Spring Break

For Spring Break, I packed the kids in the car and drove down to Tucson, Arizona to visit my sister Michelle with my parents. I car ride down actually went pretty well unless you count the fact that it was snowing here when we left which made for some slow spots and then also that a couple of my kids get car sick and threw up. Although, throwing up is nothing new for my kids, so they just threw up in their little throw up bags and we just kept on driving. Then when we got to a place with a trash can, we would throw the bag away and keep on going. Jenna threw up twice and Spencer threw up once. I know, TMI, but this is my journal, so you get ALL the gory details.

We were supposed to leave at 5 in the morning, I even set my alarm so that I could get up shower and then get the kids ready. However, I must have just turned my alarm off and went back to sleep because the next thing I know, there is someone ringing my doorbell at 5 in the morning and I was thinking, "Who in the world would be ringing my doorbell at 5 in the morning?" Then it dawns on me that I overslept my alarm. It was my parents they were all ready to go. So I jumped out of bed, got dressed, and while the kids got ready with Steve's help, I packed the cooler (the rest of out stuff was already in the car) and then we were gone by 5:30.

When we first got to Michelle's house (around 5:00 we made pretty good time) Spencer was VERY excited to see that they have a Nintendo Wii.Melissa immediately changed into shorts (remember, it was snowing in Utah).And Jayden headed outside to play in the backyard. Where he continued to play for the rest of the week.We mainly just hang out at Michelle's house. It was nice not to have things scheduled all the time and just let the kids play and relax. On Wednesday, my parents went to the Grand Canyon (Thank goodness because my Mom has only been talking about it for the past SEVERAL years, and now she can understand why we haven't wanted to go with our little kids) so Michelle and I took our kids to the Desert Museum which has some animals for the kids to see. The first thing we did is took our kids to see a bird show. But man was it crowded and mostly with old people with huge cameras. I think there were several groups of senior citizens there. And they had all of the up close spots. You just stand along a trail, and so our kids could only see the birds when they were flying right above our heads and that was only for a split second.That was where Jayden has his first and only melt down. He was not happy to be standing there with a bunch of tall people all around and no clue what was going on. Not to mention, it was a little hot just standing there in the sun.So, we said bag that and just left the bird show and took our kids to see the rest of the stuff. Here's Jenna, Jayden and Meagan (Michelle's youngest looking at the Gilo Monster. Funny thing is I have a picture of Melissa, Spencer and Rebecca (Michelle's) oldest doing the same thing the last time we went like 5 years ago.
See, funny how that works!

Thursday night, we took the kids to Mesa for the Mesa Temple Easter pageant. My Dad and I had all the kids (minus Meagan) in my van. They mostly just watched movies while we drove up there. Thank goodness for portable DVD players.Here is the kids with some of the cast from the show.
We took a picnic lunch and ate that there for dinner and then when it got dark, moved over to the seats.

I think this was the ONLY time my kids were even the slightest bit cold the entire time we were there. The weather was is the 70's and 80's every day. All in all, I think that the kids all had a pretty great time while we were there. I should have taken more pictures of the kids just doing the everyday stuff, but I didn't think about it. I was too busy enjoying just doing nothing! Thanks Michelle and Brett for a great time!

Melissa's Birthday

Melissa's now officially only two years from being a teen-ager. Scary huh? So, we planned a party and what a party it was too. I don't know who had more fun me and my sister Lisa, or the girls. To start off, when the girls got here (they all wore their pajamas), we had breakfast for dinner. We had french toast and waffles with either strawberry or apple topping, bacon, sausage, juice and chocolate milk. Once dinner was taken care of, the REAL party began. My sister Lisa came over and she and I did all the girls hair in some fun 'prom style' dos. In preparation, she and I probably watched several hours of "You Tube" trying to get all sorts of ideas for hair. And man, let me tell ya, there is A LOT of good stuff to learn about hair. I do pretty good when it comes to cute little girl hair dos, but the whole teen or "tween" (as I have learned is the correct term for Melissa's age group) hair is an entirely different endeavor. Lisa was majorly prepared, even came with a pad of paper full of notes. Good thinking on her part because I was kind of stumped when a new head of hair was presented in front of me. Here's Melissa's up-do (Lisa did it - and I think she outdid me on all the hair do's).

Melissa was sure excited about it. She even slept in it over night, and had it in all the next day. We used so much product (hair spray and such) in their hair, I wouldn't be surprised if all the girls could have worn their hair for several days and it look pretty much the same. I think 11 was the perfect age for this party because many of the girls were just so excited to wait to get their hair done. We had some make-up and a movie going for the girls who were waiting their turn, but most of the girls were excited to just wait and watch the other girls get their hair done.

After the hair was all done, the girls made some music videos. I will have to post those some other time because I didn't shoot the video on my camera, so getting it posted on the computer will take some time. After the videos were made, the girls had cake and sparkling cider.

That was followed by the gifts...

All in all, I think the girls had a really good time and more importantly, I think Melissa had a good time. I was glad that it all went so smoothely. We planned four hours for the party, and used every minute of it! Thanks again to Lisa for coming and helping out, we certainly couldn't have done it without her. We enjoyed doing the girls hair and listening to the girls talk about whatever. I think there is something to be said for a girl talking when she is getting her hair done. Boy, the stylist gets an ear-full but it was all great, I think I learned a lot about girls in that 4 hour time slot. I have to say that I was very impressed with all of them. They were so concerned about making sure that no one felt left out, and were so great with the compliments towards one another on their hair. It made me think that Melissa's got a good group of girls to be hanging around with.

In case you were wondering, this is what Melissa's hair looked like after we took it out the next night. Yeah, we used THAT much hair product in her hair!

The promised cake post

Like I said, Jenna was sad that I forgot to have birthday cake at her birthday party. So, later that night, right before bed, we all had cake together. Which actually turned out alright because Melissa and Spencer were at school during Jenna's party and Steve was at work. So this way, they were able to celebrate a little of her birthday with her. See? All better. And in crazyland style, I let her have cake the next day for breakfast! And yes, she wore her birthday bunny ears all day. (Except for at dance, I made her take them off)

Just add sun

With the weather warming up around here, we have been a lot happier. Taking FULL advantage of the nice warming trend. Which apparently will end in a few days with {gasp!} SNOW! However, while it lasts, we will be blowing bubbles... Relaxing in the grass...

Roller blading...

And loving every minute of it!

And then we will just crawl in a little hole and hibernate until it decides to warm up again...

Jenna's Birthday Party

That's right, Jenna's first ever friend birthday party happened this past week. She is now the blessed age of five, which means kindergarten!!!!!!! {Excitement for Mom's and kids}

So, this year, she wanted a Bunny Party. A Bunny Party? As in cute little rabbits, not the Playboy kind right? My kids come up with the weirdest ideas sometimes. Melissa asked for a Rainbow party when she was 4, back then I was doing them in the even years, now I have switched, friend parties are only on their odd birthdays, until they are 13, then we are done.

So, I came up with the idea of a Tea Party like in Alice in Wonderland. I should take a picture of the invitations, (maybe I will some time, but right now that just sounds kind of overwhelming to get the camera, take a picture, download, etc.). I had a picture of the White Rabbit on it, and overlayed some vellum with the important info saying "Don't be Late for this very important date!"

When the girls arrived, we had these cute little Bunny Ears for the girls to wear, and I had them decorate some bags to put all their goodies in until everyone arrived...

I even got Jayden some blue ears so that they wouldn't look too girlie. After that, I had some eggs and treats hidden in the backyard for the girls to find, and they loved just running around looking for them. It was a good thing the weather was nice, because they were able to just run around and scream all they wanted.

There was one green egg that was never found (good thing I had a back up in the house). However, I wonder if someday Steve will find it when he's doing the yardwork.After that we opened presents! Jenna got lots of fun coloring stuff which lately has been her favorite thing to do. And have you ever seen these Blendy Pen things? They are way cool, you put two colors together in this little thing, and give them a twist and it will create a new color. ALL my kids have had fun coloring with them.

After the gifts, we had our Tea Party! Of course, that is just pink lemonade, but the girls had fun doing "Cheers!" with each other. After that we played some bunny-type games like Duck, Duck, Bunny! and then the Bunny hop. However, we were having so much fun that I COMPLETELY forgot about her cake {that I got up at 6 in the morning to decorate} so we didn't do that with her friends, but that gave us something to do later that night when Melissa and Spencer were home from school and Steve was home from work. I'll post the pictures of that later... Cause around here, the party never ends! {At least not in the month of March - we still have Melissa to go}

Better Late Than Never!

My Birthday has already past, and I never had any time to actually make me a cake for my birthday, but my kids decided I needed a cake anyway. Between the four of them, they baked and decorated my cake. Of course, it is the traditional, Yellow Cake with Chocolate Frosting. It's been my favorite since as long as I can remember.

Not much

So, about the only thing worthy of blogging around here is the following...

Spencer was yelling at Melissa (nothing new).

Jayden yells, "Spencer shut your mouth!"

I asked Melissa, "Where'd he hear that?" (Expecting her to fess up).

Melissa's reply? "He heard it from Dad!"

Yeah, I guess that's possible...

Webkinz

Basically Webkinz are stuffed animals. They come with an online access code though that allows you to play games online. You can also feed and take care of your webkinz on the computer. Everytime you log in, it tells you how happy your animal is, if it's hungry, or if it is sick or whatever. You earn money called "kinzcash" by playing the different games. Then you can buy food, clothes, and even stuff to build your animal a cool house. They've got underwater homes if your animal is a fish, doghouses or should I said dogmansions, and barns. You name it and they have it. Your animal can even go to school or have a job.

Melissa will get on and see some of the cute clothes she can buy for the computer animal, and then tries to copy them for her own real stuffed animal. My kids all happen to have dogs except Jenna who also has a cat. But that's what they like. SO hopefully for those of you who have been lucky enough to have never heard of webkinz before, that's what they are. And for those of you like Michelle, who have just been introduced to them welcome to the Webkinz World!

{Just a little side note: I know that there are plenty of people that think kids play way too many video/computer games. My thought is that there are some real benefits to them that when done in the right circumstances, with the right limits, etc. they can be really great for kids.}

Lilly's Fashion update

Melissa got a digital camera for her birthday. She loves it. And she's been busy. She made some more stuff for her webkins clothes store and wanted me to post them on my blog, so here they are:

I love the calculator she put there on the counter to look like a register...

In the picture above, you can't tell so well, but those things on the shelves are little shoes she made for her webkinz.

Like I said, she's been busy!

5th grade program...

Last week was Melissa's 5th grade program at school. And since I was playing the piano, and Steve was running a little late, I handed the camera over to Spencer and didn't get any good pictures. He did manage to get a video of her when she was singing a little part with two other friends.

The program went well. There was one minor glitch when a video showing all of the kids at recess and in class and stuff didn't load. It was probably one of my favorite parts of the show, too bad the parents didn't get to see it.

Friday the classes had a "cast party" at the school. I volunteered at the beginning of the school year to help out. That was before I knew that I would be playing the piano. I think in hind sight I would have rather helped out during a different party at school. But anyway, I was in charge of bringing some soda for the party. We (Jayden, Jenna and I) took the soda over and then helped set out stuff for the kids. Jayden and Jenna were excited to get to sit and eat popcorn and candy with the kids while they were watching a taped version of the program and while I helped clean up.

Here they are sitting watching the show.