Birthday Surprise Day1

Back in August Emily mentioned that Mom was turning 70 in February and that we should do something awesome like all of us come together and surprise her. The seed was planted and over the next six months tons of emails were sent out and read and plans were made and flights were booked. On February 5th Joshua, Emily, Andrew and I flew to California and were picked up at the airport by Erin. We stayed the night at her place and the next morning we got up and got ready to go surprise my Mom. My bangs were wonky and so after I messed around with them and tried to fix them I took a picture to make sure they looked ok.

Heather and mom were going to Pilates that morning and she told Mom that they were going to meet Ashleigh at Brandon's Diner afterwards for a birthday breakfast. Mom later said she thought it was weird they were going the day before her Birthday but went along with their plans. Ashleigh also made plans with her to go to Disneyland for the day. 

the four of us with Erin met Stephanie, Jeremy and Ashleigh at the Diner and went in and got seated. We were all so excited and when we saw Mom and Heather pull up we got super giddy and had big grins on our faces. They walked in and Heather mentioned to Mom that she saw Ashleigh and Mom looked and spotted Ashleigh and then slowly saw the rest of us. Her jaw dropped and she looked stunned. It was the best reaction ever! We all said Happy Birthday and then stood to give the birthday girl hugs. All of us had tears in our eyes, it was so much fun to be together as siblings to surprise our Mom.

After we were done eating and talking I had the waiter take a group picture of all of us.

After we left the diner we headed over to Moms house where we just sat and visited and talked and laughed all afternoon. Mom made the brilliant suggestion to go to the mall so we could go to See's and she could buy us all some chocolate for valentines day, then she wouldn't have to worry about mailing them. So off we went. 

After we picked our candy I had the See's lady take our picture. She managed to cut Heather out of the picture so I took a selfie with her so she could be part of the picture fun.

Andrew found an "interesting" jacket to try on.

After the mall we headed to Mom's next surprise, dinner at "Farrell's". Farrell's is famous for it's ice-cream sundaes and it was the perfect place to take the birthday girl. We had a good time, the food was delicious, the company was awesome but the atmosphere was a little much. It was just a very loud place. It is a favorite place to go to for birthdays and there was a lot of singing going on. We decided it was a place to go to with a lot of time in between.

The menus were printed like newspapers and that made for a fun picture, 

Cutie Girls

I went to wake up the girls one morning and they looked so cute, bedhead and all, that I couldn't resist snapping some shots.

It is now the season of all things love and with Valentine's Day right around the corner preparations are being made for class parties. Rylee was excited and anxious to get her box done and turned in. 

I took a picture of my cute Avynlea doing her homework 

then she got ahold of my phone to take some pictures of herself. 

I was running late to meet some friends for lunch to celebrate a birthday and since I had to leave fairly quickly I decided to call the restaurant while on my way to get my order in. When I explained what I wanted to do and that I was meeting friends for a birthday lunch the waiter put me on hold for a minute and then came back asking if it was a table filled with old ladies. I proudly answered that yes those were my friends. I love these ladies and was very happy to celebrate the birth of my friend Carma Hamp. Rylee and Carma also have a very special relationship and after school I dropped Rylee off at Carma's so she could give her a present of chocolate and a homemade bracelet and to spend time together. When I picked her up later I got a picture of the two friends.

Avynlea's birthday got dragged out a little longer when she received a package in the mail from Joshua and Mallory. She loves the bunny necklace they sent her and wears it often.

More Valentines prep, this time Avynlea was working on her Valentines with Rylees help.

I spent some time in the morning practicing some valentines hair on my girls and thoughts these hearts looked adorable. Rylee messed hers up a little with all of her activity and running around at school, but they held up really well and we are looking forward to having fancy hair for their class parties.

Happy 10th Birthday Avynlea!

This girl just celebrated her 10th birthday and is so happy to now be in the double digits. Avynlea loves pancakes so for breakfast I, of course, made her pancakes and I added valentine sprinkles to the batter to make them more birthday fun!

After school, while dinner was cooking we let Avynlea open her presents.

Rylee wanted to get her some clothes and glasses for her American Doll. I had already bought the swimsuit set for Avy so I let Rylee give that to her and I also went to the store to see if I could find some glasses for her to give as well. Avynlea loved the swimsuit and glasses, they were so cute!

New clothes for the birthday girl to wear to church.

Turning ten is a little bit of a hard age to shop for. Too old for a lot of the toys and too young for make-up and such. I was not sure what to get her and then saw and decided on new bedding. Perfect! 

Grandma Bonnie sent Avynlea gummies and 10 fresh and brand new Dollar bills.

Avynlea's favorite color is blue and Kenedy wanted to put together a blue gift for her. Filled with all things blue. It was really cute and a creative idea.

Kenedy had some candy bars to sell and knowing that her Grandpa would most likely buy them all she sent them to the farm with Mikell. When Mikell came back later that week she dropped off the money and in the bag was a gift for Avy from her Grandpa Bob. He makes us all laugh!

Avynlea wanted hobo dinners for her birthday meal and of course she got to use the special plate.

I also let Avynlea help make her birthday cake. She said she wanted a funfetti cake and when I went to the store I found even more fun cake and so I bought that along with the funfetti frosting. When she saw what I bought she changed the cake making plans from cupcakes to a layer cake and it looked awesome and tasted awesome!

Blue and Orange cake! We love it!

*Five things I love about Avynlea*

1) She loves to help me in the kitchen and always wants to help cook dinner. I love that she is taking an interest in learning how to do things. It is fun to have the company but it is also nice to have her learning so that she can take over this job for me someday ;). I love spending the time with her one on one.

2) Avynlea had the cutest dimples and the best smile. I love being around her happiness and love when she makes me laugh, which is often. 

3) She likes playing the piano and challenges herself to get better by teaching herself to play harder things. She has been working on learning Love One Another and can play really good on one hand. I recently bought her a Disney Piano Book to learn to play because I thought it would challenge her and be fun. She has good skills and it is fun to listen to her play.

4) Avynlea works hard in school and always comes home and immediately gets started on her homework. She doesn't ever complain or try to get out of it she just does it and I appreciate that so much.

5) She is thoughtful and perceptive. She can usually tell if I have had a bad day and tries to help me feel better any way she can. I love listening to her talk and she likes to tell me stories about her day and things that are happening.

Pretty much I love this girl and am so grateful she is my kid. She is beautiful and fun and makes me very happy with her sunshine!

*Avynlea's Favorite Things* 

Dinner: pancakes

Candy: gummy bears

Color: blue

Dessert: ice-cream

Toy: Saije (American Girl Doll)

Book: Saddle-Shoe Blues

Primary Song: I am Trying to be Like Jesus

Radio Song: I'm on Top of the World by Imagine Dragons

Friend: Paige Little

Thing to do: Ride Bikes

School Subject: Art

Scripture Story: Adam and Eve 

TV Show: Girl Meets World

Rylee's Project

Rylee came home from school with a cute project showing the parts of a flower. I thought it was a fun and creative way for them to learn the different parts. Avynlea thought the "Roots" looked liked shoelaces and kept teasing Rylee about why she had shoelaces on her project. To which Rylee would reply they are not shoelaces, it is yarn! Rylee at first was not too sure what she wanted to do with this project, keep it or throw it away. She finally decided to throw it away but I made sure to get a picture with her and the project before it was gone forever.

Throwbacks and more

My friend had posted these pictures from 1998, our High School Prom. Kind of fun to reminisce and see how young we were.

Desiree, Elizabeth, Janae, Chrystal, Jenna and Deborah

And of course Kenedy took advantage of the camera on my phone

Sunday we had Mikell and her kids over for dinner, Steve was out of town. James quickly attached himself to Kefford and became his little buddy. It was really cute how he would follow him around.

On Sunday I tried something new with my hair and loved it. My kids said it looked like my hair was a pair of big lips! Ha ha ha, that made me laugh, but it won't stop me from doing it again, I still love it!

It was Joshua's birthday on Tuesday and my Mom sent me this picture she found of the two of us. Too cute!

Sometimes when the cheerleader leaves her Pom-poms lying around, I will pick them up and play with them. I can't fit into her uniform so I might as well have something I can have fun with. I did pay for them after all. :) 

KitchenAid Miracle Worker

My KitchenAid decided to stop working the day before thanksgiving. I borrowed my neighbors to get through the holiday but since then it has been bust and I have had to get by without. Not fun at all! We looked into replacing it and also seeing how much it would cost to have it fixed and both options were so expensive. Kefford took matters into his own hands and after taking it apart, ordering a new part for cheap and watching some youtube videos he was able to fix it! I was so happy and super impressed, I really love being married to a man that is handy! My Kindle decided to stop being able to charge around this same time and Kefford was able to fix that also, this man is amazing!!!

First Cheer Competition!!

Kenedy had her first cheer competition on Saturday. Trista and Avynlea came with me to watch, support and cheer her on. Their squad competition teams were divided into four groups, Sideline, stunt, pom and show, with the girls being in 2 of the groups each. Kenedy is in pom and stunt. Only Pom and Sideline were competing today, the coaches did not feel that the other ones were ready. I got a picture of the girls right before they went on and I thought they did fabulous. I loved watching their pom performance. They did it to a song called "Bazooka Zooka Bubblegum" and it was so cute and fun. I especially loved the bright pink pom poms. The only other group to perform from our squad was Sideline and they were amazing to watch as well. The Sideline placed first and the Pom did not place at all. I was really surprised they didn't place because I thought they did such a great job. They did get the judges papers and so they can go over them and see what they need to do better next time. Kenedy had a lot of fun and I have to admit to getting teary eyed as I watched her. I love seeing my kids blossoming and finding things they are passionate about. Life sure is great!

Group shot of the squad. Kenedy is on the right at the end