Mom's Birthday

For my mom's birthday, us girls spent Saturday afternoon being pampered! We went to lunch and then went to get a massage at Happy Feet Reflexology!! It was way fun and we are already planning our Mother's Day adventure.

(Note To Self: don't take a picture AFTER the massage, get one BEFORE the massage!!)

Happy 29th Birthday MOM!!

Love you!!

California... again

We went to California again in early January for our nephew's mission farewell. Tyler is going to the Pittsburg Pennsylvania Mission.

We left Thursday and this was Friday morning.  Mark was in heaven holding those 2 cute kids!!

There's a doughnut shop just around Grandma's house that Mark has made a tradition to going to.  

Mark got some cheap tickets to go whale watching off of Long Beach, so we left Friday morning to get out there. We knew it would be cold on the boat while it was moving, so we bundled up pretty warm. 

The kids thought it was fun chasing the birds.

Waiting for them to let us on the boat!!

We were told by a lady that these seats were the best seats on the boat.... but they were the coldest once the boat started moving. 

Braeden wanted a picture with the "Titanic" (but was actually the Queen Mary)

It was really cold, so the kids wanted to chill inside for a bit while Mark and I took turns saving "our good seats"

Front of the boat waiting to see a whale

The back of the boat

Not sure who this crazy kid is??

This was the best picture I got of the one whale we saw. We didn't get too lucky on our whale watching adventure, but the kids loved being on a boat like that!!

Grandma has a fun "toy" that the kids love to play with.  Mark was spinning them around really fast

 Elli's birthday wasn't for a couple weeks, but G-Ma and G-Pa made a cake for Elli and let her open a gift from them.  

This was Elli's LITTLE cake.... she was a little sad about that!!

And this was Braeden's GINORMOUS cake.... he was pretty proud of that!!

I had to get Elli with my spatula

Cute clothes from G-Ma

Then we headed to Kirk and Stacy's and the boys LOVE taking their shirts off and playing Wii Dance.  It's funny watching them strut their stuff!!

Daddy playing Jenga with Elli

Caleb cuddling with Reggie!! All the kids love this dog!! He is such a sweet dog!!

This was after the farewell at Brett & Kristi's house.  All the kids were playing on the rocks.

Tyler did an amazing job on his talk and will be a great missionary!! We will see you in 2 years!!

Crazy Times

I was at my sister's house and walked in the backyard and didn't notice anything unusual until I heard something strange standing RIGHT next to me. And there was a HUGE turkey (I'm not kidding, the head almost came to hip) It scared the Ba Gees Gees out of me!!

STORY BEHIND THE TURKEY...
On Christmas Day, my brother in law went out to feed their chickens and noticed this huge turkey the chicken coop. Well, earlier that day, my uncle called my mom to see how her Christmas was going and when her kids were coming over. Well, he never calls on Christmas Day for small talk. So we KNEW it was him that put the chicken in Paul's chicken coop. My uncle was calling because earlier he went to put in the turkey they were still at home. So he wanted to see when they were leaving. But it's funny because it's payback for my uncle and Paul will think of something..... he ALWAYS does!! He doesn't forget things like this!! 

Then the kids went on a bike ride..... together..... on the SAME BIKE......

Only the coolest bike I have ever seen!! An 8 passenger bike. Leave it to Paul to get something crazy and unusual for his kids!!

Elli's Birthday

I have never been able to bring treats for Braeden's birthday ever since Kindergarten. So even though I thought I wouldn't be able to bring some for Elli's bday, I asked her teacher anyway. And she said YES!! So Elli got to pass out cupcakes to her classmates in the morning! 

Then I headed back to her school to take her out to lunch. She wanted McDonald's, but we don't have one super close, so I convinced her Sonic was just as good. (I needed to hurry since I had to bring back a lunch for Braeden.) She LOVES corn dogs!!  

Caleb enjoying his Strawberry slush (minus the strawberries, they put maybe 2 strawberries in the slush, but it was still good)

Then later in the afternoon, I drove back to her school because she was getting an award for Best Citizenship!  

I didn't realize Braeden would be recognized for Math, but he got to stand up and be recognized for that!! 

Then after school, Elli got to open her presents. Here's a picture of Braeden taking a picture of Elli opening her camera.  Kind of funny!!

She's so corky... She said, "Yeah, I got a box!!" 

Elli has ben wanting a CTR ring for a while, so she finally got one.

Then we ate some cake!! She wanted a Rapunzel cake! This was my attempt at a fancy cake!! Elli was so excited when I showed her the finished product!!

I wasn't too excited to cut it and let them eat it. All that hard work of decorating down the drain!! Well, I guess that's what pictures are for!!

Then we headed off to Red Robin for dinner!! We waited for about 20 minutes to get a table and this was just too tempting for the kids. Since I'm a Jew and didn't want to spend $3 to let them have their own turn, they shared a turn and actually switched places during it so they could each get a turn being in front!!  WooHoo, Mom is so sweet!!

As soon as we sat down, Elli told me she wasn't feeling good. Then she acted like she was about to throw up, so I took her to the bathroom.  When we got in the stall, she burped and said, "I guess all I needed to do was burp, I feel better."

Keeping the little guy entertained until the food came!

But she was still very tired, so laid on my lap until the food came.

She didn't really want to eat this. She wanted to save it and take it home. But she kept asking me when they were going to sing to her. 

The fun didn't end at dinner.  The next day we we planned on going to see "Yogi Bear" but we got there kind of late and there weren't any good seats, so we decided to go bowling!! I love bowling!!

Braeden did pretty well. 

Elli rocked it with her squat and push technique.

Braeden started helping the younger 2 and it was cute seeing him be so big!!

I think Elli had a super fun birthday even without a friend party!!  She told me it was her best birthday yet!!

Mission accomplished!!