Kaylee's 3rd birthday

So yes Kaylee is now 3 and a half and I am just now getting to her post on her birthday.  One of these days I am going to be a great blogger but for right now this is going to have to do:)

Kaylee wanted a Mickey Mouse club house party so bad, so I decided we would try and do it just like the show.  So we went to go do different things and every time we got there we needed toddles to come and bring us whatever was missing.  It was so cute listening to the kids yell out of toddles, I loved every minute of it.  We played pin the bow on Minnie but we didn't have tape, we did bowling but we didn't have the balls, we did bubbles and didn't have the wands, and finally her cake we didn't have the candles.  It really worked out great and kept the girls attention really well.  She is still months later calling Aunt Charlene toddles sometimes:)  I dropped her cupcakes the morning of the party and had to make new ones fast, so they weren't super cute but she didn't seem to mind.  I made Mickey Mouse ice cubes with kool-aid ahead of time and they were the hit of the party, I have no clue why but they were!  If only everything was the simply and easy to please everyone.

 

Kaylee is getting so big and it makes me really sad sometimes to see how fast she will be gone :(  She loves to play right along with the big kids and is pretty good at it most of the time.  Of course she has done a ton of new things this year which I can't think of them all right now.  The big ones that are coming to mind are riding her bike and scooter, dressing herself in clothes that normally match:), drinking from a big girl glass, and more recently since her birthday but still SHE IS POTTY TRAINED!!! Yeah that is right no more diapers for me in this house (at least for right now).  She is pretty spoiled rotten but still a good girl.  She loves to play a game where I hold her and run and daddy chases us, her faces and screams while we are doing it would make anyone happy.  Also when daddy tries to wrestle with her she says "no, no daddy we is friends!"  it is the cutest thing ever.  We love her death and can't wait to watch her continue to grow.

Brayden's Birthday

We had SO much fun at Brayden's party this year, he turned the big 8 and wanted to do a science party.  We got him a lab coat and then everything just started to fall into place.  We of course had to make slime his favorite thing in the world to make.  Then we also did tornado tubes, which the kids are still playing with weeks later.  We also made fake snow which was a lot of fun and super easy (it is kind of expensive but I think it is worth it!).  For his food we just did simple cupcakes, but his was a mad scientist compelete with green hair to match his.  And we did the homemade rootbeer so it would look like a big experiment going, as always the kids LOVED doing that part.  It really was a fun party and it came together super fast, possibly the easiest party we have done, simply because we make most of the things are a regular basis.  At the end to finish it off we did Mentos Geysers which are always fun but make a huge mess, so yes I am out in the street but notice the kids aren't:)haha

 
Brayden has really been surprising us lately with what he wants to learn about and what he works really hard on.  We have always had difficulty reading but lately he is very into reading the scriptures at night, sometimes he is even reading the entire passage that we are trying to read that night.  He has such a big heart and is still my little boy but I have noticed lately that I do get less public affection but he is still my loveable hugable boy at home.  He is getting ready to get baptized at Thanksgiving, and he is so excited.  We are excited too because there will be a lot of family to be with him on his big day.  He is such smart little boy and I love watching him get older and can't wait to see all that he accomplishes in his life!

Finally Kenzie's party!

We had a great time at Kenzie's Spa Party this year.  It was the only thing that she wanted and it really turned out great.  We started off with everyone soaking their feet in the pool to get them all nice a soft:)  Then they got to have pedicures and Aunt Charlene even put little designs on their toes for them.  We made foot scrubs and did scratch art while we were waiting for everyone to get their nails done.  Then we had cake and ice cream, the cake was a bottle of finger nail polish and it turned out okay.  Not as cute as I would have wanted but still it worked.  The girls really all seemed to have a good time.  At the end we had a pinata that was filled with fingernail files, bracelets, rings, and necklaces, and then they all got fingernail polish to take home.  She had so much fun she wants to do it again next year (we will see)!


I really just can't believe that my baby girl is 5 already!!!!  Where does the time go, Kenzie is so much fun to have around.   She is a little mom, always wanting to help everyone and taking care of everyone around.  Her favorite chore to do around the house is to help me mop the kitchen.  I love it because she wants to do it pretty much everyday:)  She started preschool this year with Aunt Charlene and she is doing great at it.  She loves to learn and always has been it has really taken off now.  The first week they did the letter a and then she decided that she needed to write and entire book about apples so she could take her book the next week for the letter B!  It is just so fun to watch all of the things going into that beautiful little brain.  She is still dingy a lot and makes us smile tons.  Life wouldn't be the same without her smile around.

And soccer begins

 Well last week was our first week of soccer and it is already VERY hot sitting out there on the fields.  Brock's games was first and he had an awesome game.  The started out as goalie but didn't get much action since his team was killing the other team.  A little before half he was switched out and played forward attacker, he did great got two goals.  One with his left foot!!!!!  Toward the end he went back in as goalie and saved two goals, they ended the game 9 to 1, perfect start to the season.


Brayden's team is a little flaky the coach didn't even know there was  a game Sat so we were a little worried about how they would do.  They played against a good team and hung in there, their goalie was bigger than Brock and scared the kids some.  They ended up 3 to 2 which was really good.  Brayden had a couple of really great dribbling runs down the field and few good passes. 


They both looked really good out there and we are so excited to see them get better as the year goes on, I am sure you will be sick of the soccer pictures by the end :)

Brayden's field trip

Well daddy took off a dad from work to go with Brayden on his field trip since I was teaching at church on the same day.  They went to George Ranch, which is a old plantation house close by here where they do things like in the olden days :)  They got to rope a "cow" (hay bale), feel cotton that they had picked, dance while someone played the fiddle and a few other things.  Brayden had a really good time going with daddy, but all daddy would say was there were only 3 guy all the rest were moms.  I told his at least there was 3, hahaha.  Brayden was being a turd and didn't want to be in any of the pictures so I don't really have any great ones.

Baby Cooper

My sister finally had a her baby almost 2 weeks ago now, we have been busy enjoying him :)  I got to be their for the delivery and I am just so thankful that we are close by each other, I know it is not going to last forever but I am thankful that I have this time with her!!  My parents got there that day he was born but a little late and then they stayed for two weeks which the kids loved.
Cooper is so fun, he was 6lbs 10 oz and 20.5 inches, so WAY smaller than any of my kids.  By the time he went home from the hospital Kaylee weigh 3 pounds more than him exactly at the same time:)  Mackenzie has been loving every minute of it and holding him whenever she gets a chance.  She is also paying attention maybe a little too much, she walks around breast feeding her baby dolls now!!
 

Plus she wants to know why Aaron can be there even though he is a boy, daddy got that question the other night, how I would have LOVED to see his face when she asked that.

The boys have really been enjoying him too, Brock loves
to hold him but if we ask if we need to have another baby he very quickly tells us no.  The told me they take too much of my time, so maybe I am not so horrible to spend time with after all :)  Brayden is my typical little love dove, he loves to just sit there and hold him and not move. 

Makaylee is a little funny around him, she will say I'm not the baby and looks kind of sad.  However she does love holding him and giving him kisses, hasn't helped so far in the potty training though.  She told us when baby Cooper came she would go in the potty, hahaha.

 The kids are loving it that they get to have a cousin close by and get to see Aunt Charlene more.  With Charlene being at home now during the day hopefully we will get to spend some more time together.  We are still waiting to find out where they will be next year but we are praying that it will be close to us!!




 Grandpa got to go on Brock's field trip which was really nice since he told me that he didn't want me to come.  Then Brayden had his Reading Restaurant and we all got to go!!!  It is so nice when it works out that someone gets to be here for their things at school.  Most of the time they don't have anyone there
 so it was a lot of fun to see him with
 everyone.

Then the next week was spring break, we didn't do a ton since we were mainly spending time with baby Cooper.  We did go in and go to the zoo one day which was a lot of fun even though it was really really busy.  We took the kids to go see Mars Needs Moms which I was not super excited about, but it turned out to be a really great movie with an awesome message.  We also played putt-putt and went out for ice cream twice, so overall it was a really great spring break.

Petting the gator

 We went to Brazos Bend State Park (know by my kids as the Alligator park) for a hike with Brayden's cubscout den.  We had a great time going on the hike with everyone, we did the smaller paved path that doesn't have as many alligators.  We saw 2 alligators, some turtles, looks of ducks, a frog, and some snake like thing with legs that I don't ever want to see again!  After the hike we went into the Nature Center out there where you can pet a baby alligator and if they are out a snake.  They had out a rat snake on Sat and Kenzie was so funny.  She just stayed right by the snake petting it and then moving onto the alligator and then right back to the snake.  We had a really great time after most everyone left Brayden's two   good friends from the pack and their families all stayed and we had a picnic lunch together.  The kids pretty much just ran around playing but all in all it was a really great Sat.  We didn't get to go into the Observatory since it was still too early, but it turned out to be a good things since we found out on Tue that Brock's field is out there next week:)  If you live around us and haven't gone out to the park yet you really should!  The bigger 40 acre lake trail right in the front normally has TONS of alligators on it, but there are lots of trails out there that are lots of fun. 

Ice in Houston

So our kids got to miss a day of school and got out early two days this year due to a storm coming through.  We were expected to get a lot of snow (1 to 3 inches which is a lot here) but instead it just iced.  The kids were NOT very happy about this but they tried to make the most out of it.  There was a pretty good layer of ice on the trampoline so they went out and started to jump until they could get a big pile.  They had a pretty good time out there but got wet really fast so it didn't last too long.  Daddy got to stay home since the beltway was closed that he drives on to get to work.  So we had a great time sitting by the fire and having hot chocolate!  It doesn't happen often but when we get cold the kids really love it.

Charlene's shower!

Well Charlene's shower finally got here, I was so excited about 

getting to throw it since I never thought I would live close enough 

to her for this!!!  She has some really awesome friends that helped 

me throw a really great shower.  We had TONS of food and the

decorations her one friend did were way over the top.  It was 

turned out beautiful.  I made the cake and I wanted it to be dirt 

since Brock had that at his birthday party this year and she LOVED

it.  After one of her friends said she had seen a cake in a dump truck,

I knew I had to do it.  I decided to make them look like big hunks

of dirt so you could get them out of the truck easily, I think it turned

out great.  We played a few games, first where you had to decide what

type of poo (melted candy bars) were in the diapers, second it was a fill in the blank nursery ryhme, and the last everyone was suppose to decide when a baby was going to fall out of a block of ice.  It didn't fal

l so I was a little embarrased about that, but what are you going to do. She got lots of great stuff.

All week long Kenzie was so excited to go to the shower, I kept saying it was just going to be adults but she didn't care.  Then I found out Gnome and Juliet was coming out and they could all go see it during the shower, I thought for sure that would get her wanting to not go to the shower.  Nope she was determined she was going.  Well then on the way there, she says "So Cooper is coming today!"   I tell her "No, this is just for Charlene"  she says "It's a BABY shower!"  I felt so bad she was just sure that Cooper was going to be there.  She was still SO good and a really big helper, she had to make Charlene a card by herself.  She would not let me help at all, she got glue, ribbons, jewels, drew hearts and flowers, it was the cutest thing ever.  I love how big she is getting :)

Grandma and Grandpa Cluver come to visit

We had a great visit with Grandma and Grandpa Cluver to start the year off.  They came for a lot longer this time so everyone got to spend time with them and get to know them a little better.  I thought it would take Kaylee a while to get used to them, but nope she went right to both of them which was nice to see.  We didn't do a ton of different things while they were there but we had a good time.  We of course went to Chuck E Cheese, the park a little, we went to the Build N Grow at Lowes, and ate lots of ice cream.  We went out to eat a few times and we made Tommy eat a few things around the house.  Not sure he liked a few of them, but I have never had such great reviews on my chicken EVER.  A few days later he was still talking about it so I know what we will be making when he comes down again!  Mainly we just had a great time hanging out together and letting the kids play with them.  Watching Brock and Grandpa play the Wii together is always one of the highlights of their trips and don't worry it was again this time : Oh and I forgot, Brayden's hockey tickets that he won for selling over $600 worth of popcorn was while they were here.  So I got tickets for Grandpa and Brock to go with them and they had a great time.  I took NO pictures while they were here or they are not on the computer yet so this was really the only one I had.