Gavin Turned 8!

We had a great birthday party for Gavin's 8th birthday. Being in the new neighborhood he wanted to invite a bunch of old friends as well as new ones. I quickly realized that having a group of 8 year olds running around in my house was going to be nuts, so we reserved the gym at the church. This helped him decide to have a sports themed party. It turned out great. The kids could run around and play and be as crazy as they wanted. We also got a very random mix of sports stuff for our decor.

We started out with some stations for throwing the football, kicking soccer goals and shooting hoops.

We then had pizza and an awesome soccer ball cupcake cake.

 Then we spent almost an hour on the kids very favorite thing to do- Dodgeball. It is so funny how they would come up with different versions or how to play and go on for hours if they had the time to do it.

Gavin was even smiling as he was waiting for someone to catch a ball so he could go back in.

 At one point, there was only one girl left on one side and 4 kids on the other and she was super fast at dodging, but wasn't able to throw anyone out... So Caleb jumped in to start pegging kids out. It was hilarious and go all of the kids fired up to get him.

We also had a soccer ball pinata. We tried letting the kids hit it and then tried letting them kick it blindfolded. Both methods were very entertaining for all of the kids waiting in line and watching.

 One of my favorite things was listening to all of the kids sitting around telling Laffy Taffy jokes to each other, and sometimes even having to explain the jokes that weren't as funny. It was great. It is so nice to know these great kids and for Gavin to get to have contact with them all. He loves it.

A weekend in Vegas

A couple of weekends ago the boys and I headed down to Las Vegas to visit these super good looking Turleys. We also got to enjoy some fun and sun with them. Caleb had to stay home and work, so that made things a bit exciting. The drive down was great and seemed quick. Gavin was a superb co-pilot and took care of everything so we didn't have to stop very often.

We immediately tried to enjoy as much time outside as we could. While the other adults were driving to Vegas or working, I took the kids to the park for a couple of hours. They all loved it. The weather was completely perfect.

 Gavin and Morgan were trying to spin this thing at the same time. It was pretty funny to watch their determination.

 Super silly boys.

 We even had a little picnic on the perfectly green fake grass of the soccer field. The kids were all even complaining about how hot they were after running around playing soccer. It was great.

 Miran had the big birthday party on Friday night and it included  this princess bouncy castle. Since it was setup several hours before the party all of the kids got to spend about 7 hours jumping their little hearts out. Henry and Wyatt even indulged me by posing with the princesses. Wyatt has never talked so much about a princess as when he was trying to talk every adult into getting into the castle and jumping.

 His feet barely left the floor, but he thought he was going so high.

 So very much jumping.

 Miran's butterfly birthday cake.

 Saturday was her big day, her baptism. All of Schatzy's girls have worn my baptism dress that my mom made for me to be baptized in. It was really fun to get to be with Miran and see her wearing it.

 These guys were all having so much fun running around that there was quite a bit on complaining from my crowd when it was time to get dressed up and head to the church. Morgan and Finn were both pretty happy about it though, and even grumpy they all look very handsome.

 I also took some family photos for Schatzy, since hers hadn't been update for about 6 years. It was a lot of fun and they all looked great together. Even when Miran had decided she was done taking photos and put on her grumpy face.

 Schatzy with her baby. So hard to believe that her littlest has become so grown up.

 It was really a great weekend and a nice break from winter and life for us. Our drive home was a bit more painful because I came down with a cold by Sunday morning, but we made it, and are very glad we made the trip.

Henry is 6!

My little Henry turned 6. We planned a rockin' Star Wars party for the occasion. 

I found some great inflatable light sabers for all of the boys and they had a blast with them, while not poking anyone else's eye out.

Henry is striking his tough pose.

We also morphed some of his favorite things into Star Wars food, almost all of which was candy. Like Dark Side Skittles, light saber pretzel sticks, black licorice meteorites and blue Jedi juice.

Yes, he has inherited his Dad's knack for closing his eyes when a camera is around.

 One of the boys' favorite games was freeing Han Solo from carbonite (aka, chopping a toy Han out of colored ice). The all spent a lot of time melting and chipping away to rescue Han.

Since we only had one Han action figure, this group was freeing Chewbacca, but they also had a great time. And they did claim that theirs was frozen much deeper than the other group.

 We used the light sabers to duel as well as balance our training orb balloons in the air. They all lowed being about to test their skills.

 Even sitting and waiting for the next turn was a good time.

 Wyatt got in on a bit of the action too. He really loved this party.

 On Henry's actual birthday he spent almost the entire day building legos. He did pause for some cheese pizza for dinner and his favorite peanut butter glazed bundt cake.