It's party time!!

So, maybe I tend to go a little overboard with things. But, I think Emma's birthday was a blast! In the end her party did end having a few more friends that I would normally do, but it all worked out. Emma loves dressing up and she loves princess's. So I thought we would do a princess party. The problem came when I realized that there would be more boys coming to the party than girls. Not such a princess crowd. So we went with a "Crown" theme.

Just after Christmas I placed an oriental trading company order and got some great deals on Christmas clearance. Part of that order was Snow Princess Crowns. 12 foam crowns, the letters for their names and tons of foam snowflake stickers for $2.99! The kids loved doing it and I think they turned out super cute!
Online I found "Pin the crown on the Frog Prince" Both N8 and I thought the party went really well, but if we had to choose an activity that was more of a flop this was it. Now this wasn't because it wasn't cute or fun, but the kids just weren't super exited about it. Plus a few were afraid to be blindfolded. Still it's a fun idea.

I found some fun coloring pages and got some glitter glue pens. At first I thought this was a great idea. Then the kids started and I thought "What was I thinking". Megan, who stayed for the party was probably thinking the same thing! But the kids loved using the glitter pens and they really didn't make as big of a mess as I thought it would. It really kept their attention a lot longer than I thought it would.


We did the birthday cake, which I broke down and bought a cake at the grocery store. I've been battling a cold all week and decided that I just wanted that part of it all to be easier.
We opened presents. I know that some people don't have their kids open presents at the party, but seriously kids love it especially if you have the gift giver give the gift to the birthday girl/boy. Emma's friends were so generous and she loves all of her gifts!

Our last activity was decorating sugar cookies. I had a slight flop with these. I thought I would go the easy route and buy pre-made sugar cookie dough. The cookies just didn't hold their shape and I ended up making my own in the end anyways. We had crowns and swords and had the kids paint the frosting on the cookies. I think painting the frosting on is totally they way to go. Much less messy and I think I'll start doing it to get a cleaner nicer look to my own cookie decorating. I also think that I need to be better about rationing the sprinkles next time!
Each of Emma's friends got a fun goodie bag with their name and a crown in vinyl! I think they turned out pretty darn cute. Inside had some candies and a simple card game. A little faux pau were the candy necklaces in the bags. I bought them at the Dollartree and after I made up the bags noticed that hanging at the end of each necklance was a small candy cross. I will admit that I was embarrassed and meant to ask N8 what he thought, then I completely forgot. So, anyone who came to the party, sorry about the cross candy necklaces!!
Next year maybe we'll go smaller... or maybe not!! After the party Emma said this was the best birthday ever! That's all I needed to hear. We did a quick clean-up after and let Emma choose where we went to dinner. She chose Bernadino's over McDonald's! Smart Girl!

Here are a few more cute pictures from the party!

Apples!!

On Wednesday night I hosted our ward cooking group. We had an apple theme to go with Johnny Appleseed day. While it was a small turn out, we had fun and ate some yummy apple dishes. I decided it would be fun if we could taste as many different kinds of apple as we could find here in Ridgecrest. Here's what it looked like!

She's 4!!!

Four years ago today my little, spunky, non-stop talked, beautiful, silly girl came into this world with a BANG!!

Probably most of you who read my blog were aware that Emma was born at home, totally and completely unplanned, on our bathroom floor! In that video, N8 is the one talking, there's the paramedic (who arrived after she was actually born) and Amy! If you watch carefully you'll see N8 start to pan over to the bathroom. In a moment of sanity, he quickly realized that his wife was still on the bathroom floor, completely indecent from just delivering a baby and he quickly pans back to Emma.
Although her arrival was unconventional, we love her just that much more! She's non-stop and gives us a run for our money, but I wouldn't trade her for anything!

Happy Birthday Emma!!

It came out...

So last night at dinner Bud said one of his teeth hurt. N8 and I discussed that it might be a cavity and I should maybe make a Dentist appointment for him. Then after we cleaned up the dinner dishes he came and showed me that his tooth didn't hurt, it was loose!! This was his first loose tooth and he was really, really excited! You know the term "shaking with excitement!" -That was him. We talked a little bit about how he might lose it at school in the next day or too, but that his teacher would send it home so the tooth fairy could still come.

THen, we had FHE, I did a little variation on this FHE lesson: "I can learn to listen and obey" If you haven't seen this blog, she has a lot of FHE lesson ideas for young kids. For treat we had popsicles. About halfway through his popsicle his tooth fell out. So, our entire first loose tooth experience lasted all of about an hour!

The tooth fairy remembered to come and left him $0.50! He was pretty darn excited.

A full weekend...

This was a nice FLEX weekend that N8 didn't have any church meetings on (except for Sunday of course!). As I posted in my last post, I went out to some garage sales on Friday and I picked up some roller skates. Bud has had fun trying them out. We might need to invest in some knee and elbow pads!!
On Saturday we prepped the house for Ruth and Jim's family to arrive. We did lots of cleaning, which really needed to be done! N8 also took the kids out on a quick hike up by the college to stretch their legs. He happened to run into a 2 other families in the ward! Small Ridgecrest world!!
We had a great time with the Schouten's! The last time they were here was when Emma was just about a week old-she turns 4 on Friday, so it's been a while! We visited, the kids played and we went to dinner on Saturday. On Sunday we went to church, had a great dinner and flew kites. I unfortunately forgot my camera for the kite flying, but here are some pictures from the rest of their visit. We love to have people come and stay with us!

Mo's has a cold and was suffering from "motheritis"- Here he is being shy with Lucy!
Mother-Daughter Ruth & Lucy:
The jungle gym got some good use:
Even with the cold Mo had some fun!
All of our dress-up clothes were pulled out:
It was a lot of fun. Now back the week. On Wednesday I'm hosting our ward cooking group. Our theme is Apples in honor of Jonny Appleseed day. Then on Friday is Emma's birthday party. It should be fun!

Bye, bye fishies...

So after a quick ride around Ridgecrest with Megan this morning checking out garage sales we drained most of the fist tank.

Paccha enjoyed checking it out too...

We drained it down to just a couple of inches of water. We had to leave just enough water for the fish, yet make it light enough for N8 and I to lift and carry it into the van.

When I got home, N8 headed to the church to meet with a family about planning a funeral. (He happens to be the only member of bishopric available this weekend). I started assembling our new desk/table-

Here it is with the table and chairs:

Here's the final product with the shelves and hanging baskets:
I'm happy with how it turned out. Hopefully it gets lots of use and hopefully the fish are well loved at their new home!

The tale of the tax return...

This week our federal tax return came. Of course not our California State return because who knows if anyone in the state will ever get those! For me this is a fun time of the year where we get a little extra boost and are able to buy a few things that we have been wanting to get, but just haven't. I realize that to some a tax return means that the government took more of your money throughout the year that you could have spent and are now having to give it back without interest. But hey, I still like it.

So, we're still in debate on where it should all go, but a few things have been already purchased!

First (and to be honest I would have gotten it anyways, but it came this week so it gets on the list!)- I got a new purse. I love purses, but I don't do expensive high end purses. I like fun, funky and functional. I had been using my cherry purse for quite a while and was ready for a change. So, it's a KAVU Seattle Sling, with the sage floral print. I like the look, it's smaller than I anticipated, but so far so good:

This weekend we went down to LA to the temple. For some reason, our kids think it's the coolest thing to stay in a hotel. Now the LA temple patron apartments aren't quite a hotel, but they are by Emma and Bud's standards. It was nice that both N8 and were able to do a session.

Of course while we're down there we have to do a little shopping! We ended up going to Fry's Electronics, 2 Best Buy's and N8 went to a Circuit City. We did end up finding what we were looking for- A netbook. For those who don't know what a netbook is here's Wikipedia's definition for you:

A netbook (a portmanteau of Internet and notebook) is a class of laptop computer^[1] designed for wireless communication and access to the Internet.

Primarily designed for web browsing and e-mailing, netbooks "rely heavily on the Internet for remote access to web-based applications"^[2] and are targeted increasingly at cloud computing users who require a less powerful client computer.^[3]. Netbooks typically run either Linux or Windows XP operating systems ^[2] rather than more resource-intensive operating systems like Windows Vista^[4]. The devices range in size from below 5 inches^[5] to over 13,^[6], typically weigh 2 to 3 pounds (~1kg) and are often significantly cheaper than general purpose laptops.^[2]

Netbooks represent a "greener" alternative to larger laptops due to "lower power demands, fewer toxic components, and a resource-efficient approach to computing" and some models have achieved EPEAT gold and silver ratings.^[7]

This is the one we ended up with:

N8 has a work laptop, but he has constant problems connecting to the internet and no webcam, plus is bulky. So, he'll take this on travel, the kids can play games and less fighting over the computer- we're excited about it.

One of our other stops was IKEA. I love that place! I was on the search for a work space for the kids that wasn't my countertop! It is constantly overrun with papers, homework and art supplies. So we found a table top and legs that are ajustable so we can make it out of Mo's reach with bar stools for the kids:

We also got some shelves to go above it to store different art supplies. It's going to be a few weeks before it gets put up. We're going to put it where our fish tank currently sits. Sorry Mom and Dad, but the fish tank has to find a new home. We're going to have a garage sale (no date yet, but hopefully in March) or if we find someone from the ward or work that wants a fish tank- with fish living in it- they can have it.

Now we have to decide what we're going to do with the rest of our refund. We have a few items on our list. Of course at the top is saving it, which we will do at least some of. We also need a new sliding back door, front window, AC unit and we're found a sleeper sofa to replace our garage sale futon. We'll see what we decide!