Emily's 5th Birthday.

Today was a big day for Miss Emily.

It was her birthday.

For a week now she's been on the countdown.

Every morning for the past 13 days she been quick to tell EVERYONE how many days were left till her birthday. And then today finally arrived. She came walking down the stairs this morning and when she saw me this is what she said, "You know mom, TODAY is my birthday!"

Yes siree it is! We ventured away from our breakfast tradition of stacking pancakes on top of each other in the amount of how old they are. With Kory's work schedule being changed from 6pm to 6am for the time being this little girl had to go to the sitters yesterday because I had to work to. This means I had to wake her up at 6am. She then got to bed at 9 last night (an hour past her bed time). She didn't wake up till 10:00am this morning. Breakfast was long gone for everyone else and she wanted a scone. So being her birthday I caved instead of forcing cold cereal and stuffed her scone (frozen dough roll out of the freezer) with birthday candles instead. She was then lucky to recieve a solo of "Happy Birthday" given by me since the older kids were at school, Kory was sleeping and Brayden just kept saying Happy Biday over and over and over.For a few weeks now she been practicing her balancing skills on an old bike that we gave to Hunter when he turned 5. We took the pedals off of it for her to learn how to do this. A few weeks later she thinks she can balance well enough that she wanted the pedals put back on. Knowing I bought this bike several weeks ago off of craigslist Kory's been telling her he'd put them back on for her birthday.
Along with the daily birthday reminder we've been having we've also had a pedal reminder too. When Kory got up this afternoon Emily's first comment to him was that today was her birthday and he promised he'd put the pedals on the bike. So... can you go do that NOW! Kory told her he would but she needed to go put her shoes on first. While she was upstairs Kory brought the suprise inside. To say she was excited about this new purple, frilly girls bike was an uderstatement. I could hardly get her to stand still long enough for a picure. She kept hopping up and down with excitement.

The bike she's been balancing on is a 10" and this is a 12". OOPS! I did not realize that. She can balance on it but can't quite keep her balance and push the pedals at the same time. I'm sure with some practice she'll get use to the bigger bike. She loves it!

Emily's requested birthday cake this year was LPS (Littlest Pet Shop).

I cheated with this cake and put her little figurines on top of the cake instead of making them out of fondant. I love playing with fondant. I love the sleek, clean look that fondant gives. However, I do not like the taste along with most everyone else. A few weeks ago I made a Madagascar cake that was all fondant. Most everyone scraped the fondant off and ate the cake with what little frosting there was in between. Knowing that no one really likes fondant I decided to make Emily's cake out of my cream cheese frosting that everyone likes so much. A few days ago I did make the decor (flowers, reeds, paw prints and mini cake) out of fondant just so I wouldn't have to take the time to do it today with regular frosting. Fondant can be easier in some ways like that.

Being Emily turned "5" our tradition is that this is her 1st "Friend Birthday Party" this year. We invited all the 4-5 year olds in town to this big event. Six out of the seven came tonight.

Our first activity was to decorate a home for the LPS that each girl would be adopting later in the night.

When our boxes were done we played Musical Paw Prints.

Madelyn was in charge of the music.

Our next game was "Animal Trainer Says". You probably know this game as Simon says...

stick out your tongue.

After a few more silly games it was present time.

I hate going to birthday parties that all the kids crowd around the birthday person pushing their gift into their face and yelling open mine, open mine. The birthday kid is so busy taking gifts that the opened gift is barely looked at before the next is shoved into their hand. The birthday kid can hardly breathe a thankyou to the gift giver amidst all the chaos and confusion around him. At the same time Mom can't get any decent "opening gift" pictures. It also makes it harder on mom to know who gave what for future thank you cards and most of the time the birthday kid has no idea who gave what. It also seems that when a group of kids get around the birthday child too much help is often given in the opening of the present department. Sooooo I took something I saw a friend do many years ago and applied it once again to this party. That is instead of having one chair in front of everyone for the birthday child to sit on and open their gifts I put out 2.
I had all the guests grab their gifts and sit on the couch. Then one at a time they were all given the opportunity to sit next to Emily while she opened their gift in front of them and everyone else.

This gives me plenty of opportunity to take pictures of Emily with all of her friends. This weekend when she and I sit down to write her thankyou notes we now have a great reminder of who gave what to make the notes more personable.

Emily is very excited to have her very own apron like mom and big sis.

Thankyou cousin Rachel.

I had to include this picture because I think it's HILARIOUS! Cousin Sara thought Emily would enjoy a bag full of goodies. The new pony her mom bought for Emily wasn't good enough for her. She included two old shirts that didn't fit her anymore but thought Emily might like. A pair of well worn sunday shoes that are to small for her and the best of all an extra used toothbrush she doesn't use any more. Thankyou Sara!

After presents came the adoption time.

Each house the girls decorated earlier had a tag tied to it. There was a matching tag tied to a LPS on a different table. Each girl got to match there tag for their new best friend to take home. Along with their new friend came an adoption certificate and a bottle of bubbles to take home.

LPS's can be expensive. I was able to win a lot on Ebay a few weeks ago that ended up costing me $.75 a piece. That includes my charged shipping fee too. The boxes I got at Dollar Tree a pack of 3 for $1. The bubbles I also picked up at Dollar Tree. They are the wedding bubbles you see all the time. They came in a package of 9 for a $1. I wrapped them in a piece of scrapbook paper and put a LPS sticker on it. The LPS stickers I paid almost $3 for one package of 30 stickers. Good grief!I only paid it cause I was next to Target and didn't have the time to drive to Wal-Mart where I know they had a package for $1.50. It makes me feel better to think it would have cost more than that in gas to go to Wal Mart and my time is worth more too, right???? Total cost on goodie boxes was $13 for 9 girls. I spent $1.45 for each girl and it's something that will actually be played with and not thrown away the first time their mom has to pick it up off the floor. Or am I the only mom that throws the cheap, crappy made, going to break the 1st time it's played with plastic toy I find on the floor after my child has come home from a birthday party?

After our adoption center was complete we served cake and ice cream.

She made out with quite the loot this year.

Happy Birthday Emily!

I hope your day was a special one.

My Baby Girl is 5!

My baby girl is 5 today!

Where has the time gone?Beautiful Baby!

Bright brown eyes and all that hair.


Emily's 1st BIRTHDAY.

She was such a petite little girl.

Emily's 2nd Birthday.

This was the face we got when we told her it was time to go to bed.

We still get this look. I see Brayden in this picture. He's starting to give looks when he's asked to do something he doesn't want to . I wonder where he gets it from????

Emily's 3!

This was the year that Mosquito's over took Prescott Valley. They were so bad that I'd have a few bites just from walking out the front door to get my mail. This was when Emily learned to "SCRATCH" This girl would scratch those bites until they bled. She's got the scars to prove it.

I finally put bandaids over them but then she wouldn't let me take them off for anything.

Including Pictures!

Emily's 4.

She's accomplished so much this past year.

She finished her 1st year of preschool.

She can count to 20. Write her name and has learned the alphabet.

Today this beautiful young girl is turning 5.

Emily is such a good big sister to Brayden. With the kids at school all day she is so willing to help him get his toys or help him at the kitchen table pouring his milk into the cereal. She is very loving towards him and for the most part puts his wants 1st.

Emily is absolutely FASCINATED with baby dolls. Every where she goes she usually has one of her many dolls tucked under her arm. She wants another doll from Santa she recently said.

Emily is stubborn. Kory use to say she got that from me and I in turn would say she got that from him. We've decided that we are both right. She can be so stubborn at times that she must have gotten it from the both of us instead of just one like the rest of our kids.

Emily loves to pray. Everytime and I mean everytime, it doesn't matter at who's home we are at, Emily wants/expects to say the prayer. It doesn't matter if she said it at breakfast and then lunch too. At dinner she thinks it is still her turn. If she is told no, she says something that her Grandpa Heaton taught her. That is, she expects to be the person to call on someone else to say that prayer. There is no "forgetting" to pray at our house.

Emily LOVES dogs. Her Uncle Kale lives next door and he has 2 dogs and 5 puppies. My girl knows each of there names and gender. Most of her Aunts/Uncles that live in Alton also has dogs. She know all of there names to. We can be walking down the street and to me I see "a dog". I point "the dog" out to Emily and she can usually tell me who it belongs to and what it's name is.

Emily also enjoys any movie that has dogs in it. Right now her favorite movie is The Retreivers. She watches this movie at least once a day and would watch it more if we let her.

Emily, we love you. We are so glad you are a part of our family.

We hope you have a wonderful day today!

Happy Birthday.

Snow!

Something happened last week.

It got dang cold!

My kids catch the bus at 7:15 each morning and they won't leave the house without there warm comforting jacket's. By the time they get home it's warmed up enough that they don't need it but in the mornings it cold, cold, cold.

Friday on my way home from work in St. George where it was hot, hot, hot I decided to go home over Cedar Mountain. I was in the switch backs (close to Cedar) when I thought it had started to rain. Then I quickly noticed all the white stuff sticking to the ground on the side of the road.

Holy Cow! I wish I had my camera. It wasn't raining but SNOWING!

This whole weekend has been COLD! At night it has dropped as low as 42 degrees. The high has been mid 70's. Being it's rained all weekend long we haven't had too many hours of those mid 70 temperatures. Looking at the forecast for the upcoming 10 days does NOT look good. We are in for some very COLD days. Were dropping down to 35 degrees and our highs will be in the low-mid 60's.

Can I say I am SOOOOOOOO NOT ready for the cold.

Last week I pulled out the kids winter p.j's.

This week it looks like I need to pull out the coats and all of our other winter clothes.
I am hoping this will not be our life for the next 7-8 months.

I am really hoping this cold front will move on pass us and in a week or two we can experience some fall weather. I don't like thinking we've gone from summer to winter already!

We've collected quite a bit of wood for our wood stove. Our back porch is covered and we've had to start stacking on the side of the porch now too. We've got a wood cutting project with our ward this coming saturday. We were going to take Kory's truck and just fill the back of it. Knowing that we'll be using our wood a little earlier then planned I think we'll be taking the trailor after all and stacking it good and tall! I'm ready to start a fire now.

Corn Fest...

This past thursday night Kory's brother Kale hosted a "Corn Fest" at there house. Every one was asked to bring some corn from there garden along with a side dish to share.

Lot's and Lot's of family and friends came. We had plenty of corn to eat.

Plenty of salads to choose from and all the bbq hot dogs you could eat.

We had a great time visiting and getting to know each other a little bit better.
Once the sun started to go down, Oh Boy did it get cold.

Jacketts and coats were quickly dragged out.

Finally it got cold enough that the little ones found comfort by playing inside instead.

Brayden only ventured out side when he wanted another brownie!

I am not ready for the cold weather!

Madagascar Cake

Two weekends ago now my niece, Elena, had her 2nd birthay party in Hurricane.

I called Elena's parents to find out what she liked, what she was into.

I was quickly told Madagascar was one of her favorite movies.

Feeling up to the challenge I decided to try to make Miss Elena her very own Madagascar cake. This is what I came up with..... I think this is one of my favorite cakes I've made.
I got lots and lots of compliments on all my home made/hand made fondant figures.
I was glad everyone liked them as they took me many HOURS to complete.

I think this cake took me by far the longest to make that I've ever done.

It was worth it.

I think it turned out very well. I was pleased!

Madelyn's lunch bag

The week before school started I realized that we were not well prepared to take sack lunches to school this year. After some thought I wanted to make sure the kids lunch sacks was large enough that we could keep a little ice pack in it. The kids favorite sandwich is a chicken salad on a croissant roll. With all the chicken, bacon and sometimes shrimp I wanted to make sure it stayed cold enough that it wouldn't make the kids sick. I love etsy so I went there first to get some idea's. I quickly fell in love with the idea to make re-usable sandwich/snack bags along with the actual sack. Ziplock bags can be expensive and in the past I usually wait to buy them using coupons. Being I don't do coupons anymore and knowing that 2 of my kids were needing to take lunch's I figured this was a good idea to help save some money.

I did Madelyn's first and it turned out great!
Everything fits...

She loves it!

It took a few trial and errors but I finally did get it.

I think life is about to slow down a little bit and when it does I've got to make Hunter's.

He can hardly wait.

1st day of school 2011

Today was the 1st day of kids for my two older ones.

Hunter is in 3rd gradeMadelyn is in 2nd grade
Today was even more special because they got to ride in a BUS!
They are very excited for this new experience.
I don't mind them riding the bus it's the pick up time at 7:10 am that has me a little worried.


After last year's scenario with Madelyn I was TERRIFIED we'd have a repeat. I normally work on wed.'s but switched days so that I could be home on the 1st day of school . All day yesterday I kept asking myself why I did that. I kept thinking I should have left my schedule alone and let Kory "deal" with her this year. To my utter relief she did great. When I went to wake everyone up this morning she was already dressed, shoes on and back pack on her back. That girl was ready before 6 am this morning. I'm glad she was excited. Before the bus came she leaned over to me and said that she was getting nervous. I told her that was O.K lots of kids are going to be nervous today she would NOT be the only one. I think it really helped that her teacher had a little get to know you the night before. Attending this let Madelyn find her classroom, her desk and she even got to pick the chair she wanted.

Hunter while getting ready told me he didn't feel good. His stomach hurt. After spending a few extra mintues with him this morning helping him get ready his stomach ache went away. I think this was his way of saying he was just a wee bit nervous too.
Despite the nerves this morning it sounds to me like they both had a great day!

Girly Projects

A few weeks ago I had had enough of the girls bathroom. You see despite all the work we've done with this house we're living in we haven't quite gotten to the girls bathroom. There bathroom has a huge counter that runs from wall to wall with double sinks. There are three drawers and 2 cupboards underneath. The top drawer is completely missing. The 2nd drawer is present and is stuffed with headbands, hair bows, hair brushes, combs, toothbrushes, toothpaste, bobby pins, curlers, etc. Thanks to the toothpaste that seems to get thrown in there without the lid on of course it is the NASTIEST drawer we probably have in the entire house. The bottom drawer is there but in several pieces and so is also not usable. Of the 2 cupboards, we are using both but one of the doors is just hangin' on one hinge. I'm waiting for the day it too breaks!

Several years ago I made the girls a bow holder. I bought a poster from Good Will, kept the frame threw the poster away and covered it in bright orange polk a dot material that matched our fishy bathroom at the time. I loved it! The girls used it constantly. Having a bow board keeps the bows from being thrown into a toothpaste covered drawer, it keeps them cleaner, they're not smashed and it's much easier to pick which bow to wear for the day when they are all on display. Madelyn has been wanting to change our bow board fabric and ribbon from the bright orange polk a dot to something that now matches her pink/purple/turqoise bathroom.

Not having Hobby Lobby down the street and NOT wanting to drive an hour, one way, to the nearest fabric store I had Maddie pick something out of our fabric stash. She did good! We pulled out the old hot glue gun and together gave the bow board a face lift. After I hung the board she went through all of our bows and tossed the ones that were broken or the ones that we don't use anymore. She did a great job.

Several years ago while blog hopping I came across a blog about turning garbage into useful items again. The one thing that I remember from that blog was how she turned an old Oat Meal container into a head band holder.

WOW!

Wanting all hair products out of the toothpaste infested drawer this became our 2nd project to do together. Madelyn picked out some scrapbook paper and then she and I mod podged it to the oat meal container. While the paper was drying she painted the lid a matching green.

The next morning after all was dried she quickly put our new container to use.

The oat meal container is the perfect width. The headbands both stretchy and hard strap on real good with out a lot of sliding down. What doesn't fit around the container and go inside.

Madelyn loves the way it turned out.

It's been at least two weeks since we've done these projects. Her and Emily's bathroom is staying so much cleaner. They can now see what they've got with everything on display like it is.

The girls are happy with there cleaner drawer/counter space.

It makes me happy as I haven't had to "wash" toothpaste out of bows every stink'n morning.

This coming week our family's schedule is changing again. School starts for the kids and I'm taking another accounting course online that will also begin this week. With EVERYTHING else happening in our life I've wanted to get a few projects done before life gets very hectic around here.

A few years ago it somehow became tradition for mom to make the birthday child a special shirt/outfit for there big day. At the beginning of this year Hunter informed me that he was too old (8) for a birthday shirt this go round. Madelyn having seen a Happy Birthday shirt at DI earlier this year asked to have it instead of me making her one for her 7th birthday. I knew these day's would soon come to an end but it still made me sad.

Back in early March my sister Sheri and I decided to throw our two boys a joint birthday party. We went with a "car" theme and so I made both boy's matching car shirts to wear on there big day. While I was working on the shirts my sister in-law Christina asked if I would make her daughter a birthday shirt too for later this year.

I LOVE my boys but oh my goodness sewing for girls is so much funner!

Miss Elena is turning 2 in a few weeks and this is what I came up with.
I just love the way the skirt turned out with the matching cupcake and bow.

I just love everything about this cute outfit!

Having a lot of left over fabric I decided to make another almost identical outfit for my other niece that will be turning one in a few months.

I always loved putting my girls in dresses but when they were babies I hated seeing the old white diaper underneath. I always tried to make sure they had a diaper cover on especailly for pictures. With Mya's outfit I decided to add a little diaper cover. Having never made one before I used one of Brayden's diapers as a pattern. I think the whole outfit is just adorable. The diaper cover ended up being a little smaller than I would have liked. I'm not sure it's going to fit her. Not having a one year old around I couldn't try it on anyone but my big 2 year old. He loved that (hehehehe)!

I still LOVE these outfits. I hope the mom's of these little girls like the outfits as much as I do!

Kane County Fair

This weekend was our Kane County Fair. Saturday morning we headed to the High School's auditorium to see all the exhibits on display. I contemplated some sewing/crafting projects I've done over the past few months but I didn't know when, where or how to go about turning our stuff in. Next year we will definetly be participating. After the kids hearing that you get $3 and up for every ribbon you earn (everyone earns a ribbon) they want to participate too. While walking around the displays we heard a lot of , "Oh! Mom I did that this year too" from our children.

One of Kory's nieces, Angelique turned 15 a few weeks ago. For her birthday she wanted a "new bedroom". Her parents have gone to a lot of work. Her then bright pink little girl bedroom is now a soft brown with white moulding teenage bedroom. She also got a new bed spread with matching curtains. She has asked me to help her decorate. Before this new bedroom she use to be able to nail, tack and tape all the posters and pictures she wanted to all over her walls. One of the 1st things we made for her was a magnet board. I had one that I wasn't planning on using and so gave it to her. One night about 2 weeks ago she came over and I showed her how to modge podge scrap book paper and create her very own magnet board. She painted the sides purple, added a flower, made some magnets to go with it and tadaa... the final project. She turned it it to the fair and one the Sweepstakes! This caught Hunter's eye. He'd now like to take shot gun shells and turn it into art!

We have a very talented cake decorator in our ward. Her 8 year old daughter turned this in. Madelyn and I have been practicing our skills. Next year Madelyn wants to turn a cake in too.

A few hours after the exhibits we went to the rodeo. Our kids weren't planning on particpating becuase every other rodeo we've been too the kids had to register before hand. At this rodeo the kids registered that evening.

Brayden after finding a plastic spoon spent the night away digging and playing.

Hunter with his cousin Orinn sat on the rails waiting for there turn.

Emily and Brayden were able to ride Uncle Dustin's horse next to where we had parked the trucks.

When it came to the events we participated in a few of them. Madelyn was the 1st to ride the sheep. The first time she did it as soon as the doors opened and the sheep and her were suppose to come barreling out the sheep had other thoughts. Instead of running out the sheep fell over and just layed there. Madelyn didn't get hurt and they gave her a retry on a different sheep.

Her second sheep didn't fall over and ran out as it was suppose to. However on it's way out the sheep ran to close to the corral and knocked Madelyn's leg into one of the posts. She hung for about 3 seconds and then fell off. Daddy was there to help her get back up. She was in tears due to her knee. This morning she's got 3 nice size bruises on her knee and down the front of her leg on that bone. I'm sure it hurt last night.

Hunter too rode the sheep. He was the 1st and only in his age group that stayed on for 8 seconds.

He won $20.00. He says he is definetly doing this again next year.

I have a love/hate relationship with my camera.

During the day I LOVE it. At night or dusk I HATE IT.

The pictures at night are ALWAYS blurry when I try to take a picture that involves movement.

Both Hunter and Madelyn also participated in the hide pull. Unfortuanetly every single picture turned out blurry and un recognizable. A cousin of Hunter's was signed up to do the Sweet Heart's Race with her dad BUT she had fallen asleep in the back of the truck. Hunter was asked to fill in her spot. This is when 2 people are at the starting line but one is on a horse. At GO! the person on foot runs across the arena to a barell. That person has to put a dress on, climb up and then stand on the barell. When the person is up and standing the rider and horse come galloping down, picks up the now "sweet heart" and races back to the finish line. Uncle Dustin and Hunter did an awsome job. For quite some time they were the top speed. Near the end though someone else beat them. Kory says they were beat by 100th of a second.

WOW!

Maybe next year.

Over all it was a very late but very fun night. We are so glad we went. Next year we'll be able to particpate in a little more and help the kids earn some money. The one thing we want the kids to do is to do a show animal. The options are endless, goat, steer, pig, etc. During the fair the kids and there animal are suppose to walk the arena showing off there animal. The next day is the aucion where people can bid on these animals. The winning steer was sold for $2900. Some of the kids cousins pigs sold for $500-650 a piece. The kids generally walk away with a profit of $300+. Kory's got nieces and nephews that have done this for many years. They are in there early teens and have $3-6,000 in there savings account. The parents let there kids spend some of the money periodically through out the year but for the most part this money is saved for missions and college. It's a great way for the kids to earn money!