Happy 3rd Birthday Landon!

This year Landon had a really fun Birthday!

He spent it in a "Magic Kindgom"...riding his favorite ride.

His Birthday party happened in a hotel room filled to capacity with grandparents, cousins, aunts, and uncles.

At the end of the day he was one happy--but very exhausted--boy! 

Texas!

We had such a wonderful time visiting friends and family in Texas. We flew out to attend the wedding of a close family friend and also enjoyed visiting with my cousin Jann and her family. Texas is one hot (and humid) place in August. Despite that, we had such a great time!

We flew out of SLC at 6:30 am. That meant a very early morning for all of us.

The kids did pretty well on the plane. Landon spent a lot of time watching movies and Allie pretty much read during the whole flight.


When we got to Dallas, Jann's husband Jared picked us up. We hadn't made it too far before we had a tire blow out on the freeway. Eric and Jared were troopers changing a tire in the middle of the hot Texas heat.

The kids and I remained in the air conditioned van.

Friday night was a Texas BBQ for Jon & Lori. Lori arranged for birthday cake to be the dessert in honor of Allie & Alex who share a birthday on August 9th.


Landon loved the cake and he still says "cupcake" every time we mention Lori's name. She was kind enough to give him a large second helping which really won him over!

Saturday was the wedding. Landon would not cooperate very well for pictures. This is the "best" one we got. (Lori, you'll have to share one of yours...I'm hoping someone got a better one!)

Exploring the Dallas Temple grounds...






Landon LOVED Katie Bell (my cousin's 10-year-old). He still asks for her!

We did a lot of driving while in Texas. All of the heat and the action had a sedating effect on the kiddos. They usually passed out while driving between events and Jann & Jared's home. It made for an extremely quiet car ride. Unfortunately Eric and I were so focused on not getting lost that we didn't fully enjoy it :)

On Sunday we slept in (yay! for 1 pm church). It was Allie's 9th Birthday so Jared made her favorite breakfast, french toast and she opened her present.


After church the party continued with a yummy dinner, cake, and time to play!




On Monday before we flew back to SLC we (well, Eric and the kids) took a dip in the pool.

It was a special experience for us to be able at Jon & Lori's wedding. We are excited for them and wish them nothing but the best! Thanks again to Jann, Jared, and the kids for having us in their home. They were great hosts and a lot of fun to spend the weekend with!

Mess Makers

Yesterday we had an early Birthday celebration for my Mom & Uncle Phil. The kids were really excited to share their birthday cupcakes....

Once Kambree saw all of the attention Landon was getting, she decided to join in on the fun. What a mess! More pictures of messy kids here.

Happy, Happy Birthday Allie!

Today is Allison's 8th Birthday! Allie and her Dad are busy having fun on an overnighter at the Big Horn Ranch. They took Grandpa Swain and cousin Larkin along with them. I really hope that they don't come home with any terrifying bear stories this year. A mother's heart can only take one of those in a lifetime. I am going to ask Eric to do the blogging about this weekend's trip sometime in the next few days so keep checking back for the scoop--it's sure to be interesting.

Allie is growing into a young woman right before my very eyes. She has changed so much in the last couple of years. She is maturing and becoming more and more sophisticated and independent. It is so amazing to watch her as she continues to develop and learn and grow.

About a week and a half ago Allie was called to meet with the Bishop for her baptismal interview. The whole family got to tag along. The Bishop greeted us outside his office by saying "Allie, I hear that you have been waiting for this day for four years". Apparently this was something Allie confessed to the Bishop's daughter a few nights earlier when she went next door to help her weed a neighbor's yard. It made me laugh and it also made me think. Allie has been anxiously anticipating this day for as long as I can remember (and to be honest, I'm certain it's been longer than 4 years). She has such a tender spirit and a testimony and understanding of the gospel that humbles me. We are lucky parents to have been entrusted with this precious child!

I can't wait for her to return home so that the celebrating (with Landon and I) can begin! We are going to dinner with some friends and then over to another friends house to play games and have delicious gluten-free cake and ice cream. Really. It's tasty. Allie put in a special request a year ago for a gluten-free cake and today she's going to get her wish.

Happy Birthday, Allie. I love you!

Happy Birthday Angie!

Last night we had a fun birthday party at my parent's house for my sister Angie who is now 29 years old. We had a potluck feast where we got to sample each other's favorite recipes. Eric and I came home feeling like we do after Thanksgiving dinner. The food was good and plentiful!

The best part of the night was playing games with everyone. We played bocce, wii, and dominoes. Because I would hate to gloat, I won't dwell on the fact that I totally owned Paul when I challenged him to a round of boxing. It was pretty awesome.

We also had the chance to meet Mom & Dad's new pets. They sure are cute. Watching Paul and Eric work together to capture a picture of these little guys was also pretty entertaining.

Happy Birthday Angie! Thanks for the fun!

Happy Birthday to Me!

I celebrated my 30th Birthday yesterday on the 4th of July. I really hated having my birthday on a holiday when I was younger. Now that I have matured I realize what an incredible thing it is to have my husband and my children (and sometimes extended family, too) with me all day long. Here's a little recap of the celebration:

Eric woke up extra early to run the Freedom Festival 5k. He had a good time and is looking forward to doing it again next year. Maybe I'll join him? At 6:10 Landon decided he just couldn't wait any longer to wish me a happy birthday and beckoned me to his room. I tried to trick him into going back to sleep without any luck. Oh well.

A couple of hours later I was sitting in my living room reading when I heard someone outside whistling. I thought it was Eric but soon discovered it was my Dad's unique way of announcing his presence. Kind of strange, but that's Dad for you. (LOL, Dad) Angie, Mom, and Dad stayed and visited for a little while and we made plans to go to the Cheesecake Factory for lunch. Lunch was so yummy. We will definitely go back. Next time we'll leave the kids. They're cute, but it's just not the same relaxing experience with them along.

After lunch I had the bright idea to take a quick family picture. That's another thing that would be a lot easier to do without the kids along but that would kind of defeat the purpose. Here's a small sampling of how it went. (Check out Landon's face in the last one. Priceless.)

We had planned to go bowling but opted instead for a trip to the Living Planet Aquarium. It was pretty fun, but very small. The children both loved checking out all of the animals and it got all of us very excited for our trip to San Diego in a couple of months.

After the aquarium it was home for nap time. Yay! It's a good thing I took a short nap because the next item on the itinerary was picking up all of the Scout flags from the neighborhood. I volunteered to help Eric because he was a little short on leaders and boys and I figured that I would be less annoyed than if I sat home stewing about how long it was taking him to do it himself. (90% of the time I am fine with the amount of time it takes Eric to serve as Scoutmaster but there is that 10%...)

After the flags we spent a quiet evening at home. Allie was annoyed that we didn't do anything to "celebrate the 4th of July". We got to use our new toy from Ang, a Sno-Cone maker. It was fun and delicious. When we got the kids in bed we watched Vantage Point. It was a great day!

Thank you to my wonderful family and friends for all of the phone calls, visits, and text messages. It was so nice of you to think of me when I know that you were all busy celebrating with your own families!

Landon's 1st Birthday

Landon is officially one year old and I can't believe it! It seems like he has been in our family forever and yet I can't believe how quickly the last year passed. I was telling my father-in-law last night that I don't have any regrets about the last year. I believe that I held, cuddled, played with, and enjoyed Landon as much as I possibly could have. One of the greatest things about waiting so long for him is that I don't think I took even one minute for granted. As the one year mark approached, we had a fun few days and boy did we celebrate. We had family birthday parties, met up with both of Landon's birthparents, took a trip to Discovery Gateway, played at the park, and had birthday cake on 3 separate occasions. Landon was spoiled and now has enough toys and books to keep him entertained for the foreseeable future. Thank you everyone for the gifts! Enjoy the pictures!

Happy Birthday Landon!

What a year! Landon has grown and changed so much. We are having a fun time celebrating with him and we'll post pictures soon. For now, enjoy this little slide show of Landon's first year:

Celebrating Seven

Allie really enjoyed her Birthday today. She had a fun day filled with family and friends and some great gifts. We met up with some friends at Chuck E. Cheese's for lunch.

After lunch and games we headed to Color Me Mine. Allie chose to paint a dog. She is quite the little artist. I kept trying to give her pointers which she diplomatically and politely shot down. I should know by now not to get in her way when her creative juices are flowing.



Speaking of Allie's artistic nature, somehow we have gotten into the habit of letting her decorate all of the birthday cakes for our family. She takes this job very seriously...especially when it is her cake! This is the blank canvas I presented to her.

This is Landon taking his supervising job VERY seriously.



And finally, here is the finished masterpiece.

I think this is the best job she has ever done! Maybe we have Landon to thank?