Friday Night and Saturday

Thursday, Emma's birthday, was a pretty hectic day. We wanted to celebrate that night at David and Nancy's clubhouse but it was already reserved. We asked if they could get Friday and they did. Well the problem with that is Emma didn't want to wait an extra day to celebrate her birthday. Can you blame her? So we did what we had to do. We had two parties. This is the ice cream cake that we ate Friday night.

Happy Birthday Again

Make a Wish (again)

Saturday was our first BYU football game of the season. We have never had season tickets before so we are not used to thinking about the games while making plans. When Paul scheduled our trip to California it never crossed our minds that we would miss the first game of the season. Oh well it was a good one to miss.

I found blue hair spray for the kids, we sprayed them and got all ready in our matching t-shirts. When we got to the game we got lucky enough to see Cosmo. We all love Cosmo. What can you say, he's just awesome!
We also found cougar tales. These are giant, super fresh, major delicious, warm and gooey maple bars. I had two bites. Andrew had a couple of bites. Emma ate the rest and enjoyed every minute of it. I am afraid these are going to be a game tradition.
The game was fun and the cougars won. What more can you ask for?
We've got another game coming up this Friday night. Go Cougars!!!

New Recipe for September

I had eaten this Chicken Salad at Maggie's house but never made it myself. Is that cheating? I'm going to say no it isn't since Paul had never had it. The kids wouldn't even taste it. Paul thought it was okay. I guess this will be a recipe that is used for girlfriend lunches and not for a family meal. It would be perfect for baby showers or a brunch. Sorry I don't have any pictures.

Chicken Salad

2 C cooked, cubed chicken

1 ½ C seedless red grapes, halved

1 C chopped cucumber (I leave this out of mine)

¾ C sliced almonds

¾ C shredded mozzarella cheese

½ C poppy seed dressing (I use Brianna's)

Leaf lettuce (Please do not use iceberg)

6 croissants or pita pockets

In large bowl, combine chicken, grapes, cucumber, almonds and cheese. Add dressing and toss to coat. Line bread with lettuce and fill w/ chicken salad.

Emma's Birthday

On Wednesday Emma went to the eleven year olds activity days that our friend/neighbor was hosting. There she got glittery toes and and a fancy up-do. She wanted to keep her hair nice for her birthday. When she woke up it was a hot mess. She went back over to her friends to have it touched up but they didn't answer so I got to do it. It took at least six rubber bands and numerous bobby pins.

Notice the twist of the bangs. It was really cute. Lishelle is amazing.

Right after school I had to rush Andrew to scouts and Emma to piano. They both had to be at their activities at the same time. Because we were hurrying she didn't even get to come inside. Andrew was a bit early (Thank you Rees!) and Emma was right on time. After piano she got to come in and see her balloons, boa and tiara.

While we were waiting for Andrew to get back from scouts Emma asked if she could open one present. I gave her one of the smallest gifts. A baby penguin. She loves penguins so of course she loved it.

When Andrew got dropped off he had his troop come up to serenade Emma. It was so cute to hear all the boys singing happy birthday. (Thanks again Rees!)

She wanted to open one more gift before we left for dinner. Andrew was excited to see her open his present. Too bad the batteries were dead and then it got left in grandma's car so she still hasn't gotten to play with her My Meebas.

We went to Pizza Factory where she got a pina colada smoothie.

Their bread twists are to die for!

She got a pizza in the shape of an 11.

On our way out

The family

She had a cheesecake surrounded by mini cupcakes

Make a wish baby girl

Emma got a lot of Magic cards making Andrew very jealous.

And a shirt from Justice with black skinny jeans

She also ended up with a lego set, walkie talkies, ITunes gift cards and some other little things. I think she had a good day!

Emma is Eleven!

How is that possible? 11 years ago I was blessed with the baby girl I had always wanted. I had dreamed about having a little girl but honestly didn't think I would ever actually get one.

Right after Paul and I were married we were asked to teach primary. I was preparing a lesson on Joseph and Emma Smith. I wanted a daughter of mine to have a unique name but one that anyone could pronounce. When I read Emma in that lesson manual I knew that that would be the name of my future daughter. I had only met one Emma that I could remember and she was beautiful and intelligent. It was also a family name. My great grandma was named Emma. It was perfect and Paul agreed.

A couple of years later I was working as a manager for Eddie Bauer. That is when I got pregnant with Emma. I waited, not so patiently, for the ultrasound. I told the tech that I would not leave the table until they could tell me if it was a girl or a boy. It took a little while but finally they had a clear shot. I was getting a girl! Am I really that lucky? Yes! From that moment on the baby was called Emma and she had more pink outfits than you can imagine. I was so excited.

Besides some back pain and foot swelling the pregnancy was very uneventful. Delivery on the other hand was not. She was born 15 days past her due date. I pushed for 3.5 hours after about 20 hours of labor she was born. (I know 20+ hours isn't that long but trust me when I say it sucked hard and I am glad that I never had to do it again! I think scheduled c-sections are quite wonderful.)

I won't go into all the details but it is a miracle that we are both here, alive and healthy. It was bad. They vacuumed her out and we soon realized the problem. She weighed 9lbs. 14 oz. They had numerous specialist come and attend to her and several for me as well. Once everything was under control I finally got to hold our baby. I can't say she was perfect though. Her poor little feet were so twisted (It took six months in casts to fix that) but she had use of her arm which we are told is another miracle.(Her shoulder had gotten caught. The doctor said if it wasn't for the blessing that I had gotten he knows that she would not be able to use her arm. Having a shoulder get caught is usually very devastating.) Overall she was healthy and I had a baby girl.

Now 11 years later Paul and I are still as in love as we were then. Emma is so fun and vibrant and full of life. She wants to try everything. She is so smart and is a great student. I don't know what we would do without her in our lives. She is a miracle and I feel that she has been saved several times for something special. She is going to touch lives and change the world for the better. Heavenly Father has blessed us with someone very special and I thank Him for that.

Emma we love you tons and hope you have a wonderful birthday!

Celebrating Fall

Yesterday we tried to make the most of the first day of fall.

We went up in the canyon and took our annual family photos. We got some shots that I am pretty happy with. It didn't take long (37 shots to be exact) before the kids were D-O-N-E, done.

I think this is my favorite.

We had brought some picnic stuff with us and some warm sweatshirts. After we were done taking pictures we built a fire, roasted hot dogs and had a nice dinner. It's amazing the difference a month makes. This time were were cold and last month were in shorts and t-shirts and still warm.

After dinner the kids decided to throw around a football. Paul wanted in on the action and ended up throwing the ball into the stream. Andrew was devastated. We all reacted quickly by running down stream to save his glow-in-the-dark BYU ball. Well it was way on the other side, totally out of reach even with my weenie roasting stick. Paul did what any great dad would do. He jumped in the stream and got the ball. He was in shoes, socks and jeans.

Luckily he had some crocs in the car but we didn't stay too much longer (just long enough to make s'mores) since it was in the 40's and he was in wet pants. He drove home in his underwear!

Yum!

Happy Fall Y'all.

What a Wonderful Day to be Born

Maggie, Angela, Jennifer and Mignonne

It's the first day of autumn and Angela's birthday. We celebrated by going out to lunch. We ate at Rubio's where Angela had her first fish taco. She liked it! Happy Birthday my friend. I hope the rest of your day was great.

Some more pictures from our trip

This little trip to Disneyland was just what we all needed. It was nice to get away and to use our annual passes one last time. Our only complaint was it was super hot again. It doesn't seem to matter where we go or when we go. We always seem to have extreme weather. Here are a handful of pictures. I will keep posting them over the next few days.

Emma by the castle

Minnie and the family

I had wished on an eyelash that we would meet Mickey on this trip and it came true!

The kids need to mind their ears. They almost covered Mickey's face.

The kids have really enjoyed pin trading on the last couple of trips. They both ended up with a tomato Mickey. It's way cute.

Thunder Mountain Railroad

Before we got on the ride

Emma on the Tea Cups

We were enjoying our ice cream in the parlor when the parade went by. They shot out Mickey shaped confetti all over the streets. Emma scurried out to collect some once the parade moved down the road.