Leah's 4th Birthday

Leah shares her birthday with Jon's mom, Christine. We did a combined birthday party for them both. Chris turned 50 and we wanted to do something extra special for her. We invited all of our family, plus some of her friends to come to the party. My parents were there to celebrate with Leah too. We had a BBQ dinner with hamburgers and smoked sausages plus all of the yummy side dishes that people brought.

Leah and Chris opened their presents and then we had cake. Leah loved her princess "crown" cake and Chris was amazed by her beautiful yellow daisy cake. The entire bottom layer of the yellow cake was left over, so Chris took it home to enjoy later.

We had a good time. There were so many people that were able to come that it was like a small family reunion. Jon's parents and all of Jon's siblings were able to be there, except Merry. His Oma and Opa were also able to make it. We were praying that they would have good enough health to make the trip from Salt Lake. Aunt Denise and Karl and Iris Bailey (Verne's cousin) came too. It was a lot of work to put together, but a lot of fun.

Here are some pictures of the night along with a picture of all of Leah's stuff she got for her birthday.

Leah and her cake

My parents and Oma

Eating yummy food

The cakes and Christine

Oma, Opa, and Leah

David, Debi, and Denise

Jon, David, and Christel

Bill (Jon's Dad), Jon, David, Christel, and Christine (Jon's mom)

Jessica and Karl

Leah's loot

The bathroom is finished!

BEFORE

Here are pictures of our finished bathroom! I am so happy to not be another number in line to use the ONE bathroom we've been using for months! Now Jon and I have our own bathroom. It's pure luxury! Jon did such a great job remodeling our bathroom. I am so happy to have a husband who is so talented. He learns something new everytime we remodel something in our home and he just keeps getting better and better.

I love the 5' vanity!

The storage closet

Our new shower and DEEP tub! I love soaking in it!

Looking down the hallway

Grouting the Tile

The entire bathroom and hallway is finished being tiled. Now, Jon has begun to grout the tile. If you look close you can see he's using my favorite tool to put the grout in--a disposable icing bag! It works great.

Trip to the Zoo

I had to deliver a cake to Salt Lake this morning, so we decided that we would make a trip to the zoo while we were at it. The kids had a lot of fun. It was a fast visit, but we had enough time to see all of the animals and even stop by the gift shop for a souvenier.

On the train ride

I'm glad we got to see the white alligator exhibit. It's only here for a limited amount of time.

Our family

We're Going To Disneyland!!

I just won a trip for 4 to Disneyland this morning! I am so excited! We were planning on going for Spring Break this year, and now we can go for FREE! I won the tickets from the radio station KODJ 94.1. You enter online, then at 7:40am if they call your name you have 9 minutes and 41 seconds to call in. Today they called the first name, but they didn't call in. Then, they called a 2nd name and they didn't call in either! So, my name was the 3rd name and I CALLED IN and I WON! I won 4 3-day park hopper passes, a 2 night stay at a Disneyland Resort Hotel, and $100 in gas! What a way to start the day.

Funny Quote...

Leah came down with a fever tonight. She was laying on the floor in the living room while I took her temperature and gave her medicine. When I asked if her head hurt she said:

"No. I'm laying on a pillow."--and said it very matter-of-factly

Reunion

Me and my cousin, Clay, were in charge of our annual family reunion this year. We decided on a pirate theme. It was a lot of fun. We did many different activities. For the kids we had a cake walk ("Walk the Plank"), a Treasure Hunt, Digging for Gold (similar to a fishing pond), and a movie night with Dora's Pirate Adventure. We also had water balloons, a movie night for older kids/adults (Pirates of the Caribbean III), Bingo, and an auction.

This is a picture of the kids "Walking the Plank"

And here are some pictures of them making their treasure boxes and doing the treasure hunt.

Another fun part about our reunion this year is that there were a TON of toads everywhere around the campground! This brought out the boy in Jon. He loves finding frogs, toads, snakes, etc (basically anything that will gross me out). Jon with one of his toads he caught

We decided it would be fun to have a toad race. Conner's (the boy next to Jon) toad won. The other two got side tracked and left the track. Leah likes to admire it from afar.

Ribbit!