Chase's Birthday

Chase turns 9!!

On November 17, 2008, Chase had his 9th birthday. How is Chase already 9? Being the 2nd child, he seems to have gone from age 3 to 9 without us noticing sometimes. He often feels like a neglected middle child. I wanted to make it a great birthday for him. On his actual birthdy, I brought him lunch from In-n-Out and took it to school. I also bought Krispy Kreme Doughnuts or his 3rd grade class. After school, I took the kids to see Madagascar and dinner at one of his favorite restaurants, Panda Express (yuck!). He loved it. A couple days before, we had a party for him with some of his friends at our house. We had pizza, played night games (capture the flag at the park) and went in the hot tub. A few kids even jumped in the pool which is too cold for me! It was a fun night.

Sam, Gavin, Chase and McKay with Chase's favorite - a cookie cake!

Some crazy 9 year olds eating pizza!

More crazy 9 year olds! They really can't smile normal for a picture. Sam, Nathanael, Jake, McKay, Chase, Tanner and Gavin.

In the hot tub. Poor Mia is the only girl!

Mia spent a lot of time to make this card for Chase.

The boys were all dressed up in silly costumes for a game we played.

Gavin and Chase

McKay and Tanner

Nathanael, Sam and Jake

Chase and Matt on Chase's real birthday

Brayden, Mia and Chase.

Florida 2008

Florida Trip

November 2008

I was able to visit my friend, Judy, in Sarasota, Florida along with my good friends, Vicki, Laurette and Heather. All of us had lived in Louisville, KY at the same time. With job changes and transfers only one of the group still lives in Louisville and the rest of us live all over the place. I came from Phoenix, Vicki came from Louisville, Laurette came from Dallas, Judy lives in Florida and Heather came from Budapest, Hungary. Heather came all the way from Europe for the weekend. We hadn't all been together for a few years. We had such a blast. I seriously haven't laughed that hard in years! The weather was beautiful too. It was just what I needed - to get away and have a great time with some girlfriends. It's amazing how many magazines you can read flying across country without kids! Matt was a wonderful, supportive husband to take care the kids and get them where they needed to be. He even took all 5 of them to the Fall Festival at school!

Here we all are a few minutes after I got to Judy's house. I was the last to arrive. Judy had left her husband's car at the airport in Tampa and somehow GPS got me all the way to her house in Sarasota without getting lost.

Heather, me and Laurette

Of course I had to go running while in Florida. Judy lives on a golf course with ponds all over the place. Judy said alligators live in those ponds. She's seen them from time to time. So, I was a little nervous to find one while out running. I ran in the middle of the street to be as far away as possible-just in case one decided to venture out to the street!

Laurette and I taking over the kitchen.

Vicki and I on the way to the beach

Heather, Vicki and I at Siesta Key Beach

Laurette, Heather, Vicki and I

Ryan, Heather's 5 month old son, was our little mascot for the weekend. He is the BEST baby. She said he was great on the long flight from Europe and he hardly made a peep the whole time we were there. He makes me ALMOST want to have another baby!

Being in Florida, the average age at the beach was about 75 years old!! Lots of leather-looking ,wrinkly skinned people in bikinis and speedos were around us. This guy was sitting right by us flaunting his great physique!

Too much excitement for Ryan!

Vicki and I ready for a night out on the town.

Judy's husband, Jerry, was in CA so we had to take most of our group pictures with the camera's timer! This is before our night on the town!

While in Florida, you have to go out for Cuban food! Especially when your husband is part Cuban, like mine. We went to a well know Cuban restaurant in a super cool area called St. Armand's Circle.

The weather was perfect to eat outside.

On Saturday, we went shopping and had to have lunch at Jersey Mike's -Heather's favorite from when we lived in Louisville. Then we went to the beach once again.

Vicki, Heather, Judy and I in the hot tub.

The girls!

All of us right before we left for the airport. We all got the same Nike pullovers at the Nike outlet the day before. They were such a great deal and totally cute and comfy. We look like total dorks !

We were crammed in the back of the Escalade on the way to the airport. We were all leaving at about the same time. Even Judy, was flying out to CA. So with 5 women, one baby and all the luggage-we barely fit!

I'm so glad Vicki pinned us all down and made us commit to this girls weekend. It was so much fun. We stayed up late talking and laughing each night. I was so tired after the weekend and we pretty much ATE EVERYTHING, but it was worth it! We already have made plans to do it again in 15 months. I'm already looking forward to it!

Halloween 2008

Halloween Night 2008

On Halloween, we had a block party in front of our house before the trick-or-treaters came by. I wondered if Matt and Brayden would even be there. The night before, Brayden had hurt his thumb at football practice and we were beginning to think it was broken. We decided to take him to the doctor to check it out. The pediatrician thought it might be broken and sent Matt and Brayden to another office to have it x-rayed. After waiting for a while, Brayden was not happy about the possibility of missing Halloween with his friends. He convinced Matt to get his thumb x-rayed on Monday since. even if it was broken, it was too swolen to set. That's what we did and Matt and Brayden made it home just as people were coming over for the block party. Brayden stayed about 15 minutes then went with his friends to trick-or-treat in another neighborhood and help his friend run a haunted house. We didn't see Brayden until about 11:00 that night. The other kids were stuck with us. Chase and Mia ran off with a bunch of kids in the neighborhood and Matt and I walked around with the twins. After trick-or-treating a bunch of families came over for a movie on the wall in the front of my house. It was a fun, exhausting night.

Chase and Brayden

Jake and Chase

Rylee, wearing Brayden's costume from last year, with Brayden

Attack of the 80s hair bands!

Mia and the twins. Mia could not find her Halloween costume. She has worn it 2 days earlier, but somehow between Wednesday and Friday, she lost it. I couldn't find it anywhere. I gave up and told her to go pick out a dress in her dress up box. This is what she came up with-some Barbie princess. It turned out that I found her costume a couple days later stuffed in her dresser. Oh well, she still looked cute as a princess.

Mia and Makell


Chase



Tanner-he really is a happy kid and smiles a lot!





Preschool Halloween Party



The twins were so excited for the Shining Stars Preschool Halloween party. Here are a few pics:

Halloween

Trunk-or-Treat

A couple days before Halloween, we went to our ward's trunk-or-treat. There were so many kids! I kept losing my kids, but by the end of the night, we left with all 5! As usual, somebody has to throw up. Riley was the winner on this night. Too much candy for Riley and you know what happens-a nice puke in the car seat on the way home!!!

Here's Brayden dressed up as "Slash" from Guns 'n Roses, but more recently known for being in Guitar Hero.

Riley and Tanner not looking at all like twins. Would Riley please stop growing!!! Riley dressed up as Belle and Tanner insisited on wearing Chase's old Green Bay Packers uniform.

Chase dressed up as an"old school rapper"- at least that's what the tag on the costume said. He looks like the Run DMC guys. He's showing his best rapper look for us.

Mia was a witch. I just wore the witch hat for about 5 minutes before it started driving me crazy.

Brayden with his harem of women!! We always laugh about the fact that there are tons of girls his age at church, but very few boys. Here he is with CJ, Devin, McKenna, Allie and Lauren. He's secretly loving it!

Chase with Jake, AKA Napolean Dynamite.

Brayden trying to look his coolest. This time with - McKenna, Erin and Devin.

RILEY!

Mia and Camilla.


Raghan and Brayden.