Combined Birthday Party!

We let the kids do friend birthday parties on the even years of their birthdays. This year Cade turned 8 and Alex is turning 6. They wanted to do their party at trampoline world, an awesome gymnastics place they take a class at. With the cost of a party at trampoline world, we decided to combine their birthday parties and they could each invite 6 friends. We held it in May, since it's between their birth months.

We had a blast! {commence picture overload}

First the cake- I told the boys they had to agree on a cake. I wasn't about to make two cakes. I convinced them of this one. It may look impressive, but it was just one big mess of cake underneath. Since I drizzled hot frosting over the whole thing I didn't have to worry about it being too crumbly to frost. Add some chocolate rocks and some hard sugar pyroclastic flows = awesome chocolate cake!

The party was organized really well. When all your guests come you have a holding room for cake, presents, and all the shoes. The kids get to start playing right away, and had 1 hour and 45 minutes of fun. They were all tired when it was time to head up to the cake room. We got 45 minutes to do cake and presents. Perfect!

Most of these pictures are brought to you by Dan, who was out there with the kids the whole time. I'm so glad he did because my pictures were just of tiny little kids jumping around. He got some great shots!

Alex helping Cooper out of the foam pit!

Caleb on the trapeze!

Michael loved hanging out in the pit and throwing the foam squares!

Rio ready to go!

Taft and Zee

Michael always had the biggest smile on his face

Eva is so photogenic!

Sam in the pit!

You'll notice this is about the only one of Cade smiling. He doesn't like to smile for the camera these days

Whenever the kids were on the bungees, Dan would go out, pull them down, and let 'em go up high!

See? Nice smile. Here's Cade's school friend Kody.

Throw it cooper!

I don't think Conner stopped moving the whole time!

Michael sure loves my hubby!

Happy Birthday Alex!

Smile Cade!!

I guess that's good enough. Happy Birthday Cade!

It was a great time had by all. Thanks to everyone who came and celebrated with us!

Easter climb!

So this year I really didn't feel like participating (or having the boys participate) in an Easter egg hunt. I've only been to a few that didn't end in disaster. So when my hubby told me about a thing on base that let the kids rock climb and leave with a bag of goodies in lieu of an egg hunt, i was all over it! It was only like $1 per kid too!

Cade is a natural climber. I wonder if we should get him into it. There's a lot of great places to climb around here! The volunteers at the climbing place said he was the youngest kid to make it to the top of all the apparatuses!

Alex is NOT a natural climber. He can't quite get the coordination of the hands and the feet and balancing..yet!

I was still proud of Alex for giving each wall a shot, and having a good attitude about the whole thing! Fun day!

Cade's Baptism

Cade was baptized on Saturday April 12th, 2014.

The whole weekend was filled with family and friends.

The baptism program was wonderful, with wonderful talks, music and blessings. Yes, I used the word wonderful twice. It really left us all with a feeling of happiness and peace.

Cade was especially sweet and nervous before the baptism and had a great smile on his face the rest of the day. 

After the baptism we hosted a waffle brunch back at the house. I didn't manage to get any pictures, but it was a lot of fun and a lot of yummy food! Waffles complete with chocolate chips, pecans, strawberries, whipped cream and buttermilk syrup or apple syrup to top them off. There was also a variety of fruit, cinnamon rolls, quiches, and fruit yogurt and granola parfaits.

On Sunday Cade was welcomed as the newest member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! Unfortunately it snowed and made travel a little dangerous for all of our family that was leaving. Thankfully travels have been safe so far!

Cade's 8th Birthday!

What an exciting time for Cade! He is eight years old and is getting baptized this weekend! We did most of his birthday celebrations on Saturday so that Grandma Kathy and Uncle Kevin could join in the fun.  Cade designed a birthday shirt and I made it for him :)

After lunch at Cici's pizza it was time to open presents!

What?! A Kindle?! He's been saving his money and working hard just for this very thing. We decided to meet him half way (or a little more) and surprise him. The Kindle FreeTime program is what sold me, check it out.

After presents the men went to the Priesthood session, so we all got to play. We have a card game that even the kids can join in, called Swap 10. So much fun!

While they played I got the Cookie Monster (pazookie) ready for an awesome birthday treat.

Yum!!!

The last birthday surprise of the day were some blue glow balloons! So much fun!

Happy 8th Birthday Cade. You are a wonderful young man and surprise us every day with your intelligence, gentleness, vivaciousness and sweet smile. I am looking forward to your baptism and the memories to be made with so many friends and family coming to support you!

Spring has sprung!

It is starting to warm up (until it snows again), and you can really feel spring in the air. We have a lot planned over the next few months with birthdays, baptisms, parties and more. But here's a little bit of what we've been up to over the past few months!

Every Friday I make pizza with a yummy dough recipe my friend Jana shared with me. This is a Philly Cheesesteak pizza! Yum!

I can't believe it's almost been year since we got Carson. He truly is the best dog ever!

The boys love spending time with JoDee who's been living with us for a few months now. She's headed back for a family visit after the baptism, and since we're so awesome, she's coming back!

I crossed something off my bucket list by completing some window treatments in our living room. All the details are on our craft blog, so click here to see how it turned out!

I'm not sure if my blog has captured the essence of my kids. Cade is beyond brilliant and his brother Alex is trying his darndest to keep up with him. Their report cards are flawless and their thirst for knowledge is hard to quench. They don't talk and play the way I've seen other kids their age play. Just sit in a car with them and let them talk, it's crazy how much they know.  The other night they were getting ready for a movie in the basement when something weird happened. They were helping each other. Trust me, this doesn't happen often. I asked them why they were being so nice to each other when Cade showed me this: 

Cade wrote this all by himself with no prompting. Sadly, the treaty had ended by the next morning!

We are still blown away by Colorado's beauty (and its winds!!!)  We often get very colorful sunrises. 

Here's my goofy cute boys!

And last but not least, Cade has learned to ride his bike without training wheels, finally! I guess when you're ready, there's not much to it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1sdS-VVddo