Sunday, April 17, 2016

Birthday Vibrations - High Flying Time!

Continuing on the birthday adventures, we had the boys' birthday this year at Outer Limitz as they both wanted to have a trampoline party (again, that seems to be the theme this year).  We had 24 kids that they play football with, classmates etc along with parents, so it was a nice turnout.  The kids loved it, as it was complete with an obstacle course, trampolines of course, a spider maze tower and then the arcade (which they got to play one game at the end).  It is hard to believe that our Zachary is 10 - where did the years go????

Zachary as a very new baby!

Amy has a "thing" for doing birthday shirts and both boys prefer the sports shirts now, so she's been able to find a shop online that will allow you to put names/ages/pictures etc on them, so this year Zachary got a green skier dude on his, and Kaleb got a really cool fire bird picture on the front of his.

Resting in the spider maze tower
Addison and Devin up in the obstacle course
The boys saw the sports tower cake and decided they needed that, and Miss Fio made them "jumping bean people" for their small individual cakes.  It was super cute!  Miss Jenn was very busy that week, so she did their special cupcakes and cookies for their classroom celebrations the week after.
Still our sweet little guy for a little longer!

If only we could just freeze time!
We gave our gumball tubes in the trampoline colors - complete and ready to go from Etsy - now THAT's the easy button!!!

Mr. K goes in for the jump shot!
The party started at 10A and was pretty much deserted until we were ready to leave -it was AWESOME.  The group pretty much played dodge ball for the entire time, including some of the dads.  It was so fun to watch them having a blast!
The two birthday boys!
Amy took in cupcakes from Miss Jennifer to Zachary's classroom on Monday (favorite peanut butter chocolate ones!).  He was so excited!


In other news, it was the annual Corporate 5K recently and it is double credit at work (community involvement as well as wellness), so Amy has decided it is a smart thing to participate!  Her dear friend Stephanie travels from Texas (she is a remote employee) to do it as well, so we always enjoy walking and talking together!

Our walking group (Teri, Harmat, Stephanie, Valerie and Amy)
That Friday was the day that Amy took off to do something special for Kaleb's birthday - he desperately wanted to go to Congo River, so off we went!  It was a lovely weather day for it, so we had a wonderful time and did the treasure hunt as well.

Grandma joined in the fun as well!

Our mini-golfing crew
Afterwards, more begging ensued and as it was a birthday......so they did the "mining" for precious stones and the laser tag game as well.  Good thing birthdays only come around once a year!


Last weekend, the boys had their Adventurer campout.  Amy decided that after 3 weeks of Addison actually sleeping properly, she was not going to mess it up by taking her to sleep in a tent.  So that Friday we went over to the Js house, and of course Addison remembered that Erik, Elin and Addi love to race their plasma cars so she had to be sure to bring hers - even carrying hers in! 
Strong girl!

Swimming a bit before supper

Afterwards, they had a "tea party" complete with graham crackers and grape juice.  They had such a fun time!  These kiddos do play very well together for the most part!

Random picture:

How many people does it take to blow out the candles? 5 in this case!
Event of the week:  Kaleb is such a sweet-hearted child, and this week we received a "praise award" from school sharing how at lunch-time one day, a little girl spilled some of her lunch in the hallway and Kaleb immediately ran to the bathroom and got paper towels to clean up her mess, telling the teacher that he didn't want anyone to slip on the floor by accident.  We are so proud of you Kaleb!

Friday, April 8, 2016

Easter and Birthday Celebrations

Well, so last weekend was so crazy busy that we got behind a week in posts.  So get a drink and settle in, because there is a lot to catch up on! :)  Let's start with two weeks ago...One of the highlights around this time of year is the Easter Hilliard and Bergherm party - and this year was even more special when they added an impromptu play featuring the life of Jesus with children 'actors'.  The weather was a bit warm and humid - hence several pictures are hazy and the hair is sweaty, but you can still see the fun shining through!
A white tent sent up in the front lawn....reminiscent of an old fashioned party - it was lovely!

The ladies enjoying a visit.
Kaleb was in the play as Joseph - this was as he slept, when God told him about the coming Jesus!
Snuggling up with Zachary - not too old yet to sit on Mom's lap!

Humidity is making the camera hazy....
Love the spring-time colors!

Addison riding a horse!
And a selfie....

Let the hunting begin!
Sitting still for a moment to take a picture with their younger sisters - love these kiddos!
And the hunt begins....
Addison and Victoria playing soccer
The fun is in looking through your eggs afterwards...
The Z-family
 Last Friday, Amy took the day off to spend with Zachary for his birthday - such a great fun memory to make!  It wasn't his actual birthday day, but he was off school so it makes for an easy way to have some fun together.  The day started off with a field trip to Canine Companions for Independence, which is basically is a training center for service dogs.  Mostly Golden Retrievers and Golden Labs (or ideally a mix) - and it costs 50,000 to train one dog!  They make amazing pets, so if anyone ever wanted a dog, this would be the place to get a dog that didn't "graduate" from the program - fully trained and ready for all kinds of situations!

Learning about how they train the dogs

The school group at the end (Kaleb on the left hand side of the sign in the front with the paper, and Zach is on the right hand side of the sign in grey (front row).  
In the afternoon, Amy took the boys and their friends go-carting that afternoon, which was a first for them all.  They had a lot of fun, and the Zs will be sure to see this place again in the future!
Get your engines running!

Johnny (yellow car) David beside him in red car (hard to see), Blake and Zach in the back with Evan and Kaleb in the front

And they're off!

The two sweet Z boys!

Capturing the little ones before they take off

And the big brothers had a blast on the fast track!

Hot, sweaty, but happy boys!
Afterwards, the kids were so hot that we did stop for a small treat at Dairy Queen before they went home to dive into the pool with Daddy now supervising as Amy dashed out to a consignment sale (must get cheap clothes for these kids!)
Playing pool basketball...
That night, we decided that no moment should remain unspoken for, so we invited Touchards over.  We had a blast playing charades - with even the dads joining in.


Ice cream cake from DQ - all kids getting a chance to blow out candles after Zachary had his fill
We also had the boys' birthday bash last Sunday, but this post has now gotten long enough that we'll save those pictures for next week - otherwise our readership may fall asleep from sheer exhaustion!

Random pictures:

Hamming it up!
Addison always wants to help - she is probably our biggest happy helper in the family (go figure, the youngest one!).  She was helping Karis wash out his little spreader here - wrecking her shoes in the meantime but let's not focus on the small details....   Also, gotta love her farmer hat in this picture - we'll put a bigger picture on the blog but it is a "super girl" hat! :)