Eight is Great! Happy Birthday to Makenna!

On September 17, Makenna reached the big milestone of turning eight years old.  That day we celebrated with presents in the morning and a birthday breakfast. 

 

For Braydens present, he sent her on a scavenger hunt he had prepared, with clues/ suprises like this:

What a sweet brother she has.

 She took cupcakes to school and then after school we went to the Pizza Machine for dinner.  It made the kids crazy as usual, but was a great time.

Then that Friday was her party.  It was a pajama party with make your own pizza, a pinata and a movie.  10 girls is a lot of noise... I mean fun!

 

Make your own pizza

Eat your own pizza.

 Decorating the Pinata bags.

Makenna and Nyah (who sadly moved just two days after the party).

Pinata Time

The pinata broke off the string on the first hit so we had to improvise and they just hit it off the stool.  Amazingly Kevin's hand didnt even get hit.

For the cake she requested my "nothin bundt cake" knock off.   Its super easy and delicious so I was thrilled with her choice.  Its an exciting day when they choose the cake for the taste and not the look.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAKENNA!   We love you so so so so sooooooooooooo much!  You are an amazing gift to our family!

Crafty in the Kitchen

With school in session, and Emmitt taking a nice afternoon nap, its wonderful to have some time to do the extra stuff.  Heres a cake I made for my neighbors birthday.  Im happy with it despite its leaning tendencies.  I've also had a great time with caramel apple experimentation.  I made a few kinds but the apple pie caramel apple was my favorite.  Recipe here.  Its the one I shared with my visiting teachies.

Help Me Choose!

I took Makenna out to take her picture for her baptismal invitations.  She has some non member friends she wants to invite so I thought I would make invitations.  It will be a nice keepsake too.  I cant decide which picture to use though- so please have a look and let me know.  I haven't edited any of them yet cause there are so many so once I narrow it down I can fix the flaws.  I'll probably try to edit out that purple hair ;)  I know there's a lot here... that's why I need help.

#1 (call it reading on steps)

 #2 (future missionary)

#3 (steps of old house looking away)

#4 (steps of old house)

#5 (very similar to #6)

#6

#7 (love that BoM)

edited

#8  (needs lighting work)

 #9

#10 (really naturally happy face)

 #11 (from behind)

 

#12 (flower background)

#13 (brick)

#14

Feel free to give criticism. 

ConAgra Company Picnic at the Zoo 2012

I cant believe that this is our 5th Conagra picnic at the zoo.  We have lived here a LONG TIME!  I just went through and looked at our previous Zoo Day Posts (kind of fun here are the links... 2008, 2009,  2010, and 2011- true confession, I was missing that one so I just filled it in now).
What I have realized is that when you stay in one place, it makes time go by really quickly.  It doesn't feel like we have lived here that long and I cant believe how much our kids have grown since we got here.  Just this morning I was looking at the newly built houses behind us and thinking how when we moved in I didnt worry really about those houses because in the back of my mind I thought we'd be moving by the time houses were built back there.  Sigh... Oh well.

Back to the zoo.  This year was fun because we spent time at the zoo with the Norlunds, and the Owens and even the Thomas'.  We have figured out the best way to do zoo day is to eat, ride the free stuff a few times and then leave.  On Saturdays the zoo is... a zoo!  Here are the photo highlights...

Waiting in line for the Skyfari and watching the Rhinos.

Here are the boys ahead of us on the skyfari.  I was so nervous Emmitt would fall.  It was a long drop down and if you survive the fall there are wild animals (cheetahs included) that would certainly not welcome you into their enclosures.

Funny story- apparently my skyfari fears are not unfounded.  In the picture below you will see Emmitts shoe that dropped when he was wiggling around on the skyfari.  Down it dropped into the giraffe and Ostrich territory.  So if you see a giraffe wearing or eating a shoe next time you're at the zoo... you'll know why.  Thank goodness it was Emmitts shoe and not Emmitt himself.  Yes next year I think Emmitt and I will skip the skyfari :)

And here is our first train ride of the Day with Jenn, Jay and Aurora.  Emmitt absolutely LOVED the train or "choo choo" as he calls it.  He would have ridden it ten more times if we would've let him. 


And here is our second train ride of the day with Thomas' and Owens.  Fun times.

 
And there was lots of carousel riding- fun for both young and old...

 The picnic lunch was delicious (maybe an overstatement) as usual.  The highlight is the Healthy Choice fudge bars at the end.  (Sorry for the severely overexposed picture... evidence that Manual mode and I still have some work to do :)

And to top it off we finished the day with our friends at our house to watch the BYU football game.  Its such a fun time of year!

Weekend Getaway: Kansas City

Just for fun, we decided to head to Kansas City this past weekend.  We were joined by our fabulous friends, the Thomas'.

 We left Omaha on Friday afternoon and our first stop in KC was the T Rex cafe.  We had visited one of these in Orlando and had a great time so we were excited to see one closer by.  We were seated here under a great big jellyfish.

Saturday Morning, we headed downtown to the Crown Center where we visited Hallmark's Kaleidoscope for some crafting fun.  The kids spent their time there painting hot wax on their fingers to make finger casts (that's not what the wax was for in case your wondering- it was for use on paper :).  Emma has a cast right now so that might have been where the idea came from but it sure was a hit with my kids.  I think they would say that was their trip highlight.

Emmitt played it safe with the watercolor paints.  Hes such a cutie!

 Then it was off to Fritz's for lunch.  Its a restaurant where the train delivers your food to the table.  The train mesmerized Emmitt so it made for a pretty pleasant lunch for the rest of us.

 Constant rain was definitely a "downer."  It rained and rained and of course I booked a hotel with an outdoor pool.  That threw a bit of a wrench into our plans.  Instead of an afternoon swim, we hit the local childrens museum.  The kids had a great time there.

I'm not sure if its a duck and a donkey or what but they sure are cute kids who play together so well.

And then it was off to the American Girl store.  My girls just recently have gotten into American Girls.  I gave Makenna my dearly beloved doll last Christmas and since then the girls have gradually become enthralled with these dolls.  Both of the girls have birthdays coming up so it was fun to scope things out with them.  That store is a wonder indeed.  And yes we left without buying anything... amazing!!!

On Sunday we went to the Independence Visitors Center.  It was lovely.

Quite a coincidence, we ran into the Wadsworths (our friends who used to live near us but moved to Des Moines).  That was pretty amazing and a lot of fun!

 

 The Visitors Center had a log cabin and a wagon the kids could play in.  Anywhere we go, they can just come up with these elaborate imaginative make believe games.  I'll be sad when they get too old for that kind of thing.

This is his "where is it" expression.  He was in a log cabin which he called a "Bomb" aka barn and he spent his whole time looking for and wondering where are the "i-ins" (chickens) and the "moos" (cows) were.

After that we lunched at the Olive Garden and then headed home.  It was a great weekend.  Good times with good friends and good kids.  Its a good life.