you've had a birthday shout hurray!

This little one is 14 today...Happy Birthday Emily!  

Em is a bright spot in our family.  We love her kindness, laughter, sense of right and wrong, her ability to clean like no other...when she wants to that is - which apparently isn't right now considering the state of her room :)  She is growing into a beautiful young woman.

I was going to include a current picture of her in this post but decided to wait till after school so I could post her picture from Ugly Outfit Day.  Nice, huh?  Celebrating your birthday with an ugly outfit.  Luckily she was game for it and trotted off today in quite the outfit.  

Her friends and sister also helped ease the pain of wearing ugly clothes by writing a board full of birthday wishes on the wipe board at seminary, showering her with cakes, candy, cards and a great bunch of balloons with a basket full of Em's favorite goodies.  How grateful I am for good friends.

We love you Pie!  Hope your day is full of happiness and fun!

heading out the door BRIGHT and early

Shield your eyes...it was Neon Day today.  

Emily sporting a Denise Designer Original...hot pink t-shirt cut to make it a bit more fun paired with some sweet tights, neon orange shoelaces and an obnoxiously yellow headband - so cute!

Megan also sporting some nifty tights...yellow tights with neon orange fishnets over them with leg warmers added for good measure.  Bright shirt, some neon feather earrings all brought together into a cohesive neon explosion with the addition of the polka dot skirt.  Thank you Goodwill for always having something to complete an outfit.

Before heading to school the girls met up with some fellow neonites at early morning seminary.  This is probably the most awake and alert they have looked at 6:30 am.  

An unimportant side note...the girls seminary class is huge.  This is only half the class.  There are like 26 or so kids in the class.  Round of applause to Tom, their teacher, for being able to control, teach and love a class this size so early in the morning.  Glad its him and not me!


Now I'm off to help the girls scrounge up some ugly outfits for Ugly Outfit Day - the fun never ends!

howdy pardner!

Spirit Week continues with Wild West Day.  The girls put on their best western duds and cowgirl'd it up.

Tomorrow...Neon Day.  Yea, that should be interesting.

i heart nerds

With Homecoming being this weekend for the High School the Spirit Week festivities have begun.  Today was Nerd Day...

And just to prove that my kids are secure in their nerdiness...a photo of Megan at the mall in all her nerd glory.

We had some final Homecoming shopping to do and she didn't want to take the time to run home and change so shopping we went.  The best part was while she was getting her make-up done at MAC (experimenting for the dance) one of the girls working there commented on how cute she looked, asking her where she got some of her outfit.  When we explained she was dressed for nerd day she still insisted that she liked it.  Who knew Nerd Chic would be a hit.

Oh how I love these two adorable, little nerds!  They make me laugh every day.

Coming tomorrow...Wild Wild West Day.

the answer you have all been dying for

Saturday night Megan got invited to the Homecoming dance - you can see the creative invite here.  The family then spent the next two days trying to formulate a good response back that was in keeping with the crime scene/"die" to go to Homecoming with you scenario.

Monday with plans firmly in place the mischievousness began.  I mean look at Megan...that is the face of a girl plotting.

Meg started her reply by putting together cardboard coffins - thankfully Halloween is just around the corner so these weren't too hard to find

Meg, with a bit of help from Emily and Mom, put together 24 of these bad boys

Who knew 24 little cardboard coffins could leave such a mess.  We are still picking up little white sticker cover papers even now.

After she had the coffins complete she went on to fill them with trinkets, candies and notes.  She and I had shopped early in the day for all the little goodies while trying to think up clever little notes to go with  them.  I'm just getting this out here...I have insomnia so I get no sleep - everything seems funnier with no sleep.  Megan on the other hand has no excuse for thinking some of our lame notes are funny.

Here is a sampling of some of the lameness...

a nose that grows in water - "only I "nose" which coffin holds the answer"

bat pez dispenser - "umm...not the one - you going batty yet?"

bug candy - "stay calm and quit bugging out, you'll have to find the answer eventually"

plastic parachute man - "chute still no answer"

candy sucker with teeth - "is this answer getting all up in your grill?" Remember, I'm getting no sleep so the cheesiness of this is all on Megan

mini old maid card game - "by the time you find my answer i'll be an old maid"

eyeball candy - "eye can see that finding my answer is a bit hard"

wax lips/teeth - "apparently you have bit off more than you can chew"

light stick - "you still haven't found the answer?  you're not very bright"

candy corn - "is this answer bordering on corny yet?"

hugs and kisses candy = "some hugs and kisses to keep you motivated to continue digging"

These were just some of the fantastically witty notes.  Once all the coffins were filled Megan buried them in a huge rubbermaid using 8 big bags of dirt

Dirt that did not smell pleasant.  We really did try to get the best smelling dirt at Home Depot.  Megan smelled every bag of potting soil and went with the least offensive - nice of her, huh?

Once all the coffins were buried away Megan topped it off with these three tombstones that read..."So you really want to go with me to Homecoming so badly you would die?  Then you better get to digging to see if you need to start planning your funeral.  Good Luck.  Love, Megan"

Mission accomplished...almost.  When we went to pick it up to put in the car it was clear that there was no humanly possible way for us to do it - the thing weighed a ton!!  Derek was down for the count as he had the flu and even with Emily helping we were unsuccessful at lifting the beast.

Luckily, two of Megan's guy friends who were heading out for the evening to ask girls to Homecoming came by and loaded the dirt up for us and then went with us to deliver it to the doorstep.

Megan got to hide across the street from Austins house to watch it all unfold.  It was hilarious.  But the best part...Megan purposely left out the coffin that held the answer.  Little meanine!  We drove back to our house leaving Austin and his family to dig.  We came back a half hour or so later to leave the final coffin.

This is the little guy that finally got left on the porch sitting atop a pile of dirt with a tombstone that said "he-he-he, I seem to have forgotten one"

my baby is 9

Although I still call him the baby I know deep down that I no longer have a baby in the house - waaaaaa!  I say this repeatedly but here we go again...my kids are growing up way to fast.  It didn't seem that way some years back but now I can't seem to slow down time no matter what I do.

Today was Luke's 9th birthday.  Happy Birthday Lukey!

Oh how we love this kid.  He makes us smile with all his funny antics, songwriting skills, dance moves, and crazy remarks.  He is a joy to have in our family.  He is loving and kind.  He is sensitive to others feelings.  He is beyond cute!  

Happy Birthday Pookle-pants!

caution: do not cross

Late, way late (12:30ish am) last night while Megan and I were watching tivo'ed episodes of Project Runway when we really should have been sleeping (me and my insomnia are dragging down the rest of my family) there was an extremely loud knock at the door that took us by surprise.  When we opened the door this is what greeted us.

My sharp skills of deduction led me to send Megan out the door knowing that no one (other than the man I'm married to who at that moment was stumbling down the stairs in a sleepy stupor wondering what was going on) would send me on a middle of the night adventure.

Megan was a bit nervous venturing out into the dark and way foggy night but she went on her way anyway to see what was around the corner.

Here is her reenactment (since the first time she went out we didn't have the camera with us)  This is her "What is going on?", "Who would do this?" face.

Yet another great "reenactment" face..."Uh, what is this?  Did you see this?"  Perhaps acting is not her strong point.

Emily weeping over the "loss" of her sister.  Can you imagine what the neighbors would have been thinking looking out their window in the middle of the night?

The crime scene tape trail led her to this "crime scene" invite in the middle of the street.  The fog couldn't have been more perfect - it added a ton to the overall feel of the "scene".  This boy planned well :)

So now said boy is waiting for a reply from Megan letting him know if she'll go with him to Homecoming.  It's iffy...I'm not quite sure what she'll say.  I mean...look at her...does she really look all that thrilled about the invite?

another school year - where did summer go?

Here we go again...another school year.  

I always have mixed emotions at this time of year.  In some ways I am anxious for my kids to head back to school (in hopes that I might actually be able to clean my house and keep it clean, at least for a few hours).  On the other hand...as my kids get older I dread having them gone for so many hours of the day when they could be home with me enjoying the last couple years they actually have at home.

I better stop before the tears begin.

Here we go with the kids pictures...

Megan is heading into her Junior year.  She is thrilled to be able to drive herself there and home (assuming she gets a coveted parking pass)

Emily is starting her high school career - Freshman year.  She has enjoyed the first few days of HS and seems to be adjusting well.  It helps to have a big sister to show you the ropes.  

Just a side note...every year when we take these school pictures, Emily's is always my favorite.  I love this shot!

Em is not the only one starting at a new school...Nate is a big middle schooler this year - 6th grade!  He enjoys going to different classes and having a locker.  

My last elementary aged kid.  Luke is in 4th grade this year and couldn't be more excited to have two of his good friends in his class.  He came home from the first day of school so excited about the year that he was literally bouncing around.

L.O.V.E these kiddos!  Here is to a great school year with limited homework drama, good grades, good friends and straight A's (it's possible, right?)

prize winning oakley date

Remember this scavenger hunt at Disneyland?  If Megan and Austin got so many questions/tasks right they could win a prize.


The prize?  A fun filled date for them and another couple.  Well, Derek came through big time for the prize.  Megan, Austin and some friends headed off to Oakley this afternoon for an Oakley Factory Tour which was fun but really not the highlight of the afternoon.


The highlight, you ask...off roading Oakley style in the Oakley tank that sits outside the building.

Here is a rather long video (let's be honest, 4 plus minutes is long when you aren't in the video) but you can watch a bit of it to see the kids enjoying the tank ride.

sheeee's back!

Emily got home last night from BYU...finally!  It has been a long week without her.  She of course had a great time and we have loved hearing about all her adventures.  

Welcome back Emily!

6 more hours

and Emily will be home - yippee!

workin' it!

This kid has had lots of life changes recently...dating, driving and now her first job.  Here she is smiling and ready to head off to her first day of work at Tilly's to start an illustrious career in retail.

She turned in an application a couple weeks ago and was called back on Monday for an interview followed by a second interview on Tuesday when the job offer was extended.  We are anxious for her to get home in a few hours to hear how the first day went.


Hoping she learns lots, loves it and will have enough sense not to spend her whole paycheck at work.