Sydni's Birthday

For Syd's birthday we headed up to This is the Place state park. It was a surprise for her. I'm not sure if she was excited at first, but it ended up a hit. The kids got to ride a horse, pet the animals, go on a train ride, make butter, learn the Virginia Real (This was my favorite part. All the kids dressed up and learned a dance. 9 kids 8 and under all learning to dance!), ride in the wagon, have a tea party and make a candle. It was a lot of fun and the kids were entertained for 3 hours! The best part was at the end of the party the ladies who did the party gave Syd a pioneer bonnet. She looked so cute! Now she has two.

Happy Birthday Syd!

Sydni loved to dress up from very early. Her great grandma made her this beautiful princess dress for her third birthday. She wore it out. I'm sad because it no longer looks like this but I know how much it was loved!

From the time around 3 years old until she was about 5 Syd would only wear a dress. The dress she's wearing in the picture is the dress I wore after my baptism. She loved it! My mom gave it to me and Syd found it. Isn't it funny the things kids play with.

Syd and Gabby had many fun days dressing up! Oh I miss these days.

Happy Birthday Sydni!

I know everyone says time goes too fast but with kids I think this is especially true. Syd was born on a hot summer day. It was a very long day. She made her grand entrance around 11:30 p.m. on June 20, 2000. What a lucky girl to have her birthday on the longest day of the year. Syd was a fun baby. She could throw a fit like no other baby I've ever seen. One memory Ken often shares of Sydni has to do with a long car ride home from Bear Lake where she screamed the entire time. Sydni hated the car. Looking back maybe we're lucky she got it all out at such a young age. She is pretty even tempered now.

Syd loves to laugh. She has a great laugh when she gets going. She loves to be silly. When she was 18 months old she would hold her breath, clench her fists and her teeth until she was bright red and shaking. She soon learned that people thought this was pretty funny so she would show off her trick just to make people laugh.

Happy Birthday Syd. I love you and hope you have many more great birthdays!

We're Back

After spending 11 hours in the Atlanta airport with these two crazies we made it to Tennessee for a summer visit!

Sharon, Me and Owen watching Coopers game


Mabel and Jonah watching the game
Thursday and Friday we were able to go to Coopers baseball games. It was fun to watch. The kids had a great time. Owen decided he wants to try it out this fall.

Jonah showing his new nails

Sydni taking care of the boys
I was a little worried about Sydni because she was the only girl there with 4 boys. I was wrong. She entertained those boys all week. There were manicures, pedicures and make-up for everyone. Cooper had his toes painted a lovely shade of pink which was alright until we went out to the water park and he had to take off his shoes!

On Sunday afternoon I took the kids for a walk. At the top of the street we found a field of goats. The kids were thrilled. Luckily the girl who lived at the farm with the goats was out and told the kids they could pet them. She told them the names of the goats and which ones were nice and which ones to watch out for. They loved it.

Owen got butted a little by one of them through the fence!

The kids picked grass to feed to them through the fence.

The girl told the kids the goats would chew their hands because they liked the salt on their skin. Annabelle loved to chew on them. They found one named Dorothy who was the youngest and really sweet.

We did a lot of shopping. More than I've done in a while. Sharon took us to downtown Knoxville on Monday. We started out at the General Store. The kids had a blast. Owen and Bryson found red cowboy hats and stick horses and road around the store calling each other "partner". I'm sure all the employees were sad to see us leave!



A little cafe had hoola hoops for the kids to play with.

The Sun Sphere

Us at the top of the Sun Sphere. It over looks the Tennessee River and The University of Tennessee.

Bryson, Jonah, Sydni and Owen at the water fountains at the Worlds Fair Park

Cooper, Jonah, Mabel, Bryson, Owen, Sydni

The Knoxville Zoo.

They have a beautiful Zoo. This was Owen's favorite day. We spent the whole day at the zoo. We packed a picnic and bought a few souvenirs.



These are pictures of the kids holding Giant Hissing Cockroaches from Madagascar. The girl said they are very sweet and make great pets! (and she was serious)

After the zoo we went for ice cream. Sydni decided to get a little banana split!

Cooper, Sydni, Owen and Jonah

Bryson, Owen, Me, Sharon, Mable, Todd, Cooper and Jonah.

Sydni grabbed my camera and took some pictures at dinner one night. I'm glad she did because this is the only picture I have of all of us.

Sorry it's been a while...

Sorry to the few of you that actually look at my blog. Please don't go away. I know I haven't kept up very well but hopefully you will enjoy these few posts. It's been a busy few weeks. I'm still working on my room. There's not much new to see yet. We ran all new electrical, put in a sliding door and new studs. It's almost sheet rocked but not quite done yet. So I'll put up some new pictures when it's a little more exciting to see. In the mean time enjoy these........

Carnival

I am probably cheating a little bit by not letting Kirstie post these pictures, but they are too cute. On Friday we went to Henry's school carnival. It was so much fun and the weather was perfect. Each grade puts on a dance for everyone to watch. This is the second grade. Can you spot the cutest 2nd grader out there?

Birthday Boy!

Friday I got to take Kirstie's kids and my kids to the store while she and Jeff set up for the carnival. We went to Target to pick out Frankie's Birthday present. He went right over to the ball rack and choose a big pink ball. Perfect! We just had to keep the ball in the basket because 5 kids and a large ball in Target may not amuse some people, if you know what I mean. Then he found a bin with rubber creatures in it. He looked through for some time and then showed me a black and red rubber snake. He said, "Look at his sharp teeth. He has two of them. Can I get it?" Well, how do you say no to that? Soooo now we have a large bouncy ball and a long rubber snake which doubles as a whip! What a great aunt am I? To top it all off.......a box of side walk chalk.

Awards Assembly

Monday afternoon we went over to Sydni's awards assembly. It was fun to see all the kids get their awards for the year. Syd got her awards but my favorite was the chess tournament award. She tied for 5th place. Not too bad. She got a little medal and was pretty proud of herself. She has worked hard all year ong learning how to play, what all the pieces are worth and how they can move. She has had a great year with an amazing teacher. I couldn't have chosen a better teacher. She just can't leave until after Owen's through 2nd grade. I can't believe another school year has come and gone. Next year both my kids will be in school all day long. (This makes me feel a little old)