June 28th - Lauren's B-day and Fireworks

What a day! We had a great time at Lauren's birthday party. I think she really enjoyed and ultimately made the right choice for her to just have family. She also invited her beloved Ms. Monteith and we feel so blessed that she joined us (though I am sure she sees us all in a different light now!!!)

We had great food, a couple of games, presents and Maggie Moo Cupcakes. It was all "American Girl Sized" Mini Burgers, Mini Dogs, Mini Taco Bowls and Mini Mac's - little fruits on sticks - etc. We ate too much!

Lauren got some great gifts from all those who love her. A couple highlights -
1. Kits Tree House
2. Shopping Spree in a Box (tons of gift cards to stores that she loves!!!)
3. Great Grandma Slingerlends old school books (from the early 1900's!!)
4. Tickets and backstage passes to HighSchool Musical the Play
5. Crafts! DOLL CRAFTS even! She is stoked!

Here are a couple of my favorite photos followed by a slide show of more great photos!


Seeing the Tree House for the first time!


Grandma Mary and Grandma Maria bought the SAME card!!!!


Blowing out that last candle!



After the party and the clean up...we had an evening of fireworks with neighbors in the cul-de-sac. The kids had a BLAST (so did the daddys!!!) We had Dave and his daughter Nicole (4) Nikki and George with sons Evan and Christian (5 and 2) and of course us!

Again - a couple favorite photos followed by the slideshow!!!


The girls waiting on the lawn


Lauren, Nicole and hailey!


The girls watching the show!


Nikki with Christian and Evan watching the show!



Well, that's all folks! Off to bed soon, tomorrow I turn 35 (not that anyone reads this blog to hear about me!) then off to Beaver Creek on Tuesday (Todd to follow on Thursday) - I am looking forward to the trip!!

Someday Story

Some of you know that Lauren dreams of fixing up the old mountain towns she sees on our drives to Beaver Creek. She has talked about for two years now. Her plans keep getting more detailed and more elaborate. She wants them to be beautiful and a place for poor people to live. While I have no idea where she dreamt this up I know it to be on her mind just about constantly.

Well, last week while at WellsFargo she picked up an entry form for a contest. at the time I did not know what it was but she was excited about it. In the car she read the whole packet, then told me about it. But she was bummed because you had to be 18 to enter. The contest is called "Someday Stories" and the goal is to write your "someday" story and the winner gets $100,000 towards their "Someday" goals. The story has to be under 250 words and words like I and a count! She was so excited and so bummed at the same time.

Well, that night she wrote a "someday" story in a tiny spiral notebook.

Tonight I added two sentences to the beginning and submitted the story. I don't think she has a chance of winning - might even be breaking the rules - not her best "story" but it what she has been talking about for sure. It is also hard to tell the separation between my 2 sentences and her story on the online entry (no way to add enters) but I did it anyway -

Here is Lauren's Someday Story:

My someday story comes from my 7 year old daughter and a dream she has had for two years. She really wanted to enter your contest.

Someday I will fix the old towns in the Rocky Mountains. I want to make them nicer than ever, and I will sell them to poor people for around twenty dollars. I will have to buy the land, tools, wood, paint, screws, nails, TV’s, Dishwashers etcetera. I’ll build stores, jobs, houses and banks. For the back yards I’ll do mini pools, sod, and porches. Indoors I’d like a casual family room and living room, a pretty and nice dining room, clean looking kitchen, a basement that’s full of space to have a guest bedroom and space to store stuff, a craft room that could be converted to an office, three decent bedrooms. In each house there will be all those things I just said. There will also be one big Welcome Home present and a note per month. Each house will be three dollars. When I said around Twenty Dollars I meant to sell it. In the present will be the note and some free DVD’s, CD’s and Books. The note will say: Your monthly fee is Three Dollars. I’ll give you three times each month; every time you can’t pay three dollars it takes one of your chances. If you lose all three chances you lose your house. Please choose me for your winner; I’m doing good things for poor people. Please.

Ms. Monteiths Fairy Party

What a woman! Not only did she teach our kids this year but invited them into her home for an afternoon of fairy fun too! Actually, as part of 3rd Grade classroom economics the children had a choice to save $400 of their earned money to purchase a ticket to the fairy party! 7 of the 13 children did! (others wanted to come but couldn't for personal reasons too) - Ms. Monteith had fairy houses for them to build and paint, then they got to design their fairy gardens, eat great food (Better than Brad Pitt Cake for one)The kids had a great time!

Dance Recital update

LONG DAY. Wow. The recitals were great. Though Hailey did not really dance in her dances - 2 she just stood there one toe pointed looking out into the wings - one she tried to dance and did some of it - she was intimidated!

LAUREN DID GREAT (so I hear) I had to be backstage for most of the day but got to watch her hip hop dance - who knew she had it in her? She was awesome! It was fun to see that one!

What a money maker though...3 shows - $10 per seat per show, 3 videos $30 each, 7 costumes, all the classes, only 1 program allowed per family...Holy Moly. and all so I could hang out back stage for quick changes and not see my girls! AHHHHHH!

Oh well, I did snap a couple before the show and back stage photos for your viewing pleasure...I am anxiously awaiting the professional photos from last weekend - but I am sure it will be weeks before I see those! Oh, and the videos (at $30 bucks each) take 6 weeks to arrive too.









TOMORROW - BIG FAIRY PARTY at Ms. Monteiths house, the girls are ECSTATIC! I am sure it will be great fun for all who attend (Myself included) hope I remember the camera!

Dance Recital

Busy busy day ahead! 3 shows, 2 girls, 7 dances and costumes!!! Can't wait!

I will update about how it went tonight or tomorrow!

In the meantime. I took the camera to Tennis on Thursday. I did not get as many pictures as I wanted because the battery was low but I did some good ones and wanted to share! Coach said Lauren is doing great at keeping her racket level etc - needs to work on reaction times, but she is really doing quite well! The kids are having a blast and really getting a work out too, as he is doing some conditioning with them as well as teaching tennis basics!

Enjoy!

Water Balloons with Cailey

What fun! Cailey came over for a little while today and we threw water balloons! The girls had a BLAST! I filled them all last night (136) it was great watching them!

The slideshow has 50 pictures (SORRY) but I did narrow it down from 102!

Hope you enjoy!

Golf and Tennis...

Golf and Tennis start this week for Lauren. She does golf on Monday and Wed mornings and Tennis on Tuesday and Thur mornings! Both with her Coach from school. She is really slowing down and paying attention to her golf, and doing quite well! We are really proud of her.

We bought Hailey a small tennis racket so she could play around too! She already likes to hit golf balls with Lauren...so I kind of felt it was a must to get her a racket. She is so happy and she loves it.

We took it to the park today and I got some video of her hitting the ball while Paige threw the ball at her racket (litterally aiming for the racket so Hailey could hit it). I must say Paige is quite good at that, I sort of stunk at it! The first clip is about 2 minutes long and the second is about 1 minute.

***You can Hit PAUSE on the MP3 Player if the song interferes with the video Sound***

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I will get some video of Lauren doing golf and tennis too, I am just waiting till next week when she has had some time to practice a little without me filming her and making her nervous!