Ashley's Baptism

I drove to Idaho last weekend for my niece's baptism and my sister's bridal shower. Ashley is the oldest of the Telford cousins and turned 8 this month. She is such a great example for all her younger cousins and I'm so glad we all got to take part in her special day. We love you Asheley!

Ashley and Ryan (my brother) before the baptism.

Braden and Claire (Ryan and Mijken's youngest.)

Some of Ashely's cousins (Brooke and Jessie in the cream dresses with burgundy sashes.)
I've said it before but, I love coming from such a big family. There were so many people there to support Ashely.

Showering Christine

My little baby sister Bean is getting married! I still can't believe it. And I still can't believe I made the 16 hour round trip with all four of my kids without Brent's help! I would do it again in a heartbeat. I hope you had a fabulous party Christine. I sure had a fun time throwing it. Thanks to all my wonderful sister-in-laws and my mom for all the help.

Paige's fun "check out" game. The Price is Right bridal shower style. I love a party. It was so much fun planning and putting it all together. Lots and lots of gifts. Yummy snacks and fun prizes...can you guess the color theme yet? Being from Nevada, we had to play a little scratch off gambling...looking for the bling bling ring! (great pictures Jenna) Brookie and Ashley (the miniature brides) were my assistants and so much help. Good friends...around 50 of them! Dietrich is such a supportive town. I miss it.
Opening gifts!

I heart you little sister. I hope you had the shower you've always wanted!

Me and Bean

Sunday Dresses

One of my favorite things about Sundays (besides going to church and having an all day family day) is matching dresses! (These dresses were from Jared and Jenna's wedding.)

I love being able to match my girls and I have to really enjoy it because Brooke is starting to have tiny objections. Usually Braden is matching as well but Brent put his foot down with the pink Sunday shirt. He was a good sport for Jared and Jenna's wedding but not for church.

Thanks to my great children who are usually very willing to appease mommy!

Jessie's Movie Day

They had March Movie Madness at Jessie's school. The students dressed as their favorite movie star and then they watched a movie that day in school. They had a red carpet set up and a Capital Christian School Wall of Fame. We layed out blankets and pillows and watched it on a big screen set up in the sanctuary. It was so much fun.

Here a sweet little conversation that I heard while I was there:
Jessie's friend, Claire: Why does your mom always come to our school stuff?
Jessie: Because she just loves to be with me.

It was so sweet. I just LOVE being a mom and my kids are always so excited when I come. They always run right over and give me a big hug and take Braden and Kaylee Nicole and show them off.

Here is Jessie's star. I'm not sure why they put Jessica; they call her Jessie at school. Jessie walking the red carpet. Jessie dressed up as Princess Leah from Star Wars.
They had music playing while the kids were walking in and Kaylee Nicole was "singing" along.

Braden's latest thing is to be in EVERY picture I take. It is so cute but he will never just smile for me. He always wants to be growling or eating or talking or something. Such a little boy!

Warm weather teaser

We had our warm weather teaser last week and it was a teaser! I cannot wait until summer. I love warm weather and I LOVE having my kids at home. Here are a few pictures of Kaylee Nicole's first time swinging. Braden loved pushing her and showing off all his tricks.

Braden giving Kaylee Nicole "great big pushes".
One of Braden's many tricks.

Kaylee Nicole loved the swing. We played on the swingset for about 30 minutes.

I love my Braden Michael.

Do you like Green Eggs and Ham?

Happy St. Patrick's Day! We were invited to Jessie's school for a "Green Eggs and Ham" breakfast on St. Patrick's Day. When we arrived we were greated with a banquet style breakfast complete with ballons, candle light and table side service! The menu included green eggs, green hashbrowns, green go-gurts, green lemonade and ham! It was a fun way to start the day! Thanks everyone at Capital Christian School! We loved it!

Jessie, Braden, Kaylee Nicole and Brookie

Jessie's favorite was the green lemonade.

Brookie's favorite was the little box of gummy bears that was at every place setting!

Yeah for Braden...he actually didn't mind green food!

This post is NOT for my mom (Shannon) ; )

Kaylee Nicole is 6 months old now. Old enough to get her ears peirced. The first question is always: "Did she scream?" Yes, the second Brent grabbed her hands so she couldn't move, she started to cry. They mark the ears then peirce them. She cried for about 10 seconds until I gave her her binky and rocked her in her car seat. I made sure she was very tired so that she fell right to sleep. And now she has cute little pink diamond earrings!

Marking the ears.
And 1, 2, 3...Earrings!

If I Were the President...

Brooke had to write a paper in school completing the sentence, "If I Were the President..." I video taped her reading her paper. I can't believe that she is a 2nd grader! We love her so much!

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a BIRD!

Brooke and Jessie have been wanting a bird for a while now and Brent and I finally told them if they earned and saved enough money they could get one. We told them they had to earn $30. We thought they would either lose interest or think it wasn't worth it or something. But, here we are the proud owners of a parakeet. They worked really hard doing all kinds of jobs around the house and after about 2 weeks had earned $30! We were pretty impressed with their ambition.

Here they are entering the store. They were SOOO excited!

Braden just loved the little shopping cart. He was ZOOMING it around the store.

Here is the conversation for the following pictures:
Jessie: I want the one that's all yellow.

Brooke: I want the green one.

Mom: You can only get one so find one you both like.

Brooke: How about we get the one that is yellow and green with a little bit of black. That way you get some yellow, I get some green, and Braden likes black.

Jessie: Noooooo

After about 5 minutes of Brooke trying to convince Jessie (and a little help from Brent) Jessie finally compromised.

Jessie paying for the bird.
Sorry, no actual picture of the bird! (Didn't think of that one.) I'll have to get one of it in it's new home and post it. The bird does have a name though...GIRL. I know, real original but it's their bird and that's what they wanted to call it.

Doin' the Donuts!

One of my sister in laws blog is called "City girl living the country life." I suppose I would be the "Country girl TRYING to live the city life!" Here's why:

One of my other sister in laws had a blog post of the first calf of 2009 and they were all making homemade donuts to celebrate. It just made me cry. I was soooo sad. Because I know that I can't share the first baby calf of 2009 with my little ones and I certainly can't make homemade donuts!

So I just did the next best thing...I showed all Mijken's pictures of the calf to Braden and told him all about it and then we went to the donut shop and had donuts! I even let him pick his own donut and we shared a cup of hot chocolate!

Braden chose a BIG one with chocolate.Braden spent the entire time blowing on it so it wouldn't be hot. I think I ended up drinking it all because I couldn't convince him it wasn't hot anymore.Braden loved the fish at the donut shop!Braden is such a good big brother! This is Kaylee Nicole giving him kisses.

See...all better now. Braden knows about calves being born and we got to eat donuts! I LOVE being a mommy!

The Results Are In....

I had headshots taken of Jessie and had to choose 1 for state Cinderella for photogenic and 4 for National American Miss photogenic. I couldn't do it! They were all so precious. I must say, I have beautiful children!! So, I put it up to vote to all our friends and family. Thanks to everyone who voted and here were your top 4 (in no particular order).

Kaylee Nicole's 1/2 birthday

Kaylee Nicole turned 6 months old yesterday. We've never really celebrated "1/2 birthday's" but it sounds so cute for a post and we needed a reason to have ice cream sundaes! The kids all LOVED the idea and are already planning their 1/2 birthdays. Everyone always comments on how "tiny" or "little" Kaylee Nicole is. I prefer "petite". And everyone is right, she is only 11 pounds. But she is very healthy and has quite the little attitude. She is a very easy baby and happy about 99% of the time. However, when she is hungry or tired or needs her diaper changed or wants attention you only have about 5 seconds or she starts yelling. I know you might think that yelling comes later but this little 6 month old can yell...really. Braden loved being able to put on his "own" chocolate.

Jessie planning out what she is going to put on her sundae.

Brookie wanted to get just the right picture and the chocolate syrup just kept piling up!

People always ask me if having 4 kids is hard. I have to tell ya that trying to get a picture with 4 kids all looking at the camera is hard. I had to include this one in the post because we were trying to get everyone to look and Kaylee Nicole put her hand right in Jessie's icecream. We were all laughing so hard. I don't think I ever did get a picture with everyone looking.

Kaylee Nicole's 5 month old pictures.

This one shows Kaylee Nicole's first manicure given with Brookie and Jessie's help. They each held a hand while I painted the fingernails and then they each had to blow on it until it was dry.