of them during the piñata gorefest (not really). I made a few capes in different colors, and my son requested his be longer, and I added his initial on the back.

It was fun to see the kids trying to decide which color mask or cape to wear, it was a very important choice ;D

2011, boys, bright, colors, decor, family, holiday, home, house, husband, kids, living room

Christmas inside and out

December 1, 2011December 1, 2011by casadeberry7 Comments

My two oldest men took on the task of putting up Christmas lights a couple of nights ago. My youngest decided it was too cold and went back inside with his mama.

Our house is all prettied up now – good job, boys!

We set up the tree a few nights ago, with my oldest son being the main decorator. I should have gotten some video. “I can’t find the perfect place for this one, mama. It just doesn’t make sense here.” Mm-hmm. I helpfully said, “just put it down and leave it for later.” He glared at me.

I think he did a wonderful job:

The little village underneath has been collected over the years and adds a sweet touch. My boy took these pics:

We like to turn the tree on and enjoy the sparklies. I light my candles and sip a bit of cocoa — my boys do not like hot chocolate for now — and we snuggle in the cold California evenings. Laugh if you will, but it is 45 degrees out there as I am typing and we do not turn the heater on in the evenings.

I am waiting for a couple of things before I show you the mantel – but for now I hope you enjoyed seeing our outside lights and our tree. It’s fake, because the cats can’t help themselves.

2011, about me, autumn, birthdays, boys, california, entertaining, fall, family, forty, friends, home, house, husband, kids, parties, Uncategorized, wine

Birthday weekend, part 4

November 18, 2011November 15, 2011by casadeberry8 Comments

After lunch and a nap, we got ready for dinner at Allegria.

Last year, our friends C&D had come to Napa with us and they’d gifted me a bottle of Caymus zinfandel. I decided to bring the Caymus to my birthday dinner at Allegria and share it with my hubby and our friends J&M.

The wine went perfectly with our entrees and it was a delightful dinner.

Little did I know that our friends C&D would gift me another bottle of Caymus for this birthday – score! Now I have wine for next year’s birthday dinner ;D

On Sunday, we had breakfast at the hotel and then headed home because we had invited people to celebrate with me – the party started at noon and we got home about 90 minutes before that. My mother-in-law had watched the boys for us, my father-in-law got the house ready for guests, and both of them along with my husband did all the food. I am so grateful to them!

I saw something this board on Pinterest and decided to make my own:

The afternoon was wonderful, it was so nice to see so many people from so many facets of my life. When thinking about what to say if people asked what I wanted for my birthday, I took my inspiration from the book that started my veggie garden adventure – Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, by Barbara Kingsolver. For her 50th birthday, Barbara asks everyone to bring her a plant. I couldn’t do the same since her birthday was in May, perfect for planting, but mine is in November, and I was guessing many plants would not survive the winter. So instead, to those who asked, I simply asked for seeds. Any type of veggie or flower would do. And oh my goodness, I now have a serious stack of seeds for my 2012 garden! Plus other, very generous gifts that will all come in handy.

I didn’t want to blow out FORTY candles so my husband, helpfully, decided to get four “decade” candles.

My boys had tons of fun as well since they had lots of friends to play with.

It was such a wonderful end to my birthday weekend, so many wonderful friends and relatives. Despite all the whining and moaning I’ve done about turning forty, I know am a very lucky girl.

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

friends, kids, school

Neighbors and classmates!

September 5, 2011November 15, 2011by casadeberryLeave a Comment

A few months ago I posted about my friend L. who lives around the corner from our house. We met when my oldest and her daughter were infants, and now, they are in the same class at school!

Here are the kiddos during a playdate, which honestly was more for us moms to drink coffee and chill than for them to do any real playing 😀

Now we see each other every weekday and had a playdate the week before school started:

Look at those sweet faces! They wouldn’t sit still so I got all blurry pics. Then they got silly and started to make faces ;D

What a trip to see these two grow up. I’m very happy that they’re classmates now and both her mom and I volunteer at the school so we get to hang out then, too.

We were bummed last year because none of my boy’s friends that live close to us were in his school. Now he has a friend he’s known forever.