"Sweet" 16!!!

Guess who is 16????  This guy!

 

He really wanted to have a backyard party with a 'few' of his closest friends!  He invited his entire school! Haha.....so typical.  Thank goodness he goes to a private school and the high school only has around 100 kids!  And probably some won't be able to make it.......

 

He wants to wait and have it the first Friday back at school (August 16th)!  I'm sure we will post plenty of pics!!  He wants a D.J., tons of food, swimming, volleyball, basketball and did I mention, TONS of food!!!

 

I reminded him that all of his younger siblings will also be there!  They don't want to miss a party!!!  He was thrilled!!!  Hahahaha...

 

He chose to have cheesecake for his dessert!  He is the only one that likes it, which means of course that he got the whole thing to himself!  I think he did that on purpose!  Haha..  The rest of us had ice cream cones!

 

 

Happy Birthday Levi!!!  So blessed to have you in our family!!

  

Time For Birthdays!!!

We love summertime birthdays!!!  We celebrated Thomas turning 12 a week or so ago!!

On their birthday, each child gets to choose the menu for the day!  Sometimes that can be very interesting!  :)  Some are very particular in their wants, others don't really care.  It's interesting that several of our kids don't really care for cake!  So when it comes to their birthday dessert, we get a lot of interesting requests.

Thomas really wanted an ice cream cake this year!!  It ended up being a big hit!!

He also wanted new cowboy boots!  And chaps!  He makes birthday shopping so easy!!  Scott took him to pick out his gifts!  Just to be sneaky, I told him he needed to go underwear shopping with his dad!  Haha, he was not excited!  When they ended up at the boot store instead, he was ecstatic!!

We also went and saw a movie!  The younger kids had a great time posing for pictures!

Vanessa!!

Savannah!!

 

Talisha!!

 

Thomas!!

 

 



He had a great day and enjoyed being in the spotlight!!  We love you Thomas!!!  So blessed to have you in our family!!!

Counting My Blessings!

Yesterday our oldest daughter posted a picture on FB that took my breath away!!  When I saw it, my heart immediately felt the love she and her husband have for their sweet baby.  From the look on his face, you can tell he knows he's loved!!  His little face is so full of joy!

This picture represents love!! This picture represents what I wish every child in the world had......a family.  My heart breaks for the children, laying in orphanages around the world.  How I wish I could bring love into their little hearts.  How I wish they could know that there are people praying for them.  I pray that our Heavenly Father fills them with peace and the knowledge that they are loved by Him.  Enjoy this picture!  I hope it brings a little smile to your face like it did mine!!  :)

4th Of July!!

We're big fans of the 4th of July!!!  We love every aspect of what the day represents!  This year was no different!

Every year since we can remember, we have attended a parade.  Never mind that parades all start to look the same, never mind that most of the parade candy is disgusting, never mind that it's usually hot and we're melting......we love parades!!!!

Here are a few of the pics we took while waiting for the fun to begin!!!

 Cute girls!!

 

 Haha, boys trying to act 'cool'!!!

 

 Levi, trying hard not to look at the camera!!  Cute Jazz!

 

 Love this!!  Superman came to the parade! I at least got him to trade his cowboy boots for his tennis shoes!!

 

Lined up and ready for some action!!

 

 

 

After enjoying the parade, we hit the snow cone booth!  Haha, I love that it cost us almost 40 bucks for snow cones!!!  But so totally worth it on a hot day!!! 

 

 

After we came home, Scott started working on Tanner's Surf Shack bedroom!  He finished it up that day but I'm waiting to post pics until I get the finishing touches on it!  I totally love the way it turned out!!!

 

We had a huge bbq later in the day!  I love summertime bbq's!!!  Nothing better!!  Lots of swimming that day as well!!  Finally the much anticipated hour rolled around.....9:00!!!  That was firework time!  We had a few to do and of course sparklers! 

 

Everyone loves sparklers!!!

 

 

After everything was cleaned up, we sat back and enjoyed the show that was playing 360 degrees around us!!!  People must save up the entire year to purchase huge fireworks!!  In Oregon, the only ones sending fireworks up this size, were the organized ones put on by the city!  Here, it seems anyone who wants to spend the $$, can put on a show!!  :)

 

 

We honestly could not believe the amount of fireworks that were going strong for about 4 hours!!!  And not just on the 4th!!!  They started on the 3rd and we still heard a few going off on the 5th!!!  Sooo crazy!!

 

We hope you enjoyed the 4th!!! 

Happy Birthday America!!!!





Busy Building A Barn!!!

Scott has the week off of work.  Needless to say, when he goes back to work on Monday, it will feel like a vacation!!  :) 

The other night as I was tucking Thomas into bed, I was looking around his room.  I told him that I felt like his room needed a 'barn'!  You should have seen his face light up!!!  I told him I would talk to his dad about that. 

After sharing my idea with Scott, he decided he could tackle that project fairly easily!  Yesterday he and Thomas went to Home Depot and got a few things.  They came home and started the project.  As of today, they just had to put on the door.

It's all done and it looks great!!!  Thomas is in heaven.  In fact, last night he slept in his barn.  :)

Before the barn, he kept all of his barns, farm houses, fencing, cattle, horses and tractors all over the floor.  Now it is all neatly contained....in the 'barn'!!!!

Happy mama, happy boy!!

 The Barn!

 

 His cowboy bed!!

 

 Barn in his room=Dream come true!!!

 

One happy cowboy!!