Regan's 12th Birthday Party

We went SUPER EASY this year, and just reserved our neighborhood pool! It was very easy and she invited some neighbor friends, from kids from school, and that's about it. It was fun though, she wanted the ginormous Costco cupcakes, so I got those, she wanted a giant submarine sandwich, so I got some sub rolls and made a bunch, and chips/drinks, and we were set. I got a bunch of pool toys and water guns, and they had a blast. They got out of the pool to eat and open presents and that's about it! There was a bit of a cupcake war thanks to David! Little Bella was licking the icing off her cupcake and David smashed her face in it, she thought it was hilarious, so everyone else wanted in on it, and it ended with Tony wiping his face off on David's back! It was fun, the kids loved it.

So here's the million pics I took of her and her friends.

Regan's 12th Birthday Party

Riley is 15. FIFTEEN!!

Riley just turned 15. I can hardly believe my baby bird is FIFTEEN! We are giving him the gift of Driver's Ed for his birthday, so he doesn't get a party or anything else really. But I did pick him up from school and took him to Chili's for lunch and we split that yummy dessert. He is done with football for now (after school football, he still has football class every day where they do tons of weight lifting and training) but now he will do wrestling, and that might be before school, we aren't sure on the schedule yet. Anyway, after wrestling practice, we met Mimi and Papa for dinner at Chuy's, where we decided to be nice and not have them come out and sing to him, and embarrass him! He's excited about starting Driver's Ed, and driving. I can't believe he's 15. I sometimes really miss the old days where the only thing he drove was his little 4 wheeler around Grandma and Grandpa's house, doing tricks on it, like laying on his stomach and pushing the gas pedal with his hands. Let's hope he doesn't try anything like that while he's driving my truck!

Cake Smash and Early Birthday Party

We had some family in town so thought it would be a good idea to have a little early birthday party for Elise. My cousin, Trista, made her a cake to smash and brought her fancy camera to take some good pictures of it. Riley helped too, and really got into the cake smash thing, since he said he can't remember smashing a cake for his 1st birthday! He's so funny.

Elise loved it, she would get a little cake on her finger and lick it off and keep sticking just that finger in the cake. She turned and got some icing on her toe and just cracked up laughing, it was so cute! Trista made her this cute little tutu also, so we got some cute pictures of her in that, with her shirt that says "It's My Birthday!"

She loved all the attention and we got some cute pictures!

Elise's Early Birthday

Regan's Birthday Dinner

Regan has been wanting to go to a Hibachi type place for dinner for a while now. She wasn't sure what it was called, but kept saying one of those places where they cook in front of you with a lot of fire! So, I found a Groupon for a new place that just opened in Pflugerville, so we thought we would bring her for her birthday dinner. She loved it!

The chef we had was great, he was very entertaining, and Regan loved him. He tossed shrimp into everyone's mouth (Riley was great at this, and he even tossed one from across the table and Riley caught it, everyone was suitably impressed).

At one point, he lit the stove on fire, and it made a big whoosh, and Elise completely freaked out! It was the funniest thing we have ever seen! People across the restaurant were laughing at her. She just sat there and shook her hands back and forth and her face was priceless. I grabbed her and she held on to me like she would never let go! It sounds bad, but it was really cute. She never cried, but her lip kept curling down like she wanted to. She came around and later one when he lit some more things on fire, she was much better with it.

Regan has had 2 of her horseback riding lessons that were her birthday presents from us and her Mimi and Papa, and she is LOVING them! The horse farm where she is taking lessons does horse shows, so she can't wait to get into one of those. Not sure what that takes, but I guess we have something to work towards.

And then we have just some random update pictures. Elise is doing great, she's really enjoying trying to crawl and pull up and get around on her own. She's so cute!

Regan's 11th Birthday Party

Regan turns 11

We decided to have Regan's party a little early this year, usually being in the middle of June, people are already leaving for summer vacations. And since school isn't out yet (grumble grumble) we thought this would be a good weekend.

We started the day with breakfast at Cafe Java, her favorite (or our favorite) and then headed to the horse party!

She's been wanting a horse party for FOREVER so I found this stable near our house, and thought she would love it. A friend of ours from church makes the most awesome cakes, so I had Regan pick out her flavors and colors, and left it to Jennifer and the cake turned out perfect! Regan, and all the kids, loved it! And it was delicious, the kids all loved eating the "apples" and Regan saved the horse and the bucket of apples, she said they were too cute to eat.

The girls started in the barn and looked around at all the horses and helped get them saddled up, and headed to the covered arena to ride. The rode for almost an hour and then we went to the party room for cake and presents. Then they went back to the barn and saw some babies and just spent some time with the horses. Regan is very excited that Mimi and Papa are getting her a few horseback riding lessons for her birthday! And she can't WAIT to get started!

It was a great party, not too crazy, even if it was crazy hot, and Elise ended the day by falling asleep on dada. The party was right during nap time, and she was cranking up a little, but they both got a little cat nap.

Happy 14th Birthday Riley!

I can't believe he's 14 already! My baby bird has grown up. He wants a bike for his birthday so we are still looking for the one he wants, and we may have to order it, so for now, he hasn't really gotten any presents. The guys had a camp out on the hill at church over the weekend, so most of their weekend was spent doing that, or recovering from doing that! Then on Sunday, it was our day to serve at church, and that always makes for a long day.

Monday, on his actual birthday, Riley special requested Chicken and Arugula Pita Pockets for dinner. Regan and I had a Girl Scout meeting, so I made that for him before I left, and Regan made him some bacon-cheese fries for a snack, she's so nice to her brother sometimes! (Although, I think she wanted them more than anything!) so we didn't really get to celebrate much until Tuesday night, we went to dinner with Mimi and Papa at Chuy's, everyone's favorite place to eat. He really wanted them to come sing Happy Birthday to him, so they did, he loves being the center of attention sometimes!

And this came today, he doesn't know it yet, but we did get him a little something...

He is currently running for Student Council Vice-President, so he's been working on posters and his speech, and he seems to be doing really well in school so far. He made all A's and B's and is really liking 8th grade. I just still can't believe next year he will be driving!

Regan's 10th Birthday Party

We decided to have a sleepover party for Regan's 10th birthday. You only turn double digits once, right?! So, she invited her Girl Scout friends, a couple of friends from church, school, and the neighborhood, and we had us a shindig! We had about 12 girls for the evening, 7 that slept over. Riley and David took off and spent the night with Mimi and Papa, so we had the house to ourselves. I got white pillowcases for everyone and pink, purple, turquoise, yellow and lime green tie dye, and we dyed the pillowcases. They turned out really cute! Regan wanted ice cream cake, and we got Little Caesar's pizza and they watched Alvin and the Chipmunk's Chipwrecked! They were all very well behaved and we had no melt downs, so all in all, it was a success. She won't be 10 till the 14th, but we wanted to have her party before everyone was gone for the summer.

 

Her gift from us!

Gummy Bear Beach Party cupcakes for school party

Regan's Birthday Part 4

We've had to spread out the birthday celebrations, since we have had so much going on this summer. Regan has swim team every morning from 7am-8am, and then swim meets on Saturdays that start at 6am. So, we're either at the pool, or recuperating from being at the pool! But since this was her actual birthday, and we had to go to the pet store to get dead mice for the snake, she wanted to hold some animals, and I let her. She would LOVE a pet ferret, but they sure did stink! Someone there was getting a chinchilla and she would have loved one of those also, but I'm not sure I'm ready for a giant rodent for a pet. Maybe for her 10th birthday?

Regan's Birthday Part 3

Regan wanted to go to Chuy's for her birthday lunch after church, so here we are, the waiters came out and sang to her, she was very embarrassed, but I think she decided it was worth it for the free ice cream!

Regan's Birthday Part 2

With some of her birthday money, Regan wanted to go to Build A Bear to get a new "pet". She got a black and white dog, named it Alyssa, and then got a cute outfit, and a "puppy" that she named Bailey.

Regan's Birthday Party

Regan's Birthday Party

Regan wanted a pool party for her birthday this year. Easier said than done, but after a few phone calls, emails, and arguments with our HOA, we were finally able to have her party at our neighborhood pool. She wanted a simple party where they swam the whole time, so that's what she got!

It was a long, hot, sweaty day since we started off at 5:30 am at a swim meet, then when it was over, at 2 in the afternoon, we had to rush home and make 50 hot dogs, and rush to the pool. The kids swam almost the entire time, took a quick hot dog break, and then swam some more. We took the presents home to open them at home so we didn't have more trash at the pool, and so the kids could swim even longer!

She was happy, it was just what she wanted. Oh, and the night before, we colored her hair bright red! She wanted her hair to be the color of "vampire eyes" and we got it pretty close. But with her being in swim team and in the pool all the time, the red will not last, I'm sure.

Charles Elijah

Charles Elijah

What a roller coaster the last few days have been! On Sunday, after church, I took the kids to the outlet mall to get some new shoes, and it was sweltering hot. We hurried, rushed home and met Kenzie and Joe at the pool, and wouldn't you know it, a cold front came in just as we got to the pool, it dropped 20 degrees! The kids still jumped in, but after swimming about an hour, we were all freezing and turning blue, so we left.

When we got home, Kenzie told me she thought she had been leaking amniotic fluid for a few days. I was concerned about that and told her to call the doctor immediately and see what they say about it. Well, they told her to go ahead and pack her bags just in case, and come on in, but no rush. So, she went home and packed her bags and came back here and I drove her to the hospital. Well, they got her checked out and sure enough, it was amniotic fluid so they decided to hook her up to a pitocin drip right away to get contractions started.

I went home and changed clothes (it was freezing in there and I will still in my "hot" clothes) so took Regan back up there with me where we sat and waited. And waited. And waited! She was around 1cm for hours. They got the pitocin up as high as they would go and left it there most of the night, and while she was having regular contractions, they just weren't productive.

So, on Monday afternoon, I went home, cleaned up, took a nap, and then headed back up there Monday evening. The doctor finally said they could increase the pitocin by double the amount, and so that started climbing, the contractions got worse, and much more painful, and finally, about 27 hours in, Kenzie asked for an epidural. It was horrible, I know she was so hungry, and tired and worn out, and in so much pain at that point, that even I, a staunch epidural-opponent, was like, get that needle in here STAT!!

Well, that made contractions stop completely, so they upped the pitocin again, but that made Eli's heart rate drop off the charts, so they would stop pitocin, then the contractions would stop, so they would start pitocin again, and then his heart would drop again, it was a long back and forth, back and forth. Finally, they realized, she was still just barely at 5cm, and this was not going anywhere, so they decided to do an emergency c-section. They said she could bring one person with her, she pointed at me, they gave me some lovely paper scrubs, and away we went. I was nervous, I don't handle blood well AT ALL. Mine is fine, anyone else's and I get light headed.

So, within minutes, I find myself at her head, desperately trying not to see anything, and just freaking out over the whole c-section process. They were very aggressive at that point, and it was just all so surreal. But in a matter of minutes, we see little Eli, and come to find out, the cord was wrapped tightly around his little neck, and it took him a while to breathe and start making noises. But finally he started making some little sounds, and they wrapped him up, showed him to Kenzie, then me and Eli left for the nursery while they put her back together.

He was perfect, so cute and a head full of black hair!! He was born at 12:58am on May 3rd. He weighed in at 7lbs 12 oz, and that's a pretty good size for being 3 weeks early! He was 20.5 inches long, head was 14.5 inches. He was in the nursery for a couple of hours for observation, but then they brought us back to Kenzie's room where she finally got to hold him. We stayed there for a couple of hours, getting our stuff together to move to a different room, and finally got moved over around 6am. It was a long, hard night!

So, here are some pictures of Charles Elijah, and some of his visitors. He's been really good, sleeping for 3 hours at a time, waking up to nurse, he's taken to breastfeeding almost immediately, and he's just so darn cute! Kenzie is finally up and around, and should be able to leave the hospital tomorrow.

Princess Party

One of Regan's Girl Scout friends had a birthday party and it was Princess/Pirate themed. Regan of course wanted to be a pirate, and we found the most adorable princess dog costume for Princess! And she was the hit of the party. She looked so cute in her pink outfit with little pink faerie wings and pink puffy skirt! And the party was so much fun, they had a treasure chest FULL of popcorn that the girls could dig around in to find buried treasure, and Princess got to eat all the popcorn that fell overboard! She loved it.

Happy 10th Birthday Celebration!

Watch this and I dare you not to cry! It makes me tear up every time I watch it!



So to celebrate the 10th birthday, we had a humongous Country Fair on top of the hill! It was off the hook!! I volunteered to work the first shift, strategically so I could get good parking, and having a husband on the parking staff, I thought for sure would insure me a free golf cart ride to the top! Of course, Regan brought friends, and I don't know how many people showed up, but that place was packed! I worked the "Super Slide" and the kids got to ride most things before it got too crowded (another advantage of working the early shift) and we got cotton candy, snow cones, and the best funnel cake ever (even if I did have to wait in line for almost an hour for it!)

I am just so honored to be a part of this church, and I know that it is making a difference in our lives, and the lives of our children, and hopefully in the lives of others that we serve.

ETA: I forgot to add the pictures! Oopsie!

Happy Birthday Papa!

We went to Iron Cactus for brunch to celebrate Dave's birthday with the family. Riley was about to head off to camp, so he was happy to spend time with everyone before he had to leave. It was a really good brunch buffet too!

Happy Birthday Sydney!

I can't believe it's already a year since little Sydney was born! To help her celebrate, we went to her house for cake, and watched her demolish a piece the size of her head. We got her a cute little musical tea set that she seemed to love, and Regan picked her out an outfit that matches one of Regan's, so they can be "twins".

She's BaaaAAACK!!

I was so torn, I really wanted to bring Princess to pick up Regan and surprise her in the car, but I was afraid that Princess wouldn't appreciate the long and winding road to Camp Texlake! So, I left her at home, and we stopped by Tammy's house and got to play with the bunnies, chickens and goats, and our human friends too! Then headed home, I could hardly keep my mouth shut, I just knew she was going to be so excited. And she was! She opened the front door, saw Princess running around and she just started squealing. She was so happy, and Princess was such a good dog for letting Regan cart her around for the rest of the day! She even slept on the foot of Regan's bed and anytime one of us would step in the hallway she would sit up and growl. She's the sweetest dog and Regan has said over and over again that this is the best birthday ever.

Happy Birthday Regan!

A walk down Memory Lane with Regan! A picture of her every year on her birthday.

I can't believe I'm not getting to spend Regan's 8th birthday with her. It is certainly a lot quieter around here with her at camp. I miss her, and I know she's having fun but it's just not the same here without my boo.

I was talking to a friend of mine about some of Regan's struggles in school this year, and she thought Regan might be dyslexic. I had no idea what dyslexic was other than getting letters confused, so I googled it when I got home and got pretty worried. Regan does seem to have a lot of the symptoms. So please be praying with us as we go forward with testing for her, that if she is dyslexic, we get her the help she needs to do well in school, and help me know how to teach her as well!

I still can't believe she's 8. Time sure flies when you're having fun!

Tristan's Birthday

CAKE!!

David and I had a date night since Regan went to Girl Scout camp for the weekend, Riley went to Tristan's birthday party for a while, then to the church's Gattiland lock-in. But we had to stop by the party and give Sydney some cake! She loved it, had it all over, and then I got to give her a bath. It was fun, she loved the cake, and the bath! And Tristan turned 12 years old, I can't believe it, our boys are growing up!

Then David and I went to see Date Night (hilarious!) and had a late dinner at Magnolia Cafe which is open 24 hours, and awesome!

Paintball Party

Paintball

It's a toss up what Riley likes most right now, Paintball or the Skate Park. But he decided to have his party at the Paintball Field this year. I was still at Tammy's, trying to hurry home, get the cupcakes and Gatorade, and David and Riley spent the morning at church working at the Single Mom's Oil Change. So we had all had a busy day even before the party!

It was a lot of fun. David was ready to go out and teach them a few things (he used to be on a team many, many moons ago). The boys had a good time, Riley never wanted to leave the field, and he's pretty good. One of the Pro's even told me that Riley was pretty good out there! He managed to make it most of the day without getting shot, that is until Dad decided to have a go. Then Riley came off the field in tears cause Dad shot him "point blank" which was really about 20 feet away, it just felt like point blank. He has a nice big fat bruise to prove it too! But we were out there for about 4 hours, he and David were the last ones on the field, shooting their hearts out. Good bonding time. Regan was bored to tears and collecting a colorful medley of the dropped paint all over the ground.

Then we headed home for a birthday dinner cooked by our friend Andrew. He made Riley's favorite, Mexican Pizzas, Kenzie stopped by, and the Shenkin's, and then Riley left to spend the night with Tristan.