A Birthday Celebration

This year Millie requested that her birthday party be at Monkey Joes.  I didn't want to pay the outrageous fee to rent a room for two hours, so we invited Millie's best buddy, Deacon to come with us and called it a party.  The bonus was that Deacon's mom and sister watched Sophia while we went and played!

 Levi loved playing on the blow up playground.  He didn't want to leave, but Millie and Deacon asked to leave because they were wore out after about 2 hours. 

We went to Monkey Joes on Tuesday and our family celebration on Wednesday, but Millie's birthday isn't until Saturday.   Because everyone was off on the 4th of July we celebrated early, Millie didn't complain. 

When planning out the day, at 6:30 am, Millie decided that she would let everyone arrive at her party, eat, then open her presents.  It was just too hard to wait until everyone arrived, so Millie asked if she could open one of her present from early with just Pap, Grandma, Aunt Tootsie, and Grandma McCoy.  She was one happy girl to get her dollar bin sunglasses, Hello Kitty stickers, paper, and tin from Sophia.

 It still proved difficult to wait until everyone was seated with their food, but she did it....while sitting on her biggest present, a bike from Mom and Dad.  Yes it was in a box and not assembled. 

 Levi got in on the present action and helped Millie open her "American Girl" doll.  It is actually just a doll from Target, but I didn't want to spend the $150, and neither did Grandma on a doll that we were not sure Millie would like or play with. 

Millie wanted to take an active roll in her party and picked out cupcakes instead of a cake.  We had Hello Kitty cupcakes, Care Bear cupcakes, and Beauteefull rose cupcakes.  She also got Hello Kitty plates, and tie die cups.  It was a great party.

After everyone left I was cleaning up the mess and didn't hear Millie, I went to check on her and she was sound asleep in Levi's game chair.  I let her sleep and continued cleaning up and found her new doll with matching nightgown all tucked in for a nap too.

Maybe we will do American Girl next year.

Getting Taller

The other day Millie and Levi were walking side by side and it amazed me at how tall Millie was getting.  She has already reached his shoulders. 

Happy Fathers Day

Usually for Father's Day I am out the day before trying to pick out a gift from the kiddos to give to Scott.  This year I am proud to announce that the kids and I made (yes you read that correctly we made) our gift.  Thanks to Pinterest, I saw a neat handprint craft and thought we could do that.  So off to Hobby Lobby we went.  While there Sophia got tired of picking out scrapbooking paper.  She started fussing, and of course Levi came to her rescue and picked her up.  About 5 minutes later she was sound asleep in his arms.  He was eating it up! 

 We went home and made our gifts, with enough time to get paps in the mail and delivered on the Saturday before Fathers Day!! 

Levi and Millie were very proud of thier gift and couldn't wait to give it to Daddy.  So they had him open it up on Saturday night.  Of course daddy loved it. 

Since Sophia was asleep when Levi and Millie gave daddy their present we took more pictures in Daddy's office where the picture will stay. 

No matter how big we get we will always reach for you. 

Happy Birthday Anna

Little Miss Anna is not so little anymore and has officially turned 3!  Boy does time fly.  To celebrate her birthday with her we took a day trip to their new house in Ohio and had a party.  There were lots of kids and cousins to play with, and everyone had a great time. 

 Here Gideon is teaching Anna the proper use of his light saber. 

 All the kiddos had fun "swimming."

 Levi especially enjoyed "working out" with Uncle Gabe's equipment.  He is tough stuff, pulling a total of 450 pounds. 

 What is a birthday party without cake, ice cream, and presents!  The chocolate cake and Aunt Susan made was super yummy.  I need to get the recipe from her....or maybe she will read this and send it to me.  ;-)

I think that Miss Anna liked her tea set that we got her.  I hope she has lots of tea parties with it. 

A little color

Last year for Mothers Day I got the two rockers.  Well it has taken me a year, but I have finally added some color to my front porch.

 

 I went to Hobby Lobby and picked out some fabric.  I then came up with what I wanted and took it over to my sister-in-laws house for a sewing bee.  Well she sews and I watch.  I told her what I wanted and she made it happen all in about an two hours time.  That included design, sewing, and lots of talking in between. 

I also made this square wreath.  Yes that is right, I made it.  The uncrafty sister finally has got her craft on....thanks to Pinterest. 

 Also got a new entry mat. 

Summer Fun

  Every since our Spring Break trip to Aunt Sara's house and Millie saw the garden rocks with "diamonds" that Gideon and Judah made she has wanted to make one.  When I saw that our local toy store downtown was holding a class to make garden rocks I immediately signed up.   

Millie and Levi loved it so we are signing up for more classes at Imagination Station.  We are making a robot soon. 

We took a trip to Grandma and Pap's house to meet up with the cousins and ate lots of popsicles. 

Now Sara may look like she is in distress, but she is really just making fun of a song that is playing on her phone.  Good times. 

 Sophia too got in on the popsicle action too.  Grandma just couldn't say no.  Look at her eyeing it.

 We have also been spending lots of time in the pool.  Millie is turning into a regular water bug and begs to go out every day. 

A trip to the circus??

For weeks there were free tickets all around Columbus to the circus.  I thought it would be fun to go, seeing that it was on the last day of school.  A little something special.  One sign that it was a "special" circus was that it was to be inside at the armory, but we did not pay attention to the signs and went anyway.  Now when a circus comes to town and is inside the armory you have to sit on the concrete floor and watch the one ring show with a horrible female announcer. 

 

Here she is in the black and green.  The first thing they allow you to do is to come inside the ring with $2 and buy a coloring book, now if your coloring book has a special sticker in the front cover you get to pick a special toy.  Of course all $100 little children beg their parents for $2 and run to buy the lovely coloring book. 

 Then the "clown" comes out.  He randomly picks some 'dads' out of the crowd and has them perform with hispanic music.  Some people laughed. 

One of the main attractions was "spongebob"  He came out walked around the circle and when back behind the curtain.  Of course this was after the horrible female announcer again allowed the children to come back with $2 more dollars to buy the purple star baloon.  I refused the baloon, which Millie thought was abuse and fell out on the floor crying.  I won though. 

The show continued with the clown and his "elephant."  He would wind the "elephant" up and have him walk, then the "elephant" would fall over dead.  This happened about 10 times, before he revealed the "elephant" was actually a dog in a costume.

 There was also this lady who brought two horses out.  This little pony, and an "unicorn."  She was also assisted by Crocodile Dundee.

I became a little concerned when the acrobat show was going on, when these fellas were the "lift" system. 

No matter how bad the show, Millie and Levi had fun. 

Scott on the other hand was ready to go when we arrived, but endured until the end.  Next time we will stick with Barnum and Bailey.