It's Pirate P"AAARRR"TY Time!

We had a big boy turn 6 yesterday! Our little (well, not so little anymore) Zachary turned 6 and boy did we party - all day. He decided he wanted a pirate theme and was so excited about all of his decorations. I decorated the house after he went to sleep on Tuesday, so that it was all decorated when he woke up. He was so excited and kept running around the house pointing out all the fun things that were up.

He had a blast at Kindergarten where they gave him a crown, sang to him, and he got a fun book, pencil, and bubbles from his teacher. He also got a token for the prize tower in the office. He took Reese Peanut Butter Cups for his birthday treat and couldn't wait to share them with his class. He came home with a big smile on his face and told me over and over about the fun things they did.

After kindergarten Nana, Michelle, Ashton, and Branson came down for a little party. We had lunch - Zach chose sandwiches - really quick, then headed to the bowling alley for some bowling. The kids had a blast and almost made it through 2 games. I forgot my camera, but Michelle has some really cute pics on her blog, so if you're interested, you can check out the fun we had.

Next we headed home for some present opening. Zach was thrilled with the bowling set Michelle, Ashton, and Branson gave him, the Scooby Doo Beach Towel from Nana, and the Scooby Doo movie from his sister.





After presents, we had cake and ice cream complete with singing and blowing out the candles 100 times as is tradition in our family. I think there may have been more melted candle wax than frosting on that cake by the time we were done!





After we had our fill of cake and ice cream, the kids headed off to play with the bowling set and the other toys. They had such a blast until Michelle and her kids had to head out to meet Brian. We sure had fun with you guys, thanks for coming to share the celebration with us!

You might think this is the end of our partying, but we're just getting started! About 5 minutes after Michelle and the kids left, Papa and Taylor arrived. The kids played with Tay and a bunch of toys until Kylie, Jedd, Michael, and Afton arrived. We had a yummy dinner of Hamburgers, Hotdogs, and French Fries - all Zach's choice of course.

After dinner Zach had round 2 of opening presents.

He loved the Shrek XBOX game from Afton and Uncle Bubby,


the Cubbies hat from Awa and Jedd,


the construction set from Nana, Papa, and Tay (I thought I got a picture of it, but guess I didn't), the pirate play set from his sister Hailey,


the Connect 4 game, Scooby Doo Leapster Game, Cars XBOX game, pirate dress up outfits, and the remote control truck from Jeremiah and I,


and the Cars Leapster Game from his Nana and Papa in California.


And as if we hadn't already had enough cake and ice cream already, we had round 2 with that as well!


He was such a good brother to share with his sister in blowing out the candles.


We all enjoyed some yummy cake and ice cream.


Thanks for everyone for coming and helping us celebrate the birthday of our special boy.


Looks to me like he had a wonderful birthday! Happy Birthday Bud, we sure love you!


P.S. In case you're wondering about the $10 off sticker on his shirt, it's a sticker from Papa. He works in the meat department at Smith's and every time the kids come to see him at the store, he gives them a sticker. Ashton and Branson stopped by to see my Dad on their way down and Papa sent a sticker down for Zach and Hailey. Save $10 - what a bargain for such a cute boy!

Princess Party

On Saturday we were invited to a special Princess Party. Hailey's cousin Jocelyn finally succeeded at getting potty trained and we decided to celebrate with a fun party. The girls dressed up in their best princess outfits and we had a party for them.


Our three little princesses


A tea party


Opening presents


My little princess

We had so much fun and the girls were so cute! Thank you so much Jocelyn for inviting us to your very special party, we both loved it!

Just Chillin'

Nothing more relaxing than sitting in a big, comfy recliner while watching cartoons!

Piggy-tails

Recently my little girl has been obsessed with pigtails (you'll remember a post I did a while back with her and her Dora doll both with pigtails). I don't do them often because I don't wash her hair every night and trying to go back to having her hair down after a whole day of pigtails makes it all kinky and lay weird. Well, when I did her hair a few days ago and did pigtails for her, she kept asking me why I never did my hair that way.

So on Saturday, I decided that since I wasn't going anywhere, I would do my hair the same way so we could be twins (she likes to call it twiner-sames when two things are alike). She walked around saying "Mommy and I are twiner-sames with our piggy-tails" all day. I didn't feel like I looked my best, but it was worth it just to have her so excited. The things we do as parents to make our children happy. Here are a few pictures for you to laugh at:


(She's by far the cutest!)




Although I felt a little silly, it was fun and I would do it again just to see the smile on her face.

Have You Ever Seen Anything This Cute???

I know all mothers are biased towards their children, but I really think mine are special. They are the cutest things when they want to be. I just love them and can't imagine life without them.

Today we were all getting ready to head out the door and I just had to snap a few pictures of my beautiful children.



Are they cute or what? They are just so super sweet and love each other (most of the time). They were all dressed and ready to go and gave me their best smiles despite how many pictures I was taking trying to get that "perfect picture."



This is my Zachary. He's very sweet and very helpful. He is so smart and absolutely loves school. His favorite shirt is his school dragon shirt that he wears every single Friday.



I can't help but laugh at some of his smiles. He knows that I always take tons of pictures, because I don't do it that often, so he's ready with his "ok, take the picture already smile" most of the time. But every once in a while I can get him to loosen up and catch a few precious pictures like these.



And this is my Hailey. Isn't she something? If you know her, you know that she's both the sweetest angel and biggest terror all rolled into one. And yet, I love her to death. Although she's the biggest girly girl, she still like to play trucks, balls, and such with her brother, whom she absolutely idolizes. She so much wants to be just like him and doing just what he's doing.



She's a bit of a tease (ok, that's an understatement), but she's really a good girl deep down. She loves all things pink, princess, and ladybug. She loves to shop, in fact she'll be the first to tell you that her favorite store is Target.



Even though my kids fight, like most normal kids do, they do have those times when they are so sweet to each other. One of those moments is every night when we get them to bed. They ALWAYS have to give each other a love and kiss goodnight. If you think you can get away without them doing it, think again.

And then there are other times during the day, when I catch them playing well together and just plain being cute. Recently, they have both been into playing Jeremiah's XBOX. And today as I was working, I got them set-up playing soccer - Zach plays, Hailey just holds a controller and plays the part of the computer on the opposite team. It's cute because she really thinks she's playing and gets so excited when her team does something good. Well, as I walked by to put the laundry away, I saw the two of them laying on the floor, right next to each other. They were giggling and talking about what they were doing. It was so cute.



I wish all times were like this, but I guess I'll be content to see a times like these every now and again.



Those are my special kids. Cute as can be. I love them dearly and think they are the most precious things on earth!

Valentine's and Temple Open House

I've been a bit bad at keeping up with blogging the last few days. I wish I had a reason why, but there really isn't one. I guess my only reason is that I decided to "take it easy" these last few days and not worry so much about the little things. Boy has it been nice! I've enjoyed a very lazy and laid back weekend and now that I'm somewhat recharged, I'm ready to get back at it.

Since I've not updated in a while, this post will be a collage of a few recent experiences in order to catch up.

The first I wanted to fill you in on was our Valentine's. Jeremiah and I actually celebrated a little early on Friday night at the ward YM/YW's Fundraiser which was a Valentine's dinner, dance, etc. night. Before you ask, no we didn't do any dancing - that's really not our thing. But the food was good and we enjoyed watching some of the more talented dancer couples in our ward go to it out on the dance floor. We were priviledged enough to have Kylie and Jedd come down to watch the kids (which was part of their Christmas gift to us last year). They watched our two rugrats and I'm sure went home exhausted! Anyone who knows our kids knows that they can run you ragged in a very short amount of time. Aunt Kylie painted Hailey's toenails, which was a big hit - in fact, she's run around without socks on ever since. And Uncle Jedd played XBOX with Zach, which he absolutely loves to do! The kids had such a fun time and thanks so much Kylie and Jedd for coming all the way down to watch them.

Our actual Valentine's Day was fun too. We started out the morning with a big breakfast, then headed to watch Jeremiah's basketball game at the church. The kids have really been into watching Daddy play basketball and had a blast! After that we headed home, had lunch, then basically just relaxed all afternoon. We had big plans to go out and do something fun, but it started snowing and we all decided we'd rather stay home where it was warm instead. The kids had fun opening up their Valentine boxes they made at Nana and Papa's house and seeing all the fun valentine's and of course, eating all the yummy candy! The evening was pretty uneventful too, but very relaxing, which is just the way we like it!

Today both Jeremiah and the kids have school off for President's Day (one of the perks of being married to a teacher). I, of course, had to work, so there wasn't much going on this morning. This afternoon, however, was lots of fun. We took the kids up to the Draper Temple Open House. It was a lot of waiting and walking, but we had a wonderful time. The kids have been very excited about this day since they have had to wait outside during weddings and stay home with others while we've done temple work, so the thought of actually being able to go inside themselves was really exciting. They loved looking at the little brochure they gave us and finding the rooms that matched the pictures. It was a really long time - we got there at 1:30 and didn't get finished until 5:00, but the kids were really, really good. In fact, I'm not even sure those were my kids because 3 1/2 hours is a record for being good for them. Just kidding. They did really great and we rewarded them by taking them out to dinner. It was so much fun spending the day together.

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of any of these events - I seem to be forgetting my camera a lot lately. But I promise I'll take some more pictures soon and post them for you all to see!

Gaming and 100th Day of Kindergarten!

I couldn't resist taking some pictures of Zach. For Christmas, we gave him a Leapster Game System and some games. Little did we know how much he would love it! He spends a lot of time playing it and we don't mind since it teaches him the alphabet, numbers, and things like that.

The other day he asked to play it and when I turned around from working on the computer a few minutes later to check on him, I saw these feet sitting up on the side of the recliner.



He was really intent on his game because he didn't even notice me snapping these other pictures.




I'm so glad to see the gift we bought is so well appreciated and loved. He even showed his Leapster to his cousin Ashton during a ride in the car and it was fun to hear the both of them talk about the game and how to play it. I think he's got Ashton convinced he needs one too!

On a different note, yesterday was the 100th day of school for Zach. He was so excited to go and celebrate. They had a little party and did all sorts of fun things. They came out of their classroom sporting these nifty 100 days of school hats. Zach was so cute, I had to take a picture to post.





Zach was so excited to tell us about all of the different things he chose to put on his hat - stamps, macaroni, stickers, cotton balls, etc. They had such a fun day and it was so fun to hear him tell us all about it! Has it really been 100 days that he's been in Kindergarten? Time flies by so fast!