The pictures of the cake didn't really turn out in the slideshow, so here is a better one, and there are a couple more on cow cake creations.

Mad Hadder Tea Party

Is this awesome, or what.......

I had to show this awesome t-shirt the Stowers got Mackenna for her birthday. Need I say more?

Riddle me this.....

How do you get your husband to have a perma-grin following a sleepless night? Cave on one of the two things you swore you would never permit in your house: A huge, flat-screen t.v. Yup, it's official. When we got married I said we would never (1) own a video game system, (2) own a t.v. that cost more than $1,000, and (3)sean would never own a motorcycle. So I have caved on 2/3, and the deal is that Sean is not allowed to make any allusions whatsoever to the motorcycle thing.



Here is a lite brite picture the girls did together the other day - can you see the rain drops?

Photoshoot

Some of you know that Mackenna has a tendency to swipe my camera when I am otherwise engaged and start snapping pictures of everything. Today she took some really good ones!



And Emma's not so bad herself, either.


Here are some of the girls crushing the dog (oh, calm down, he loves the attention), and some of my boys! I am trying to use my photoshop to change that middle one of Spencer to black & white or vintage, but the program is so complicated I have no clue how to do it. HELP?




That one is Spencer's monster face. He is talking so much more now. His latest catch phrase is "Ow! You hut me. I need band-aid." Anytime I touch him. Or, when I am doing the girls' hair in the morning, he lines up to get his done after them. I spray his hair with detangler and the minute the comb touches his head he screams "Ow...ow...ow!" Little parrot. He has also decided it's time to potty train. Oh....I am SO not ready for this. He has gone on there once or twice though. Maybe his potty days will be a hybrid of Emma & Kenna. He'll start early and be done in 3 days, dry through the night from day 1, and hardly any accidents. Yeah, right.

Twilight Mania

I'll start with the midnight release party on Friday night. It was rumored that there would be free give aways, doughnuts, etc. Becky and I stood in line for an hour with nothing passed out but a chocolate heart. We spent most our time staring at the 14-year-old transvestite in front of us. His hair was dyed like Edward's, his face was painted blue and green (why?), and he was wearing a black spaghetti strap tank, tight jeans, and black platform heels. I ask you, how can someone so young be so sure about who they are, especially when it is so completely opposite of the way nature intended? Anyway, it made me sad to think that because of an identity crisis that most of us have in our teens, someone would grab onto that. No offense intended to anyone.

So by the time it was our turn to buy the DVD, they had sold all the 2-disk editions. Why on earth would they only order 150? There was probably a line of 500 people wrapping through the store by midnight. Grudgingly we bought our single-disk DVDs for $17, and went away disgruntled. First thing Saturday morning I hit Target and was delighted to see a 3-disk DVD for $17.99. Ka-Chow. And Danielle bought my other one and saved me the trouble of returning it. Thanks, Danielle!

Just a few pictures from our Twilight night. It was a lot of fun. I hope my frequent outbursts didn't scare any Twilight fence-sitters away. We had about 15 of us altogether, and everyone brought treats. I think we were all in agreement about the eeew-factor of the deleted finger-licking scene. Thanks for coming, girls!






There were a few others who came after the picture-taking: Stephanie & Amber, Kristin, & 2 of Sarah's friends.

Got guts?

Here's a look at what peer pressure can do to a person. Not really, I've been saying I was going to do it, I just hadn't gotten the courage up yet! Just pretend I have a glamorous make up job and I'm a beautiful model, instead of a tired mom sans-makeup.

TWILIGHT Girls' Night!

This is just to let you all know that this Saturday (Mar 21st) @ 8:00 p.m. I will be having a Twilight girls' movie night at my house. You are all welcome to come and bring some kind of junk food to share! We will be watching it on my wall via projector. You can come in your PJs if you want, and bring a pillow or anything else that will make you cozy. I hope to see you all there!

Military Ball

Well, last night was the big event. I must say that at the end of the day I felt it was much like Christmas. Weeks and weeks of preparation and running around in a state of chaos for a very short-lived event. But I would do it all again! I'll start with Friday morning.

My awesome baby sister BryAnne and her husband Tyson came up from Richfield to babysit for us! Isn't that the best? It made everything so much nicer not having to pack the kids up or worry about them being with somebody too young. Thanks again, sis. Here are some pics of the kids with them before we left!



First thing Saturday morning the four ladies met at 99 Nails for various pamperings. I got my nails done in sparkly pink and the others all got pedicures. Then it was off to hair appointments. My friend Sarah came here to do my hair and she did such a great job! The others went to an up-do place and they all looked fabulous!! After hair we all caravaned down to the hotel together (Sheraton) - we never would have stayed there on our own because it is a super nice place, but thanks Mike & Sarah for the vouchers!!! It really made the night. The girls all went into one room to get ready, and here are a couple I took of that process.



Once we were all dressed and ready we were whisked (wisked?) away to Bambara by the Sheraton shuttle. It was a fabulous restaraunt with fabulously expensive food. But the food tasted delicious. Here are some pictures we took during the dinner.

Daron & Carissa:


Annie & Cam:


Mike & Sara:


Sean & Misty:


We went straight to the ball from dinner, which was at the Capital Building. We stood in line for about 1 1/2 hours for pictures, then danced a couple dances and sat down with some cake and punch. By the time we actually got to the ball none of the girls were wearing our shoes - our feet were already aching by then. Mine were these awesome polished gold thingys, but they were cutting into my toes.


So we all went barefoot, and I must say that the floors of the capital building must be meticulously clean, because my feet were only slightly dirty at the end of the night. As we were trying to get out the door to meet the shuttle Carissa and Annie seemed to explode with crazy dance energy and all we could do was watch from the sidelines, kind of like watching a tornado and not being able to move.

Here are some random pictures from the night.








It was a blast and I can't wait for next year! I would do a few things differently though:

1. Walk around shoe store at least once in glass slipper candidates to make sure I won't be hurting 10 minutes into the night.
2. What am I talking about? I have already sworn to use the same shoes next year.
3. Next time book a room for two nights instead of one.
4. Keep pampering on the day of to a minimum, as this only makes the day more stressful instead of relaxing.
5. Don't bother renting a tux - about a third of the guys there were in suits.
6. Skip professional pictures and spend most the night dancing - take awesome snapshots instead!
7. Don't waste money/mental energy on matching accessories - they were more of a bother than anything. Spend more on a dress instead!
8. Don't bother with corsages/bootineers next year - or make my own out of silk flowers - by the time we got to the restaraunt both mine & Carissa's had fallen apart and we were holding the flowers in with ABC gum (eeeewwww.)

I have a strong feeling that this may become as much of an obsession as kid's bday parties and halloween for me.

Teeth: Out with the old, in with the new

Sorry if any of you have been bored by my lack of exciting posts of late. Basically we just got our computer last week and I have been in root canal hell since then. I seriously hate going to the dentist! Even though our dentist is an old family friend (he's not old - he's our age, but his wife's parents are friends with Sean's parents and they grew up together), and even though I get to suck on laughing gas when I'm there and don't feel a thing, I still hate it! I went to get my temporary crown put on after the root canal on Friday and I have been in throbbing pain since Saturday night. Is this normal??? I don't think so. So I am waiting on a call back from him to say come back in, or hey, here's some more Lortab.

Anyway, here are some pictures I've been saving up:

Here is Kenna reading to Spencer (I had to take a picture since they hardly ever get along):


And here are my cute Valentine's girls. Can't you just feel the love?


And here is my cute boy in his Valentine's pj's from Children's Place (4.99):


Emma has lost two teeth in the last week, and the last one she pulled out all by herself.

Here are just a couple fun mommy pictures I've been wanting to put up!

Blogging Famine

Sorry for the draught (sp?)! We finally have a new computer, thanks to our awesome ward friend Jed Stowers. He built us a brand new computer with a huge monitor and a bunch of extras - he is the bomb! So hopefully life can return to normal now. The header of my blog will be changing soon too, thanks to my very talented friend, Becky. Hopefully I can get our checking account caught up and have some time to blog soon. Sorry again!