Well a few weeks ago Ilene had her 3rd birthday. Here are a few random pictures of our birthday princess from the last few weeks.
This was her first Sunday the Sunbeams (3 year olds) for next year came into singing time in Primary (the children's class in our church).
Notice her favorite pose??
And side-note: Alli had her "bookit" coupon for reading in October so at the beginning of November we had a picnic in the back of the 4runner for dinner.
Ryan took Alli on a date to a BYU football game the Saturday before Ilene's birthday and I took Ilene and Cam to the mall. We happened to see Santa-she was thrilled!
Then we went to the play place.
Notice the blurriness-because my children never seem to stop moving!!
Well the next day we did a little family celebration and she wanted a princess castle cake. Well the cupcake towers were a bust, but the rest was decent :).
She thought it was great though so my very sub-par cake skills passed.
Not sure why she was grumpy, but she quickly cheered up.
Cam thought it was great!
She was soo excited for her Cinderella doll!
Taking care of her new doll-naked...She would put this doll to bed, rock it etc. so darling!
On her birthday morning we had the kids sit in the living room...
And dropped garbage bags full of balloons on them.
They loved this. She played and rolled around on them for a really long time.
While Alli was at school Grandma came and took her for a special birthday lunch date. Her restaurant of choice? Cafe Rio :).
She helped make her cake for her "friend" party. She wanted lots of sprinkles so that is what she got.
Her funny expressions make me laugh.
She wanted bubble guppies and the bakeries were lame-o
So we printed out a few pictures and put some chocolate seashells and "air bubbles" and she was happy.
All ready for the party.
She had a specific list of people she wanted to invite. Our cute neighbor Lexie, her friend Natalie, and then her favorite 11 year old girls from up the street who were so excited and so darling to come (all dressed up as Cinderella and her Fairy Godmother even without me saying anything) and celebrate! Here is Olivia helping her decorate her magic wand.
Alli playing with Kapri's umbrella.
I sent this picture to Ryan one week while he was at his basketball game. It made me laugh trying to get the girls to sleep and Cam had gone to sleep, but then woke up crying shortly after so I laid in with the girls with a somewhat crying Cam and a girl on each side :). Just have to remember these moments...
Now onto some other random happenings. I just seriously can't get enough of my cute chubby sleeping, sweet, perfect boy! We just love him!!
Some of our FAVORITE friends-the Willis family-were in town for Thanksgiving to visit family so we got to hangout with them one night. It was great! We went to the BYU Creamery since their old house is right up the street from there. Emma loves basketball and wants to play for BYU when she is older so we went to the Women's basketball game. Ryan and Jake were super excited for that ;) but it was a lot of fun hanging out with them!
The kids all got along so well. Alli and Ilene love Emma, Nate, and Ian! Cam and Hailey will be best buds sometime I am sure!
During one of the breaks they let us go down on the floor and do the chicken dance. Alli was thrilled and extra excited when one of the cheerleaders offered her pom poms.
We love these guys so much! It was a great summer when we lived "across the pond" when we lived in Indiana and we would eat dinner together pretty much every single night! Tanya and I would switch off cooking. Emma turned 3 that summer-crazy how time flies!
Later that week was Thanksgiving! Bryan and Annie made the trek down so that was awesome!
These girls were in heaven playing the Julia, Audrey, and Lily! And the weather was gorgeous so they played outside in Grandma's yard.
Ryan joined in the fun as well ;).
We ate Thanksgiving dinner at Ryan's office because they have a small kitchen, but a big "boardroom" where the adults could sit and then some other areas the kids could eat and play.
One of the big hits was when Ryan opened an extra box of light up bouncy balls from a previous order. We turned off the lights in the big extra room and dropped all the balls. The kids had a great time. It was so fun to watch! Grandma had a fun coloring table and some other activities so the kids played great and the adults hung out-it was a perfect afternoon!
The next week we got family pictures taken. It was a crazy BLIZZARD that day so our 50 minute drive took over 2 hours and we saw at least 10-15 wrecks driving up and back. We were fine, but it made it so we pretty much missed our appointment :(. They were able to fit us in before the next appointment got there so we got some FAST pictures, but we are happy with them! Here are some I got on my phone why she was taking the actual pictures.
Then we started decorating for Christmas! Alli and Cam thought the Christmas tree box was a great "bed".
And Cam liked to close Alli in it and then "find" her. He would laugh and laugh. They are so cute!
We had an amazing ward party. The decorations were unreal.
And Alli found some glow in the dark teeth at our house and loved hiding in the pantry with them.
We also got our first big snowstorm (it may have been part of the blizzard, but it may have been after). So we went sledding at grandma's house. It was perfect for 3-4 sled runs that are awesome for the girls!
And just a random morning with Alli in her swimming suit (no clue why!) and Cam loving her!
I made this wreath. It started our as a "simple" project, but turned into an extra trip to Target for more ornament balls because they definitely didn't go as far as I thought they would!
Decorating gingerbread cookies. We did this 3 different times because they loved it so much! Grandma did it with them first, then the neighbor gave a present of cookies with stuff to decorate, and when I was going to make sugar cookies to decorate Alli begged for gingerbread men instead.
And I didn't take any pictures, but we took some cookies and decorating stuff to our neighbor Karen (gingerbread cookies are one of her favorite things) and decorated with her and Lexie her granddaughter. After we decorated the kids were playing and Karen and I were talking. I went to get the girls and found Alli and Ilene in Karen's bathroom. I had her open the door and sure enough she had gotten into Karen's makeup and had it on her...all over. I was so embarrassed, but luckily Karen is a saint and laughed and thought it was really funny. She asked to take a picture of Alli and assured me that one of her granddaughters had gotten in her makeup and done much more damage many more times :). But I still was "loving" that moment!
Ilene was somewhat "made up" at Karen's, but a few days later she had her one "incident". She got my eyeliner pot out and rubbed it all over her hands. Luckily it came off everything she had touched real easily...
We also had a little girls' date and got our toenails done for Christmas :)
Ilene's match Alli's but she picked purple background.
I may have posted about this, but at the beginning of November I had the Daddy/Daughter activity at our church and while I was gone Ryan/Alli decided to take the training wheels off (this was the 2nd or 3rd attempt).
He went to check on Ilene and she came running out of our room. Come to find out she was in our closet with the big tub of vanilla ice cream :).
Ryan took Alli to the last BYU football game.
It was FREEZING but she was a trooper and didn't want to leave.
While they were there I took Ilene and Cam to the mall and those pictures are at the beginning of the post...like 20 minutes ago.
I love helping in Alli's class during centers every other week so here is a pic I took.
Ilene opening her presents on her birthday. Cam is checking out her beloved Posey doll.
She is opening a princess piano with piano books. Alli got her a cute Doc McStuffins cellphone (with her own money even!). And Ilene with her birthday breakfast!
These kids love to help us put things together. They are great little helpers hammering and screwing things in!
