June

June is always a busy month for us, but it also bring us a lot of fun too. Early this month Michael graduated from preschool! We are so proud of him for all he has learned this year, especially to sit still for more than a couple of seconds. He's also learned all his numbers, letters and is now reading. Thanks to his wonderful teacher Miss Angie, he has also learned his numbers in Spanish and all his colors in Spanish too. She had a darling graduation program and we are grateful to her for all she taught our boy.Michael had an early birthday party so his school friends could come. We had uncle Anthony come and do a magic show for us which everyone loved especially Michael.
Mom did face painting and cousin Jeremy made balloon animals for everyone.
And everyone enjoyed the goodies.Here is a picture of the girl Michael wants to marry when he grows up. She's so sweet. Unfortunately they will be going to different schools in the fall so Michael will have to find a new sweetheart.We celebrated on Michael's real birthday too and I'll post about that later.

Karen turned 7

Karen is so excited to be 7, and can you guess why? It's closer to 8 and getting baptized. Lately that is all she can talk about. She is so excited to get baptized and can hardly wait. Every time she takes a bath, she practices putting her face under the water to practice for getting baptized. It's so cute. It also reminds me that I need to make sure she gets taught the things she needs to so that she can make such a grown up decision.

But right now we just enjoyed celebrating her birthday. The Friday before her birthday we invited several of her friends to come to a party.

We had face painting done by me...then we taught the kids to play red rover...
we also decorated butterflies....

played pin the tail on the monkey....and smashed our homemade butterfly pinata (created by me too).

Presents and rice crispie cupcakes (rice crispie treats in the shape of cupcakes because Karen doesn't like cake) ended the party with great success. We had a lot of fun and Karen was thrilled with the way everything turned out.

On her actual birthday we took her to dinner at the new McDonalds by our house. The play area was the best part of dinner for her and Michael.Afterward we had an actual birthday cake, though Karen only had ice cream and the last of her presents. Her grandma and grandpa came along with a few cousins. It was fun. Happy birthday my darling girl.
A few facts about Karen at age 7: favorite color - pink (currently), favorite animal - cat, favorite food - pizza, very good at math, loves reading, has lots and lots of friends.

Birthday

Happy Birthday to me! I love birthdays, it's so great to have an excuse to do something fun, have cake and get presents. We weren't able to do too much since Neils is still limping about, but we did do a few things. Cheesecake factory is my favorite and since we just got our tax return we took the kids and went there. LOVE IT! Here is a picture of the red velvet cake cheesecake I chose this time. Yum!Then we had my sister and her family over for games and cake. This is the cake I made for myself. Turned out pretty cute, though a little messy.
We had a lot of fun playing games, my favorite way to spend an evening.

Neils got me the movie "Tan.gled" which made me so happy :) I loved that movie and if you haven't seen it yet, you need to. So cute!

Michael turns 4

Two days after we came home from our vacation, we had Michael's birthday. I didn't have as much time as I wanted to do the cake, so this is more simple, but I think it turned out really cute anyway. He loved it! And the cars were a present for him too. He was extra excited about that!

He's been borrowing his sister's pink princess scooter for the last year, so we decided that it was time to get him his very own. He was thrilled, especially since the deck lights up too!

We had a quiet family party at the park. Michael & Karen both rode their scooters and then played in the splash pad. When we came home a few cousins and grandparents stopped by for cake and presents. It was a lot of fun and Michael is very excited to be 4 years old, especially since 4 is his favorite number.

Happy birthday to my favorite son!

Dad/Michael Day

Yesterday we celebrated Father's day and Michael's birthday. It was fun and busy. We started out with me actually getting up early so that I could make French toast for Neils' breakfast in bed. Church actually went better than usual. Then we had lunch and presents.


After naps we went to Neils' brother's house for dinner with his side of the family and had more presents and birthday cake. Michael was ecstatic and really enjoyed his Wall-E cake. Thanks to everyone who helped make this a wonderful day for both Neils and Michael.