Lula Belle's 2nd Birthday

Lula turns 2 tomorrow but we celebrated on Saturday with a big ol bash. This little girls is so much fun! She's a spoiled rotten diva for sure but we adore her. Alan tells me that I've ruined her and I have to agree, I have no defense. For example she didn't show any interest in her presents until she opened the frilly dress from Grandma, then she cracked a smile and let out a giggle. This girl LOVES clothes and possibly loves shoes even more. I'm really not the only one to blame in her spoiling. All 5 of us pamper her. She's our baby and we can't help ourselves!

Our Young Woman

Our baby girl isn't a baby anymore. Taylor turned 12 on April 17. She celebrated twice. On Thursday I took her to Sephora to get a makeover and buy some makeup for her, then I took her to her favorite restraunt Red Robin for dinner. On Friday she had a party with 8 of her friends at our house. The girls all made flowers into hair clips. Then I took pictures of each of them as a keepsake. My friend Natalie made some awesome cupcakes for Taylor's party that Taylor helped design.
This Sunday was Taylor first Sunday in the Young Woman's program. All of the girls and leaders came to primary to get Taylor. Alan and I stood in the hall to watch her go. We had big smiles on our faces but a little bit of sadness that our baby girl has grown up so fast. I really don't know where the last 12 years have gone! I'm so proud and thankful for this young woman of mine.

Tanner's Big Day

Tanner turned 10 on April 14th. Totally amazing that he's so grown up! I love this little guy so much. The 10 best things about Tanner are:

1. He'll still snuggle up to me.
2. He has a big huge heart.
3. He loves animals.
4. He can read better than most grown ups.
5. He's adorable.
6. He has a sense of humor that you don't see coming.
7. He's so logical.
8. He doesn't allow people to be insulting.
9. He's brilliant.
10. He has a great testimony.

For his birthday Alan took him for breakfast to the Pancake House. After school they headed out with his friend Easton and Easton's Dad Dan to the Family Fun Center for some serious fun.

The egg hunt.

We had our friends the Nerlands over for Easter this year. It stopped raining long enough so that we could have our Easter egg hunt outside. Yah! The kids were pumped. We tried to count the eggs while we were hiding them but we totally lost count and didn't end up with a number. I think it was around 200 eggs though. The kids had them gathered in about 5 minutes! Although, they went out later and spent an hour finding about 16 more eggs. Next year I'm not being so nice and hiding them in plain site, I'm going to make it much harder.

Happy Easter!!!

I love Easter sunday. This year is especially wonderful because we have the opportunity to hear the Prophet, Apostles and leaders of the church testify of the Savior. What a special confrence it's been! I love my Savior and am so grateful to him, to all that he has done for me. If you didn't have a chance to hear the confrence messages, click here...go be edified!

HAPPY EASTER TO OUR FAMILY AND FRIENDS!

Ours Girls are here!!!!

WE HAVE CHICKENS! We've been wanting to get them ever since we moved into our house. They call our ward the "chicken ward". Apparently the previous bishop asked the ward members to do a few things to be better prepared...have a wood stove, a garden, fruit trees and CHICKENS! So we just had to get some so we could fit in. Alan is almost done building their new home, it looks like a mini red barn. I love it, pictures of that when it's done.
We had agreed that 4 chickens would be a good number but when it came down to it I just couldn't resist them. The kids and I brought home 6 chickens, one for each of us. We have 2 Silver Laced Wyandottes named Oreo (Tanner) and Sally (Tate), 2 Barred Rocks named Chickita (Taylor) and Black Mambo (Alan), 2 Buff Orpingtons named Hazel (Tallula) and Henrietta (Karina).
We decided to get month old chicks instead of day old chicks because they're healthier and have a better life expectancy. So they're a little gangly, we joke that we've adopted a bunch of teenagers. Some of them already have very distinct personalities. Not surprisingly Alan's chicken is a trouble maker and riles everyone up. Tanner's is quite the explorer and Lula and mine are sweet and love to be held. Tate's has a little disability (he has a fifth toe). Taylor's comes right to her. We can already tell them all apart and it's starting out to be a great adventure!
By August we'll have 4-6 big brown eggs a day from our little family of chickens, can't wait!