Tessa Turns 9 and We Celebrate Easter

Tessa had her 9th birthday on March 24th. It was a low key birthday this year, but we had a fun cake and friends over to help celebrate. I always try to make creative cakes for Tessa, because I wanted to do something special for my "middle child" after Aubrey was born. Unfortunately, after having a total of 4 kids, poor Aubrey is the one left out on almost everything and will probably have the most "middle child" issues. :) Anyway, so Tessa asked for a turtle cake, and I did my best to make her one. I thought it turned out pretty good. She liked it too, so that's a success in my book!

Since we've been reading the Book of Mormon, our treat for finishing the book of Jacob was to eat out at Olive Garden. Luckily, we finished that book right around Tessa's birthday and she allowed us to combine the two by celebrating that accomplishment and her birthday in one shot by eating at Olive Garden on her birthday. They sang to her and she picked out her very own dessert - a caramel flavored mousse. She was still a little embarrassed to be the center of attention, but she at least didn't hide while they were singing this time.

We had the Kasallis family over to help us eat our turtle cake and to watch her open her presents. She got a tricycle race bike which was her biggest and most exciting gift along with a few smaller gifts too. I didn't get any pictures of her gifts, but we did get one with her by her cake before we started eating it. 

Tessa is still our smarty-pants girl. She always has the highest grades and she does well in school and in the GT program. She loves being active still and doing things like tumbling, dancing, riding bikes, or basically anything that lets her move. She has a lot of friends and loves to create clubs with all of them at school and do all kinds of elaborate imagination games and activities with them, which is awesome. She's our happy, easy-go-lucky girl and we love her. I can't believe she's 9, but we're so happy that she is a part of our family. We love you Tessa!

A week after Tessa's birthday, we celebrated Easter. We had a ward activity that included an Easter egg hunt and an auction for a fund raiser for the youth. The girls loved playing at the park and doing the egg hunt. Abby was hanging out with her older friends and a couple minutes before the egg hunt began, she told me she didn't want to participate. I figured it was because it's only for the primary kids and Abby's older friends were too old to participate and she was tagging along with them. Luckily however, some of her younger friends, like our neighbor Claire, talked her into doing it. I was happy because I was also reminded that it was her final year to participate anyway, because she's 11 and next year she'd be too old to participate whether she wanted to or not. 

I was excited to get pictures of each of the age groups as they waited for their turn to hunt eggs. Aubrey and Tessa were in the same age group this year. 

They each got to find 10 eggs and then once all the kids had 10, they were able to go around and find any eggs that were left. We definitely had plenty of candy by the time the night was over. 

The day before Easter, we let the kids dye eggs. It was a bit messy, but we only spilled one cup of dye; so I guess that's pretty good considering we were working with 9 kids. Everyone got to decorate two eggs and they had fun choosing their colors and picking their designs.

I also wanted to add our semi-annual women's conference picture. The past couple years, we started going out for a treat after the broadcast, and this time we picked AJ's Diner. Girls ages 8 and up are invited, so it's a fun mother/daughter activity that the older girls and I get to do together. It's fun to be with other ladies and their daughters from church as well. This was the only picture I took, but these girls had fun making another concoction with their leftover food and shakes, just like they had 6 months ago at our last restaurant outing.

On Easter Sunday, I talked Tyler into letting us take pictures since the girls finally got to wear their new Easter dresses that Grandma and Grandpa Black had bought for them a couple weeks ago. I thought the pictures turned out really pretty. I love having family pictures.

That evening, we had our own egg hunt around the yard, and the Kasallis family joined us. Tyler's family's tradition is to include money in some of the eggs, so the kids are showing off their dollar bills in the second picture. They had a lot of fun finding their own eggs and helping others find the eggs that they couldn't.

I love Easter and all the fun family activities we do together for it, but we were able to also spend a lot of time talking about the true meaning of Easter and how our Savior, Jesus Christ, rose from the tomb and is now alive just like we are. We watched a video of His life and talked about how important His life, atonement, and resurrection are to us. We are so grateful for the gospel we have in our lives and the knowledge we have of our Savior. And we love being able to celebrate that together as a family every Easter season.

Spring Break and Other March Happenings

I wanted to start this post with a few pictures about a block party we had one weekend. It's been a dream of mine ever since we moved onto a cul-de-sac to have a block party and invite all the neighbors. Especially now that we know more than half of the people who live on our street, I've really wanted to do this. One night we kind of had an impromptu block party and BBQ, and it just makes me want to do it even more and really put some planning into the next one. It was so much fun. 

The hardest part was getting good pictures in the dark.

Our Spring Break was pretty low key this year. We stayed home and Tyler worked, but we did have some visitors who made it more fun for the kids. The week before our Spring Break started, Grandma and Grandpa Gibbons came to visit. We had fun eating out with them, going to the school to have lunch with the girls, and just hanging out. We met them at Applebees when they first pulled into town. I took a ton of pictures trying to get the right flash without it being too bright, but this goofy picture was the best one of the bunch.

We picked up some pizzas and spent an entire afternoon at the school one day, so we could eat with all three girls. I didn't think about taking pictures until the last lunch, Abby's. It was a really cute picture though. Taryn was a good sport to sit through all those lunch times too.

I had a Relief Society activity the week that they were visiting, so Marilyn went with me. We were celebrating the Relief Society's birthday and we had a dinner. I took a picture of our entire group. We sat at tables determined by our own birth month, so Marilyn and I didn't even get to sit together, but everyone was very friendly and we had a good time.

We love when family comes to visit and are always sad to see them go.

AJ Kasallis turned 12 right before Spring Break and their family had a dinner party with a bunch of families from church. We caught all the youth at one point to grab a picture and I wanted to include that here. They are a great group of kids and I'm excited for Abby to grow up with them.

Like I said, we mostly hung out at home for Spring Break. The girls played a lot of tablets and phones and other electronics. Abby and Taryn looked so cute together on their phones playing games, that I had to grab a picture.They could barely even spare the time to smile let alone look up for the picture.

We did take one afternoon to go to a park to play. The girls picked the "spiderman park" because of its huge "spider's web" that they can climb. I pulled out my phone to take some pictures so we'd have some account of what we did during Spring Break this year.

You can tell from Taryn's hair that the girls also got to play beauty parlor and they colored their own hair using hair chalk that we have. They entertained themselves pretty well during their week off from school.

The girls had fun making up their own games including a ninja warrior course and using the back of the drums as a hiding place.

During the second half of our Spring Break week, Grandma and Grandpa Black came to visit. We just hung out and did some shopping to get the girls new Easter dresses. The most exciting thing we did together was have an ice cream sundae party because we had finished reading 2nd Nephi and that was our treat for finishing that book. It was yummy and fun to have all the exciting toppings like angel food cake, hot fudge, and of course whipped cream and cherries.

The last thing I wanted to include was a birthday party that we went to at Peter Piper Pizza. It happened a week or so after Spring Break, but it was in March and the girls had lots of fun.

The party was for one of Tessa's school friends, but they let us all play, so Aubrey and Taryn had a blast as well. The cutest thing I saw was at the roller coaster video game where it's only meant for two. However, Tessa and her classmates would squeeze as many kids on as possible so they could all enjoy the ride together. Here's Tessa with three of her friends. It was so funny to watch.

Even though we didn't travel anywhere this Spring Break, we still made our own memories and had fun with family and friends.

Aubrey's 7th Birthday

Aubrey celebrated her 7th birthday on February 10th. What made it even more special was that Grandma and Grandpa Black came to help celebrate. The girls were in school during most of the days they were here visiting, but they just tagged along with all our regular activities. They were able to see Abby's volleyball game and I took this picture of Aubrey walking with Grandpa because she's always been a "grandpa's girl." Grandma and I also took pictures of the girls after they were all dressed up and ready for church on Sunday.

Aubrey picked her favorite place to eat for her birthday dinner. That place is still IHOP. She enjoyed her ice cream treat after the workers sang to her. She shared it with everyone too. 

We went with Grandma and Grandpa to eat lunch with each of the girls at school - a different girl each day. We joined Aubrey for lunch on her actual birthday. They love getting to eat at the special family table during lunch and it was fun for us to see the girls during the day. Taryn wanted a picture with me and Grandma while we waited for Aubrey to show up.

Aubrey unwrapped her presents on her birthday and got quite a few fun things. First, she got her own headphones that she begged for after Abby stopped letting Aubrey borrow hers. And they were her favorite color too - blue! She also got a Wii game, a new BYU t-shirt, the Hotel Transylvania 2 movie, a toy butterfly, and lots of shopkins that she opened later when Grandpa and Grandma Gibbons' package arrived. 

Instead of a cake this year, Aubrey chose to have a lemon meringue pie. That's one of my favorite desserts, so I was excited to make it. Aubrey loved the meringue but thought the lemon was too sour, so she'll probably go back to a traditional cake next year.  

We also celebrated with the Kasallis family a couple weeks later because AJ has a birthday in February too. Tyler made chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting and a chocolate crunch topping. They were really yummy and really rich. 

During the President's Day holiday, we took a family trip to the dollar movies on the east side of town to see the Peanuts movie. We went with the Kasallis's and we were the only people in the theater, so that was fun. During the credits, the kids decided to have an impromptu dance party at the front of the theater. I think it was actually Audrey's idea so the kids were all happy to participate without feeling like they were going to get in trouble. It was a fun way to finish out the month and the birthday celebrations with family and friends. 

As for an update on Aubrey, she's still our headband girl choosing to wear them over having any other hairstyle. She has let me cut her hair a couple times now and currently has it shoulder-length, which she loves. Her favorite color is blue and her favorite things to do include watching Studio C and finding videos of Pentatonix on the computer to watch. She knows all of their songs and sings along with all of them. She still prefers skirts over pants, and she has started wearing cowboy boots every day. She loves them! She wears them with skirts, pants, shorts, and even dresses. It's pretty cute. Aubrey is still our most dramatic and loud girl, but she can also be the sweetest and friendliest too. She's always quick to give hugs and say "I love you" just because. We love our Aubrey!

Happy Birthday!

It's 2016! And We Did Some Crazy Stuff!

To start out the new year, I've collected all my January pictures and some of them seem to run under the same theme of Crazy! But before we get to the really crazy stuff, I'll start with our family's New Year's resolution. We decided, after being challenged in church, to make sure we read the entire Book of Mormon as a family this year. We've done it before, but with more of the girls actually reading this time around, I was excited to start again. I found an idea on Pinterest that gave you rewards after finishing each book, like cupcakes or a dinner out, and I thought this would help motivate us. So far it's been working great, and we're even ahead of schedule. This brings us to my first picture. While reading one night, Taryn was sitting on Tyler's lap, and it was so cute I had to take a picture. It turned out even better when I captured Taryn looking at him. I love it so much!

Cupcakes were the reward after finishing 1st Nephi, so I made a new cupcake to try. It was a chocolate cupcake with a caramel candy center with caramel frosting. I thought they were super yummy. Everyone else seemed to think so too. We even shared them with the Kasallis family. I almost forgot to take a picture so I grabbed one after everyone was almost done eating. I tried to get a picture of the cupcake itself, but it wasn't the greatest. Oh well. The kids were excited for the treat and it's keeping them motivated to read every night. 

In the middle of January, the girls dressed up for class pictures at school, so I took pictures before taking them to school that morning. I love my girls. They're so beautiful! 

And then the craziness begins... Don't you just love Taryn's beautiful picture?!? She still loves taking pictures using Abby's crazy teeth from Halloween. Even though Taryn didn't have a school picture, I couldn't not include her in the pictures of each girl. 

Tyler's been playing softball with some friends almost every weekend. We finally ended up going to his games one Saturday and I decided I needed pictures of him playing. They always play two games and they win one and lose one almost every week. That was the case when we were there too. I love watching them play, and the girls didn't mind watching and playing around the park. I was happy to get some kind of documentation of Tyler's extra activities so that I could post about them here. He plays outfield and always makes the awesome catches. He was too far away to take a picture of him in the outfield, but I did get some as he waited to bat and while he was batting.

I feel like I had to take a picture of Taryn just to have record of the outfit she picked on her own for church one Sunday. Crazy right? She picked out the dress and the tights and refused when we tried talking her into a different pair of tights. You should have seen her with her shoes on too. She picked her white, high-heeled Sunday shoes, but they're like sandals, so her toes were showing and everything. It was awesome! I know she'll love this picture when she's a teenager. We just had to smile and shake our heads and let her go how she wanted to. Apparently her friends still stood by her for pictures, so I guess it turned out fine. :) And finally, Tyler found Teagan's Olaf costume and decided to model it for everyone while we were together with the Kasallis's. 

See what I mean about how a lot of my January pictures were related in the crazy department?!? It was a fun month of spending time together as a family and with our friends. It was a great start to the new year!