Jacque turned 10!

Jacque's birthday was yesterday, April 21.  She is a whole decade old!!  Jacque loves horses, so after school I picked the kids up and we went to a friend's house (Holly Hellberg for those of you who know her) and rode horses!!  Jacque was so excited!  When I first told the kids, Jacque was the only one really excited.  Calista said she wasn't going to ride the horse and I told her that was fine.  This was Jacque's present and anyone who wanted to could ride the horse.  This horse, Shasta, was such a good horse and by the end everyone loved her and didn't want to go home.

Ellen decided it looked fun to ride the horse, but didn't want to do it all by herself.

Seeing two people ride the horse made it look safer (I guess), so Sarah joined to make 3

Jacque was the favorite person to ride the horse with, which didn't hurt her feelings any!

Samuel thought he could do it without Jacque's help.

Heidi wasn't too sure at first, but by the end she was waving and rocking in the saddle!

Jacque got to hold the reins.  Shasta still followed our friend's daughter around, but you feel very grown up holding the reins.

 Eventually everyone (but Heidi) got their turn of riding Shasta all by themselves.

 Shasta is smiling!

 Can you believe Calista is petting the horse?!!  If you look in the background, you can see a dog.  Calista pet the dog and even played fetch with it.  She did such a good job!  For those of you not familiar with Calista, she's very afraid of most animals, especially dogs.  She's never been hurt by one, but if one comes close to her, she tries to climb up the closest person and starts screaming.  So this was a big day for her.

Ellen's birthday

February 14th was a special day for two reasons:  Calista got baptized (and I didn't get any pictures taken.  Luckily my mom did, but I don't have them yet), and Ellen's 6th birthday!!

Aunt Tiffanie made this heart shaped cake out of a square 8x8 and a round cake! Ellen decorated it with marshmallows, sprinkles and heart shaped candy.  It's a good thing that Ellen loves hearts and the color red.  She was born on the right day!

We didn't actually eat the cake until the day after Ellen's birthday because everyone had valentine's parties on the 14th and that meant too much sugar!  Ellen is always nice to put it off a day!

 Friends were over for the cake!  I told them they had to each have a piece so I wouldn't have to eat it all!

Calista turned 8!

Calista had her 8th birthday last January, but I finally got the pictures off of my camera!!  She had a "Frozen" themed party.  We only do these kinds of parties when the kids turn 8 years old.  I think I'd go crazy if I had to do one every month!  But its fun when it's only once in a while.

We played the penny game (no Frozen theme here), then we had a Frozen dance.  We played music from the Frozen soundtrack and everyone danced.   However, every now and then someone would freeze the music and everyone had to stop right then. The kids were a little shy at first, but I got up and started doing it with them, and that seemed to break the ice!  Then we went in the backroom and pinned the arm on Olaf (no picture sorry) and last of all we dressed each other up as snowmen.  I did actually get pictures of that:

 We had left over butcher paper from butchering cows this fall, and we put it to good use.

 We also made our own pinata instead of a birthday cake, unfortunately I forgot to take pictures before we tore it apart.  But it only tore on the seems where we glued it!  We got the pictures off the Internet and Calista colored them.

She was pleased and everyone seemed to have fun!

Locks of Love

I was brushing Sarah's hair last Friday, April 4 and I noticed it was to her bottom.  That meant she had finally grown it long enough to donate her hair!  So the kids and I made a trip into town, bought our groceries for the month and stopped by the beauty salon.  We don't usually go to a shop to get our hair cut, so this was a special treat for everyone.  I'm not sure if the lady has had this large of an audience :)

I forgot to get a before picture! 

Her beautiful hair!

  Sarah had fun making funny faces in the mirror and to the camera!

 The finished look!  Her hair is wet so it looks darker.  It is still blonde, but I think she'll end up having the same coloring as Jacque because it isn't as blonde as it used to be.

The next morning look!