Fun Surprise!

A few months back Abbie was given the assignment to write a letter to someone she admires. After much thought she chose the Henderson Police Department. Her letter was really appreciative of all that they do for our city and asked quite a few questions about being a police officer. We sent the letter on it's way not really expecting to hear anything more about it, but I was wrong. Abbie's teacher e-mailed me this morning letting me know that two Henderson policemen were headed over after lunch to answer her questions and give her a surprise. Of course I dropped everything and went to the school to capture a few pictures.

She was so surprised to see me and her sisters walking in with the police and kept looking at me as if to say "what is going on." The policemen were so cute with her. They read her letter to the whole class and presented her with a letter from the Chief of Police in Henderson. He spent a lot of time answering all her questions in her letter which mostly had to do with police dogs and what education they needed to be on the police force. Then he answered a lot of questions from everyone in the class. Some of my favorite question were "what do you feed the prisoners" and "what weapons do you have?" He then went through everything he had on him from pepper spray to the different sizes of handcuffs and guns.

He then presented her with two books. One was an encyclopedia of animals and the other is a book full of puzzles. I think her teacher Mr. Giacomino was really excited to have them visiting (that's what the front office staff told me anyway.) It's not very often that you get a response from a simple letter written from a fourth grader.

She also tried out for an acting part in her school's choir performance coming up in April and got the part. It's been a great week for our Abbie! Way to go Abbie!

Aliza 4th Birthday

On March 21st our little "Lizzie" turned four years old. I made sure to spend the day doing whatever she wanted to do on her special day. Our first stop after taking her sisters to school was the party store to get a few supplies for her birthday party scheduled for the next day. We then headed over to McDonalds for a kids meal for lunch. With this being her choice for lunch she was even more thrilled when she realized that I had picked a McDonalds with a play place. I personally think those play places are so gross, but it was her birthday wish. She was so excited as we were heading inside that she gave me a great big hug and said "this is what I have always dreamed of." Well it didn't take much to please her.

When we got home from lunch all she wanted to do was play in the bathtub with her new tub toys. So that is what we did for about an hour. She then helped me make and decorate her birthday cake which was fun.

Her request for birthday dinner was pancakes. I was not going to argue with that, so that is just what we had. She even wanted to eat them with her hands and I just let it slide. It was HER birthday after all.

She seemed thrilled with her all pink cake and sprinkles.

The day after her birthday was my turn to teach preschool. The other moms were nice enough to let me just do her party on my preschool day rather than having everyone over twice in one week. We had a great time with her princess party. We played lots of fun games, made crowns, painted princess nails (in the picture), and ate cake and ice cream. This little group of girls is so much fun.

This was a great princess pinata with strings on the bottom to pull rather than whacking it with a stick. I was a little nervous about that whacking part with me being the only adult supervising. Aliza had a great birthday and we can't believe our little one is four years old.

This video is really funny if you can stand to listen to the awful singing in the background. I didn't think we sounded THAT bad, but I guess we really do. I love the big breath she takes long before it is even time to blow out the candles. Too cute!

Build A Bear

Aliza was given a gift certificate to "Build A Bear" for her birthday. She had so much fun picking out each piece of her stuffed animal. She fell in love with this fluffy, purple dog as soon as we walked through the door.

She then picked a sound which was called "Magic." They had all different sounds to pick from, but she loved this sound. When you push her paw it sounds like she is making all your wishes come true. :)

This is Aliza filling her dog with stuffing. You could tell Aliza wasn't sure of this guy helping us because she is twirling her hair on one side. She always does that when she is a bit nervous or tired.

Kissing her dogs heart before putting it inside of her.

Of course she needed a good cleaning and fluffing before we could bring her home.

She named her new dog Ariel which is her favorite Disney princess right now. She came home with this cute pink dress, high heel shoes and a cute leash to take her for walks around the house. We had a great time!

Our New Toy

Several weeks back we were given this fun new toy from my parents. My kids have been asking for a telescope for quite a while, and finally they got their wish.

Unfortunately the weather in the evenings is still a little bit too chilly to be outside, but this past weekend it was just right. We had a great time examining the moon and all it's craters.

The hardest part was waiting for dad to line it up right, and then being patient while each took a turn.

Abbie is our little science fanatic. She was really loving it!

My favorite feature is the remote control. Not only does it find the planet/stars your looking for, but while your looking at it a recording plays with all sorts of information. While we were looking at the moon it talked about it's temperature, craters, landmarks, and much more. What a fun learning tool.

We may have some future astrologers on our hands. Thanks mom and dad!!!

St. George Trip

We were able to head to St. George last weekend for a fun get-together with Micah's side of the family. Now that we have moved away we don't have many opportunities to have ALL of us together at the same time. We were only missing one of Micah's brothers, but everyone else was there.. It was totally worth the trip to just let our kids play with their cousins and feel like they were having a big sleepover. I think one of the things my kids miss most about not living in Utah is being with their cousins. It's a unique friendship that doesn't matter if they are different ages, or have different interests. They just love each other.

We spent part of Saturday afternoon at Pioneer Park which was beautiful. The kids loved being able to climb all over the beautiful red rocks. For some reason Aliza was being camera shy and would duck every time a camera was in sight.

I didn't even attempt to make it through this tight squeeze. Of course the kids had no hesitation in climbing all the way to the top.

This is Avery climbing with her Gramps. It's funny how being up high doesn't even phase these kids. They have no fear.

It was tricky, but we did try and squeeze in a quick photo of all the grandkids. Twelve grandkids in all with one on the way. It's very hard to get all of them to sit still long enough to take a picture, but we got it. The weekend flew by way too fast so hopefully we will see everyone again sometime soon.

Valentines 2011

Having Valentines Day on a Monday this year sure put a damper on doing anything too time consuming on actual Valentines day with homework and it being a school night. Abbie and Avery's classes in school actually celebrated the Friday before Valentines which I thought was smart from a teaching perspective. In all of my kids classes this year they made their own valentine boxes at school which was nice. This was Aliza's masterpiece from pre school this morning.

I tried to pack the girls lunch boxes with everything red and valentineie (I know that's not really a word) which was fun. Abbie had a well child check up that day so Abbie and Avery were able to get out of school a little bit early. They really enjoyed being checked out of school since that hardly ever happens. At her appointment we found out that she missed a chicken pox vaccine somewhere along the way, so she had to get a shot. That wasn't the greatest Valentines present, but she handled it well. We haven't seen this particular doctor for any well child check ups yet, so when she noticed that she was only in the 4th percentile she wanted to confirm with me that all my kids were very petite so she wouldn't be worried about her. Trust me, we have done all the testing before, and we just have small kids. We ended the day with a candlelight dinner and our favorite jello heart jigglers. It was a good day.

We have some friends in the ward who put together a really fun valentines party a few weeks back for adults. We were able to get a babysitter for our girls, and had a great time playing couple games and just being with other couples in our ward without the kids running around. The picture above is what Micah drew of our first date. It's crazy to think that our actual first date was in high school and we really didn't know each other very well. We just wanted all of our friends to be together and have a fun night out. We went to several school dances together, but never really dated until after his mission. Then it just all fell into place I suppose. There is nothing better than marrying someone who was a great friend first. I feel lucky to have married one of my best friends.

I'm not sure if I should post this picture because Micah was trying to be silly, and I look pregnant in the lovely shirt I'm wearing. But I'm choosing to post it to remember our fun evening. Thanks Sondrup's for a fantastic Valentines party!

Abbie Turns 10

Abbie turned ten years old last week which is still CRAZY to me. She keeps reminding me that she is now in the double digits. AHHHH! How did this happen? Time really does go by too fast!

She started her day with her favorite breakfast of crepes with strawberries. Yum! Then I was able to go eat lunch with her in the courtyard of the school. It was really fun to have some one-on-one time with her on her special day.

Then, for dinner, she asked to have "Emily's Chicken" which is not it's name, but thats what we call it at our house. It's a recipe that my sister-in-law (Emily, hence the name) gave to us a while back, and Abbie just loves it. She decorated her own birthday cake which was fun, and she loved being creative with it.

Wow, ten candles can possibly start the smoke alarm. It's a good thing it didn't.

She is so lucky to have such wonderful family who sent her gifts so she could have them for her birthday. It was like Christmas for her at our house that evening. She had a great day!