Fun for February

Here are some of the things that happend in the month of February. Of course there was a ton of snow for sledding, building snowmen, snowball fights, etc:

At the end of this month was cousin Abbie's birthday which we got to go down for a fun play day at Adventure Zone and to go to the dollar show. We saw Tangled and the girls loved it!!!

Lexi has been doing pre-school at home with mom (so I don't have to make my two trips to the school a day turn into three). She is very organized and particular where her things are placed, even her fruit snacks:

We had an oportunity to go to Idaho Falls and spend the night with my sister Jenn and her family. The kids loved having a huge slumber party with all eight kids, the moms weren't so sure about it but they tried really hard to all stay put for the night:

Thanksgiving 2010

This year we went to my sister's house in Idaho Falls to celabrate all we are thankful for. My Mom and Dad work a lot on holidays, so it was great to get to see them and be with them for Thanksgiving. We played lots of card games, WII games, ate plenty of great food and just remenisced about past family times together. We missed not having my youngest sister, Sarah, and her family but we called and talked to them to get them closer to us. I am so very greatful for all the wonderful blessings I have been blessed with in my life. I have a hard-working, loving and very supportive husband. I have three very vibrant and beautiful daughters. I am blessed to live in a small town with lots of family and friends surrounding us. I have the gospel in my life which helps me every day to be a better person. I'm so thankful for all I have and hope to be thankful more than just in November. Happy Thanksgiving to all!

From Bugs to Witches to Angels

Halloween was a two days at our house. School parties, spook walk at school, pumpkin decorating, Trunk or Treat, carnivals, family, etc., etc., etc., etc. You get the point. so instead of writing a book on the subject I will just hit the high spots.
At school they have a Spook Walk where the elementary kids walk through the school with their costumes on for the teachers, Principal, high school kids. (The school is a one hallway school basically so some benefits come from a small school :) Lexi had to go because Sadie was there so all three kids were in costume at the school that day. They had a great time walking, decorating pumpkins with a high school partner, and making their teacher into a mummy.
Saturday was normal until about five o'clock when the carnival at the church was put on with lots of fun games for the kids. Haylee wasn't sure what to think especially when her friend Darrell Peterson sat by her in his costume, they just sat there and stared at each other. It was funny!!! Truck or Treat followed outside in the parking lot and they got tons of candy as always. Aunt Angie, Uncle Jason and Abbie were up from Pocatello this year so they had fun playing this weekend as well.
Sadie dressed up as an angel, Lexi went as a "nice" witch and Haylee was a pink butterfly. Quite the crew!!!

Abbie the panda, Lexi the witch and Haylee the butterfly show us their haul. . . .

Haylee and Darrell staring at each other. . . .

Mr. Stokes the mummy and his "princesses"

Lexi , Mackenzie Mackay and Annie Matson decorating pumpkins. . . . .

Sadie, Haylee and Laura Playfair glittering up their pumpkin. . . .

My three "ghouls". . . . . .

Pumpkins and Cookies!!!

We started the tradition of baking Halloween sugar cookies a few years ago and the girls look forward to decorating them each year. We spent an afternoon and evening doing that with pumpkin carving. I figured I might as well do all the messy stuff the same time so I didn't have to clean up more than once! Haylee got bored with the pumpkin carving because there wasn't much for her to do but she loved getting candy pieces from her sisters while decorating cookies!

Cory wasn't feeling very well but still helped me with the carving. He said the sight of the green frosting made him feel nauseous. That's a first, I didn't have to keep poking his hand with a fork each time he stole a spoonful of frosting or candy!!!

Happy Birthday Lexi!!!

Princess Lexi is now three years old! Oh how we are into the princess theme for this quick witted girl. Lexi is always dressing up as a princess, a ballerina or just in a skirt to be "beautiful". Can we say laundry? She changes clothes a lot but she is so into her character when she does it is hard to be mad at her at all. I love that she is such the comic relief in our family, coming up with the funniest things!!! Lexi is my home body but you can get her to go outside and do anything for "monies". $$$$ She is really wanting to go to school but I chose to teach her pre-school at home and she really loves it. She reminds me as soon as Sadie walks out the door for school that it is her time for school. Lexi is a fantastic big sister to Haylee and my very best helper in the kitchen. She had changed so much over the past year is it amazing.
For her birthday we had a party here at the house with just the immediate family over. She chose a princess castle cake (naturally) and loved eating the pink candy corn effect. (See pictures below) Her favorite present was her new skirt I made her, which she has worn every day since. Her other favorite was the shark bath towel Grandpa and Grandma Bird gave her. And of course it was complete with "pig food" for her piggybank. It was a fun birthday for everyone.

Lexi also went to the dentist for the first time. She had her "Happy Visit" with Dr. Oliverson. All the kids call him Dr. O and Lexi kept asking me why they call him that. She is so timid in that regard for new things. I can't get her to quit singing at the top of her lungs at home but put her in the dentist office and she barley said five words. She was very excited about the treasure chest and the toys she got from it though. I hope this makes future visits more fun for her. We shall see.

Happy Birthday Haylee!

My baby is now one year old today. I can't believe she won't be such a baby anymore. Haylee is a very happy girl but when you make her mad, she goes straight to tantrum mad. Haylee laughs at everyone and everything. Her giggles are such a sweet sound to my ears. I love how she comes trucking down the hall just a giggling over something her sisters have said or did. She is a daddy's girl through and through. If a temper tantrum is inevitable, I just need to dial a certain number and a smile will appear back on her face. I think Cory enjoys being the center of her world right now. She will be crying for me one minute and as soon as she hears Cory's voice or sees him coming up the walk at night; she lights up with a twinkle in her eye and a giant grin on her face. Haylee is a big tease as well. One of the highlights of my day is when she comes to find me wherever I am and says "Mommy" while trying to run away and hide from me. Haylee can also say Dada, Keekee (for kitty and the dogs) Uh-oh, and "tank ewe" (for thank you).


I make a giant cupcake for her cake that I decorated in about twenty minutes. We weren't going to have a party because Haylee wasn't feeling well but then we decided to go ahead with it. She was one so she didn't see all the flaws in my decorating thank goodness!

Here's Sadie getting mad at Uncle Buzz because he was going to blow out Haylee's candle on her cake for her.



Finally happy after she got some cake even though she wasn't feeling well:

Grandma and Grandpa Bird got her the cutest little bath towel! Look at that cute pink zebra:

And of course what would be a birthday without "pig food" from Grandpa Bird:

This is what the Birds' do . . .

We had almost all of the Kurt and Jan Bird family together over the weekend and got together for some fun. The kids kind of ran the agenda which ended up in some pretty intense competitions along the way. We started jumproping and it turned into see who can jump the most jumps without messing up. Sadie did really well as the only kid who could master the rope. The adventurous adults gave it a shot and it was pretty comical I must say. The grand pooba winner (as Grandpa Bird says) was . . . . . . . .ME! I jumped 56 jumps in a row (pretty pathetic I know) for the win out of the adults. I enjoyed watching everyone try to get the hang of jumproping again, like I said-VERY ENTERTAINING!!!
After a quick session of Mother-May-I becuase the big boys kept cheating, we turned to a roping competition to see who could rope another person running away the fastest. It ended up being a competition between the three brothers while the kids played in the sandbox. I have never seen a man move so fast as not to get caught by a lasso loop! Highly comical as well.

Summer at Grandma's House

Fun times at Grandma Bird's house with the all four of the grand kids. Sadie, Lexi, Haylee and Abbie love to play outside with all the fun things to do. Hours and hours go by while they run around and entertain us:

Finally some good weather for playing outside!!!!

Shriner's Circus

Wave as you pass by on the elephant. . . . . .

Balloon animals are great entertainment!!!

The last couple years we've started a tradition of going to the circus with the Bird's. It had been quite a process each time especially with all the kids. This year we went with Grandma Bird, Aunt Angie and cousin Abbie. It was a girl fest as none of the men were able to attend. We first went to IF and spent some time at the zoo. The kids loved seeing all the animals again (my kids could go every day and not get tired of the animals) and going on a scavenger hunt while we were there. After the zoo we had some grocery and part shopping to do as always. Preferring to get that dreadful part over with we opted to shop first, then eat some lunner (lunch/dinner) before heading to Sandy Downs where the circus was set up. Upon our travels we noticed the sky getting cloudy and gray all the while wondering if we would get a chance to see the circus that night. By the time we sat down at the circus it was looking pretty grim, so always being prepared for dismal weather, I had brought the girls' raincoats. Ready now for whatever the night had in store for us the circus began and boy did I have some happy girls! We saw horses, dogs, camels, goats, trapeze artists, fire blowers, knife jugglers, ribbon dancers and lots more! The rain started to come down too hard for the circus to finish so we missed the last six acts; one of which was the elephants of course! However riding the elephants (for a nice fee) was still an option for the girls and Aunt Angie!!! HE HE HE I got lots of pictures of that. Haylee was too little to ride the elephant but she had a great time watching everyone and all the excitement from the circus. Lexi liked the elephant the best and Sadie said she liked the trapeze artists that flew through the air the best. (She took about 40 pictures of them on my camera.) Thanks Grandma Bird for getting us tickets to go, we had a super, duper time!!!

Animals Galore

Since it's summer now we are outside constantly playing with the sandbox, toys, and yes all the animals that seem to surround us. It is a blessing to have these animals around, but sometimes it is too much! We recently lost a puppy that actually was a good puppy that we liked and wanted to keep around. His name was Tom and he got attacked by a raccoon this last week. We still had our ever faithful dog Tuff, three kittens and two horses amongst us. So why Uncle Buzz and Aunt Julee thought we needed another puppy is beyond me. Here they come out of the blue last week with a pup for the kids. They didn't even ask first, they just brought him over! I know the old saying about asking forgiveness later but this is NOT one of those cases. This puppy is as cute as can be but that is all he had going for him. We named him Jerry (yes my kids watch Tom and Jerry the cartoon, hence the puppy names). First of all this puppy is a red heeler (which is good) golden retriever mix. He basically was an ooops for a registered Golden Retriever female in Cary where Aunt Julee is from. Jerry is a typical puppy tearing up anything he can get his hands on. He finds garbage, clothes, boots, gloves, wood, anything to chew on and I am pretty sure he gets this stuff from all our neighbors! I can't tell my kids that I wish this dog would find an "Elvis ticket" but man is he a menace! I guess the war is on, I told Aunt Julee to expect to basically dread me coming around in the future when they have kids. I owe Uncle Buzz really good by now so I'm just biding my time. I'm thinking a llama would be good, or maybe a goat for their kids. We shall see.

Fun VACATE!!!

Okay these pictures are soooooo out of order it isn't funny. I'm trying to multitask and it isn't working to my advantage this time. Here are tons of pictures from our fun trip we took to Pocatello and to Utah. We went to see family both places and made many fun memories, I just can't put up all the pictures I want too!

We traveled to Pocatello to see Aunt Angie and take our dog Fudge to her. We stayed there for a night and the girls got to play with cousin Abbie. They enjoyed the things they don't get to do at our house; like swing on the swing set. And playing with new toys.

Then next day we finished our journey to Utah to visit my little sister. (Sorry Sar you still get to be little :D ) Her three kids and my three kids played SO HARD they tuckered themselves out by the third day. We enjoyed a little R and R that day while they all slept!! Sadie was so stoked about going to the dinosaur museum, again, but I think all the kids enjoyed it immensely.
They played dress up, colored, did puzzles and then on the last day we decorated some foam visors which were a huge hit for all the kids! (Even Nathan) Playing chefs, and going outside on the play house were a must as well. We always enjoy our time spent with family.

Play, Play, Play the day away!!!