Kaitlyn's Lengthy Locks

Kaitlyn's hair grows really fast, just like mine. It had gotten so long that it was causing some problems for her. . This is her hair caught in the curtain on our side door. I'm not sure how this happened. Tom was the one that got her out of this mess. I would've just cut her hair to get it untangled, but I didn't. Last week though, I finally cut it. We forgot to take a good picture of her new hair cut, but here's a picture of her at her party. I cut over 1 foot off. She doesn't mind at all because it's not as hot and it's way easier to brush and wash.

Kaitlyn's 6th Birthday Party!

Kaitlyn had a teddy bear birthday party today. A few weeks ago Kaitlyn said she wanted her own stuffed animal. I told her that she had plenty, but then I realized that all the stuffed animals in our house originally belonged to Alan or Sarah. She didn't have one of her own. So, we decided to have a "make your own teddy bear" party. I found this place online that makes teddy bears that you stuff yourself (waaaaay cheaper than "build-a-bear"). The bears are 14" long and all come with their own adoption certificate, heart to place in side, and stuffing. It was at http://www.buildables.biz/ if anyone is interested. ..... Anyway, we had a ton of fun at our teddy bear party!!

Here's Kaitlyn coloring on her bear's shirt, with friends stuffing their bears in the background:

Here you can see one of the bears after it was stuffed, along with the kids coloring their bear shirts.
Kaitlyn opening her presents:

Enjoyting cake, ice cream, and pink lemonade:

Here's the Birthday Cake!! The "fondant" is not really fondant, it's just marshmallow cream and powdered sugar mixed together until it became a dough. Not the greatest to work with for covering a cake, but nice for making little teddy bears!! The teddy bears had some powdered unsweetened cocoa in them to make them brown,.. the chocolate made them taste awesome.

Happy 6th Birthday Kaitlyn!!

Cupcakes for Kaitlyn

Yesterday was Kaitlyn's 6th Birthday. We'll be having a party for her on Saturday, but I took cupcakes to her class yesterday for fun. I made cupcakes in mini ice cream cones and I tried to frost them to look like ice cream cones. I guess I didn't use the right tip because as I was frosting them, I noticed they looked more like pink flowers in a flower pot than ice cream. So, I added some green leaves, and took the potted flower cupcakes to Kaitlyn's class. Everyone loved them!! I also decided to make a little wooden cupcake for fun this morning as well. I used food coloring to stain the wood for the first time. It worked really well. William has been having fun taking the candle and the top off and on all morning.

The big 1 1

For Alan's 11th Birthday party, he wanted to just invite a few friends over to play some video games and have pizza. (At our house, the kids only get to play video games once a week on Saturday, and only after their chores/homework/piano practicing are done. So it's a big deal to be able to play video games in our family) I was more than happy to agree to that party idea.

It was the easiest birthday party we've ever had. Because he's 11, I don't really pay attention to what he's putting on, and I didn't notice his fashion choices until after the party had started. Oh well.

He got a U-Command Wall-E, which is basically a robot that he controls with a wireless remote. He was so excited to get it. He's wanted that since Christmas.

And of course it wouldn't be Alan's Birthday if there weren't something resembling Star Wars. He asked for a cake that just said "Star Wars" on it. Funny. But it's so Alan.

Activity Days video!

This a video we did to help the 8-11 year olds in our primary accomplish one of their goals in theif Faith in God books. Part of the goal was "Tell a story from the book of Mormon that exemplifies faith in Christ". We decided it would be fun to make a movie!

Dancing Teddy Bears

Sarah likes the "player piano" feature of our piano. She tried to see if she could make her teddy bears dance while sitting them on the moving keys.

Big Boy Lessons

William likes to color... everything.... paper, rugs, beds, walls... I realized that just telling him "no" or having him go to the corner when he did it was not working. So when he recently colored on the wall in the family room I gave him a sponge with soap on it to scrub it off. I think he understood why he was doing it, and if he does it again, he'll have to clean it up. And in other news... William started wearing underwear this week. He loves it and he has been going to the bathroom everyday since Monday. He even stays dry at naptime! We're still having a little trouble getting to the bathroom on time with "number 2", but he at least tries to get there. Having only underwear on and no pullups really helps because he doesn't like to be wet. YAY!! We're a diaper free home!!

"

1st Day of School!!

Today was the 1st Day of School. Kaitlyn was so excited that she's been counting down the days for weeks!! As per our tradition, yesterday evening they all recieved a "Daddy blessing". When the blessings were done for the big kids, William got on the chair and said, "my turn" so he got a special blessing from Daddy too.

Here they all are in their uniforms ready to go. (William had to be in the picture too of course) Kaitlyn starts Kindergarten today!
Sarah starts 4th grade!!

Alan is the big man on campus this year in the 5th grade. He prides himself in the fact that he could be the oldest kid at the school since technically he could be in the 6th grade.

(his birthday is one day before the cut-off, so I kept him back in kindergarten so that he wouldn't be the youngest).

Breakfast with Sister Parks

Our friend Christie parks likes to come over to visit and play with our kids. She's the Primary Chorister in our ward and loves children, but can't have any of her own. This morning she came over and had breakfast with us. She brought her own special batter for waffles. She had the kids help her make it. They had lots of fun. She also brought some fruit to put on the waffles.

It was a delicious breakfast. Thanks Sister Parks!!!I love William's morning hair.

Fruit pizza and homemade ice cream

One of our new favorite desserts!! We put sugar cookie dough on a pizza pan and cooked it. Then covered it with frosting, then covered it with fruit. We did the ice cream the old fashioned way-without an ice cream maker. We placed the ingredients inside a plastic jar, made sure the lid was tight, then placed that jar into an even bigger jar. We put ice and rock salt around it, then closed the lid on the bigger jar. Then we rolled it back and forth to each other in the kitchen. It took about 30 minutes of rolling back and forth. We sang songs as we did it. It was fun and yummy!!

Alan's letter to the tooth fairy

Alan has been losing alot of teeth lately. He has 3 teeth with stainless steel crowns. When he got them put on it cost over $200. I guess he heard me talk about it before, and so this was the letter that went under his pillow with his tooth. The tooth fairy gave him .50 cents. :)

UPDATE: Alan just corrected me, he said the tooth fairy gave him $1.

Pioneer Day

Last week much of my time was spent getting ready for the Pioneer Day Ward Activity that the primary was in charge of. We haven't had a pioneer day acivity for our ward or even stake in years, so I thought it would be nice to do something this year. You can see what we did on the primary blog I write by going here: http://www.edgewoodprimary.blogspot.com/

I made bonnets for Kaitlyn and Sarah and myself. Sarah is wearing hers with the front flipped up.

Normally you might think that we'd have a pioneer activity outside, but it was sooooo hot! It was over 105 degrees outside and the humidity was so much that not even the air conditioning could get rid of the "stickiness" in the air. Anyway, we had fun-about 80 people came a very good turn out for our tiny ward. The activities were making butter, hoop racing, and making a ward quilt. I also made a giant map of the pioneer trail and put it up on the wall. We all had a good time, but even today, a day later, I'm exhausted.

Museum Mayhem

We went to the museum yesterday to play in the children's section.Kaitlyn dressed up.One of their favorite places is the light blocks area. They all have fun building with the clear colored blocks on a light table. One room is covered in chalk boards. Kaitlyn-who doesn't know the order of the rainbow, decided that she wanted to put the colored chalk in "order". I didn't notice what she was doing until she was done. I asked her if any one helped her with it. She said "no". She's such a little artist that she saw how the colors would naturally change from one to another. She's been drawing people with faces, hands and legs since she was two,

but I've kind of forgotten how artistic she was until I saw this.

Library trips

We go to the library every 2 weeks to check out new books. We have a really big city library with a huge children's section that my kids love. When we first started going, William was so excited with all the room in the library that he'd run around like a crazy boy. So I would put him in our toddler hiking back pack. That made it alot easier, except for the back pain. :/ Anyway, William the conquerer has finally learned that the library is not to be conquered, and he stays with me when we go-mostly.

Watermelon seed spitting contest

Our friends the Holloways came over yesterday to play and have lunch. They have 8 children in their family, so it's always a party when they come.