Cats Party at the Park

We celebrated Amberly's Birthday with her friends on April 8th. She requested a cat birthday cake (who even knew she liked cats that much?...not me). So I took that and made it the theme for her party. There were plenty of ideas on line and that helped a lot. I was worried about it raining since we were having the party at the park, but it turned out to be the opposite problem. It was 90 degrees that day and the party was at 1:30 in the afternoon. It felt sweltering because we weren't used to that heat yet. Luckily it was very windy (and unluckily because we couldn't get the decorations to stay up) and that helped it not be completely unbearable. I believe all the kids had fun....I was lucky enough to have some friends and neighbors there to help when I needed it. I can't lie...I'm glad it's over. Maybe that is why it has taken so long to post about it.

The cake I stayed up til 1 a.m. decorating (but we also had 2 showings that next morning that I was cleaning for too). Thank goodness my friend Hannah came to help me.

Amberly was happy with her cake, which made it all worth it.

All the cats playing "Cat, Cat, Mouse".

One of the cutest cats ever!

Time for cake!

One of the biggest requests was for a pinata. There weren't any in the shape of a cat, so we had to settle for a Lion. Amberly gets all ready to slam it here.

The loot!

A 6th Birthday to Remember

We uber-celebrated Amberly's birthday this year. So here are the pictures of her actual birthday (which was during spring break (April 1)). Another post will be devoted entirely to her birthday party with her friends that occurred about a week later. I can't believe she is already six. She is our self-motivated, self-entertained, artistic, giggly, beautiful middle child. Happy Birthday Amberly! We love having you in our family.

She begged to get to open a present the morning of her birthday.

This was her breakfast choice this year, strawberries and chocolate milk...YUM!

We spent the day going to Purina farms where we watched this dog show. The kids loved it!

It's too exciting to even pose for a picture. (Amberly chose to take Tabitha Whittekiend along.)

The five little munchkins pose with the dogs.

AHHHHH a horse (just love Wesley's scared face in this one...a typical one of his.).

Look at the horse Mom!

Suey! Animals in the petting zoo.

Upstairs in the barn they had a play area which included these tunnels....

a couple hay lofts....

and these tables filled with dry corn for the kids to play in. They spent at least an hour playing and loved it. Ellie loved sticking the corn in her mouth.

We had invited Tabitha's family over for dinner, but had a house showing at the last minute so we had to go to their house and make dinner. We rushed home so I could finish cleaning the house and get some of the ingredients for dinner. Then we went to the Whittekiends and enjoyed the evening with them. Amberly opted for donuts that night since we were saving the cake making for her party. Brooke even had a mini-cake stand to hold the special birthday-girl donut. It was so much better than it would have been at home. We are lucky to have such great friends.

The Birthday girl with her "cake"

Some welcome Spring Break Visitors

Since Tom was gone for Spring Break this year, my younger sister Kathy decided to save my sanity by coming out from California to visit. She brought along her oldest, Samantha, who is now 11. The girls had so much fun playing and getting to know their cousin and we were able to go on a few outings together. Unfortunately, the weather during spring break was more like winter. We were going to take the kids to Silver Dollar City, but it was rainy and cold...so we ended up taking them to the swimming pool at The Centre. They had fun, but were sad to miss all the rides and made me promise to take them there or to Six Flags before we move. We also were able to visit the Arch and the Science Center in St. Louis on one of the days they were here. Other than that, we just let the kids play, made some delicious food....and ate it, watched some movies, ate more food, and played some games. We sure are glad they came to visit and are hopefully going to see more of them when we are in Texas and they are in Mississippi. Sadly, I didn't get many pictures....here are some that I do have:

Samantha and "El Belle" (as she is affectionately called by Tom and the Kids...but now the kids have switched to "El Bow").

Smiley Amberly...always giggling.

She loves the froggy slide!

Wes on the slide...he is such a big boy now! Cool "gobbles"!

Budding Talent

Just before our Spring Break, Reili's school held a Variety (Talent) Show where the students were able to perform a talent. Reili was able to play the flute in front of a big audience for the first time. Her teacher came to play a duet with her and said that her legs were really shaking up there on stage.

She just started taking lessons in December and is doing really well. Her teacher is impressed with her natural vibrato and her progression. We are excited that she is doing so well and that she wanted to perform already. It is fun to see her enjoy doing something that much. I wasn't able to download the poor quality video that I made of the performance, but I did manage to snap this picture of her and her teacher after the show. Way to go Reili!

10 & just over 3/4

Last week Tom and I finally took a week long get away to Florida for our tenth anniversary! We couldn't get away during our actual anniversary last May because Elizabeth was so young and still nursing. We hired a young single adult from our ward to take care of the kids and flew the coop. It's the first time we have done anything "fun" on our own like that since we started having children. We realized that we should probably do it more often than once every ten years. It was so relaxing to be together and just do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted. We got a great deal for Disney World Tickets through the military and had fun doing a lot of the things we missed out on while we were there with our kids. Tom found out just how much I love the rides that make your stomach drop. He wore a patch for motion sickness this time and was able to go on many of the rides with me that he hadn't ever been on. My ultimate favorites there are Tower of Terror and Expedition to Everest. We also took a nap almost everyday and I lounged at the pool at our hotel one afternoon. Just the relaxing break I needed before a 2 month stint as a single parent with 4 children trying to sell a house! I will try to think back on those lazy days of vacation and suck all the life out of them that I can in my mind. Thank you Tom for 10 (almost 11) great years and a wonderful vacation! I love you!

First day at Epcot!

Memories.....

The magic kingdom....always magic with Tom!