And now...

She's Eleven!!

I can hardly believe it!  So grown up so fun and wonderful, smart and beautiful!!

We love you Abby Girl.

Happy Birthday!!

Thanksgiving here we come!

Every other year Paul gets to choose where we are going to spend our Thanksgiving holiday (that is because the other years we are with my family).  Every time his turn comes up he calls his sister Audrey and invites us over to spend a week in her home, for her to house us, feed us, take care of us, and entertain us.  She is always a good sport and opens her doors to all five of us (we double the normal occupancy) with loving open arms and we are so grateful.  Because they live in California we don't get to see them very often, and they have three girls like us, as well as a delightful little boy that Paul always want to take back home with us.  We love our Wilson family and our time spent with them.

Get ready for picture overload!! 

We arrived the Sunday night before the holiday and spent the following Monday just by ourselves as a family over at Knott's Berry Farm. 

Now, I will be honest, this was not my first choice.  I had only been once before when I was 10 and I remembered it being rather boring.  But let me just tell you , Knott's has stepped it up!  They have expanded into a full force roller coaster amusement park and we had such a good time!!  I don't have any pictures because I only brought my phone in, and last week before I was able to transfer the pics, I broke my phone and lost all the photo's! Yes I am soo sad,  but just know that Abby, Paul, and I rode as many thrill rides as we could squeeze in (taking turns with Liv and Eva on more tame rides).  Abby and I LOVED Boomerang and Blast Off.  Paul loved the Silver Bullet, Eva loved the Log Ride, and Olivia loved the Pony Express.  What a great day- I love my adventurous family!

Tuesday our cousins were still in school so we packed a picnic lunch and went down to their pool and spent the afternoon sunning and splashing about.  It was really relaxing and fun.

That night the adults had a dinner together in LA at a really fun place with a live Mariachi band- one of the weeks highlights, it was great to be away from the kids, laughing and having great food and conversation.  Yes, the children were at home eating popcorn and having a cousin movie night - we just love that they are all getting so grown up!

Wednesday we put on our shorts and sandals and made our way over to a beach full of rocky tide pools.  The water had many shells,

and it was crawling with hermit crabs and sand crabs, star fish and anemone's.

  It was really fun to explore and you know that our animal lover Eva was in heaven.

 Olivia- not so much!

One of my most favorite shots of the entire trip!!

Thursday was Thanksgiving.  The kids went swimming again and Audrey and Kevin put on a spectacular meal complete with all the fixings and a turkey roasted to perfection - and Pie, lots of Pie!!

Most of our down time looked like this:

Everyone on a personal electronic device playing MineCraft - well going into each others world and destroying it by setting things on fire and filling up houses with water, etc.  "Lizzie! Get out of my world!!" was a familiar sound!! Followed by some sinister laughter :)

Friday we decided, despite the rain that was drizzling outside, we were going to go and hike up to the Hollywood sign.  I was so excited to do this, and wouldn't you know that right when we arrived at the trail head the clouds cleared and the sun shown, even a rainbow graced the skies and it turned into a really perfect day!

Of course Olivia kept asking why we were doing this and I told her because every time she sees that sign in a movie for the rest of her life she can say "I've been there!"

Saturday all the kids wanted to go to a sandy beach with good waves so that the coastal Wilson kids could give our landlocked children body-boarding lessons.  We made are way over to Malibu and found ourselves on an almost deserted Zuma Beach - It was GLORIOUS!! It was almost 80degrees and we had almost the entire beach to ourselves.  The girls had the most fun that day playing in the surf, finding "Jellyfish" in the sand and riding in the waves.

  I just love the beach so much and it was a great way to end our trip.

Sunday we drove the 11 hour drive back home, stopping for dinner at our usual Pizza Hut in Ceder City for dinner.  Abby ended up with not only a 48 oz cup of Mt. Dew but an entire sizzling HOT pepperoni pan pizza in her lap and getting us our entire meal for free - but that is a story for another day!!!

Thanks again Wilson's - you made our trip so fun and we love you all so much!!!

Happy Birthday Eva!!

Yesterday Eva celebrated her 7th birthday.  I have come to the conclusion that there is just something magical about the 7th birthday - the child just gets how awesome it is to be the birthday girl!  We had a totally rad scooter/skate party over at the local rink and I don't think Eva stopped grinning from ear to ear the entire night.  Made my heart burst to see her so joyful and happy surrounded by her dearest friends.

To start it all off I had the local bakery create a cake just for Eva with a puppy on top. She was thrilled with that sweet little puppy and made sure that everyone got a good look before we sang to her and ate it up!!

She was able to go in the birthday ticket booth and catch as many tickets as she could - 80 points, not bad!

Then they let her spin the birthday wheel of prizes - of which she won a flashing dolphin necklace- just perfect.

After that they played her favorite song request (Imagine Dragons-On Top of the World) and gave a birthday shout out for her and her friends to scoot around the rink to.

Top that all off with decking out everyone and their scooters in glow sticks, eating pizza and ice cream, and opening presents - I will just say that it was the greatest night of her life to date.

Happy Birthday Eva

We love you so so much!!!

This is Halloween, This is Halloween

My favorite holiday of the year!! We were ready and set and just about the first ones out on the street this year.  We all went around from door to door together as a family- and my parents came over to man our door for us and we love having them here to join in the celebration.

Our theme this year was the Wizard of Oz.  The girls and I love this movie, and with the anniversary remastered edition released this fall we thought it appropriate to have a tribute to one of the best made movies of all time.

I was Glenda the Good.

It's always fun to be a blond - but just for one night because we all know that brunettes are better!!!!

I was pretty pleased with how my make-up turned out :)

Olivia was Dorothy.

It was the role of a lifetime for her and she took it very seriously.  She would not alter her costume for warmth one bit and YES you better believe that she walked around for the entire three hours in those heels!!

Abby was the Wicked Witch of the West.

She was thrilled to be painted all green and get to tap into her evil side for one night.  Her favorite part of the night was having lots of people stop her and Liv to remind them that they shouldn't be out together-  they are ENEMIES after all!

Which brings us to our little Toto.

Yes that is Eva under there- just about as thrilled as ever to finally have a doggy costume that she has been wanting for just about her whole life :)

She looked pretty darn cute and went out with her sister's for the entire time, didn't get tired, complain, or have to got to the bathroom - looks like someone is growing up too much.

Paul made it home from work in time to transform into the Scarecrow.  He looked pretty great (even if he won't let me get a picture of just him)

My Dad had a new Pirate costume to wear while answering the door and he looked wonderful!

My girls kept asking me if his earring was real!!

Here we are all ready to head out and get some candy!!!

Happy Halloween everyone!

Fall Photo shoot 2013

It's almost the end of OCTOBER!! Holy Moly- time is flying!!  Amid all our business we almost missed our chance to go up the canyon for our annual photo shoot. During the week when the leaves were at their peak in color gorgeousness we were just too busy, and then when we did have a moment it was a total crap out in the weather department, cold and wet, a complete bummer really.  So we finally went up last Friday when the girls were out of school.  The afternoon was lovely, bright blue sky's and the air had just the perfect amount of crisp to it.  Most of the leaves were past their prime but we did stumble upon a few golden spots and took advantage of them.  Of all the different photo shoots that I do with the girls each year, the fall leaves still rules as my favorite.

 American Fork Canyon 2013

 My girls are growing up - and they are just as lovely and beautiful as ever!!