Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Happy Birthday Griffin!

6 already!  Boy the time flies.

This year all he wanted was donuts, no cake just chocolate donuts with chocolate frosting and sprinkles.  Luckily I have a donut pan so chocolate cake donuts he got.


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And just like most 6 year old boys he loved everything he got.  Waterguns, angry birds, water sprinkler toy, bubble machine and remote control car.  He was even completely excited about the flashlight.  Plus he got some spending money so now all we hear is I want to buy this and this etc.


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What a fun day with cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles.  Thanks everyone for celebrating with Griffin!

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Finley is 3!!!!

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I just can't believe that my baby is 3. It seems funny but I'm feeling a little old. I've always had a baby younger by the time the other turned 3 so this is a little different for me having all my kids so independent.

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We celebrated all day by getting pictures taken, decorating, buying balloons. We got the barn cake and all the animal cupcakes made the night before and luckily we had the house cleaned up in time for the party.

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We were so happy to have cousins, aunts and uncles join us for the celebrating. He even got to talk to both of his Grandma's on the phone since they had to miss the party.

The biggest hit of the night was the horn's. We had quite a loud evening with all the kids running and blowing the noise makers all at once.

Happy Birthday Finley. We love you!

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Christmas

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What a wonderful Christmas! We spent the morning in church with all our Perkins family. What a great time being able to enjoy time with so many wonderful people. After a brunch with Kevin's family we headed home to open our own Christmas presents before heading back to Centerville to join with all the Willis clan.
We enjoyed playing with cousins we don't get to see nearly enough and enjoyed great food. Thanks to my wonderful sisters in law I got my fill of pumpkin pies that I missed out on since I was sick for Thanksgiving.
The boys had a great time and were shocked to find wrapped under the tree a whole arsenal of nerf disc guns. Previously we had banned all toy guns but this year we decided if we were going to have one we might as well all have one. The funniest thing was the next day when Griffin got shot in the eye by one (oops) he said "see this is why we shouldn't have guns. You said no guns" Oh well.
I love my new couch and enjoy not having to sit on a broken one anymore but most of all I enjoy the memories we made as a family.
We are so blessed to be together and be a forever family. We are thankful for the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ and are especially grateful to have the knowledge of the true gospel of Jesus Christ in our lives.
Happy New Year!

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

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Pismo Beach. What can I say.....it is gorgeous. Kevin served 9 months of his mission here and always wanted to return so when we decided that we needed to celebrate 10 years with some quality alone time we knew just where to go. It was fun to see his old apartments (I should say it was fun to watch as he saw his old apartments), you could see the memories jumping into his mind as he laughed and smiled.

We stayed in a hotel on the cliffs right above the beach. The weather was cloudy and foggy as we drove it but as soon as we arrived the sun broke out and stayed out for the entire trip. It only returned as we drove away. Great timing.

This is the longest I have ever been away from my children since I became a mom. I was very nervous and anxious even though I had left them with the best people (my brother and sister in law and my mom). I kept thinking they would miss me too much or be trouble for their sitters but no, they were all smiles when we skyped with them so I decided to relax and enjoy not having to do anything.

So what did we do.....well we got up when we wanted, we went to the beach,

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we went boogie boarding,
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we built a sand turtle

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We explored the sea caves and cliffs at the state park and on the beach

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We played on the sand dunes

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we took a horseback ride on the beach

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we went to the pier

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we drove all around looking at old mission areas where Kevin had served, ate at resturants without having to tell anyone to be quite and never once did we have to order chicken nuggets, we drove around in a jeep on the beach and bought a kite to fly, we got to walk around holding hands and have conversations without being interrupted,we even got to enjoy as sunset together

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What a wonderful trip.

I appreciate my kids even more now and hopefully came back relaxed and refreshed enough to be a better wife and mom.

Now to plan the next trip except this time we are not going to wait 10 years before taking it.

Oh and did I mention I got attacked by a giant sea monster.......

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luckily I survived :)

Monday, August 1, 2011

Puddle Jumps

One of my favorite memories growing up in North Carolina was puddle jumping in the warm spring and summer storms. I remember the roads would just flood with water sometimes. I mentioned this to the boys earlier this summer and they have been waiting for an opportunity to try it out. Yesterday's storm was perfect! The gutters were nice and full, the temperature was warm, so out they went. I kept an eye out for lighting and when it finally did start to flash we had them come on in for warm baths. It was a good night for new memories and big smiles.

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ImageBig smiles means it was a success. They were upset when we made them come in even though the lighting had shown up.

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Thursday, July 14, 2011

Angry Birds Birthday Number 1

Uh, to be fair I guess I'd better post about the first party since I guess I have been that neglectful in getting my posts out.

So Griffin had an angry birds party to celebrate turning 5! I got this great idea to do shaped edible birds and pigs and kind of bit off a bit more than I could chew. I got it done in the end but it took a lot longer than I thought.


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The birds and pigs are my design in the cake pops fashion, and obviously the towers were rice krispie treats.


ImageThey even tasted delicious! And for a first attempt at anything like them I thought they turned out very cute.

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We had a lot of fun having the aunts, uncles and cousins over and as always enjoyed the grandparents.
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After he opened all his presents we decided he should have had a rocket party! All but two of his gifts ended up being rockets of some kind. It was awesome and he loved them all.


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Happy Birthday Buddy!


Angry Birds Birthday Number 2

After a great Angry Birds birthday for Griffin at the beginning of June we got to do it all over again this time for Braeden. But since Mom doesn't like to do things the same this time we had a new cake, new decorations and even games.

It was our first Friend party, (we are mean parents and make the kids wait to have a friend party until they turn 8). We had quite the house full of boys and made sure to help the one girl feel at home. (She is over a lot anyway and friends with all the boys, I'm not sure she even realized that she and I were the only girls there.)

Here are the cakes, we felt it only right to eat the pig first since the birds should be the winners!

ImageWe played pin the mustache on mustache pig, the kids came up with a new blind fold option after the presents were open.

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ImageBag head, yep this was a silly bunch of kids.



We played water balloon angry birds and threw the "angry birds" aka water balloons at the pigs and watched them splat.
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We even played angry bird memory.

Then we realized that kids do things much faster than we figured and served the cake while we hurried to find other options to keep them busy for the last hour of the party. And after they destroyed all the extra water balloons and wore themselves out outside we turned to Mario Kart Wii for the last few minutes of the party. (Angry birds isn't really a multi-player game, after all)