Celebrating Cirdan, Kaiya and My Dad's Birthdays. Kaiya Turns double digits!

Birthdays! When we got home I only had a couple days to prepare for Cirdan and Kaiya's birthday. Ella, Jett and I did some shopping and got everything we needed. The birthday people both woke up to balloons. Kaiya got a donut for her birthday breakfast. Before Kaiya went to school I let her open a couple of presents. One of the top things she wanted was dangle earrings. I have held off on letting her wear any so I told her that she could when she turned 10. Not crazy dangle ones...just the cute dangle earrings.

Putting on her new earrings

Kaiya went to school and Cirdan stayed home. His friend was over installing new closet organizers for the closets upstairs. We gave him a couple of gifts...which he is going to return. That boy is picky! Then the kids and I went to Starbucks to get Cirdan breakfast. We also went to pick up his ice cream cake and get him and David (his friend) some lunch at Subway.

When Kaiya got home she opened the rest of gifts from us. Her birthday fell on a Thursday which is her long day at dance (4:30-9:00) so she had to hurry.

Kaiya requested a fruit truffle from my mom. She just enough time for us to sing to her and to eat some.

The birthdays went in stages. Kaiya had her cake 1st. Then we had Greg and Staci over for an Applebees takeout dinner and some ice cream cake.

Lastly, my mom and dad stopped by around 9:00 pm so we could sing to Papa.

The birthday kids! (minus the guy in the back, ha ha)

It was a fun filled day of sweets and birthday celebrations! Happy Birthday!

Going Home

We headed home on Sunday morning. We didn't need to be back to Washington until Tuesday for Kaiya to be at school (MSP) and dance. So we took our time. We packed up the car and stopped off at Cirdan's aunt and uncles house to say a quick goodbye and see his cousins that we weren't able to see the week before.

Each time we were in our hotel the kids loved playing with the 2 phones. One was in the room right when you come in and the other phone was next to the bed. They spent a majority of the time on the phone with each other playing house.

Our hotel room was nice and had a kitchen.

All loaded up and ready for the long drive ahead! At this point I was really ready to throw Kaiya's glasses out the window. :)

Our quick stop to see the relatives.

The plan was to stay in Boise again. However, once we started driving we figured we should drive a little farther than Boise and make the drive on Monday shorter. We also wanted to stop in Imbler, Oregon which was on the other side of the Blue Mountains. Unfortunately we wanted to get as far as we could so we ended up in Pendleton for the night. Which was past Imbler. Next time!!! I really thought it would be fun to see all the Imbler stuff around town. The drive wasn't as bad as Cirdan thought it would be so I am hoping for more drives to Utah in the near future.

Utah - Temple Square

On Friday we met Cirdan's Grandma, Aunt and Uncle for lunch. It was great to see his Aunt and Uncle again and it was a nice lunch. Kinda crazy in the restaurant with 3 kids but everyone survived. The girls enjoyed meeting Grandpas brother.

We then headed to Salt Lake to walk around Temple Square. We started at the visitor center. The kids had fun at first then got a little bored. While Cirdan and Ella went to the bathroom I started talking to a couple of the sister missionaries. They were both from different countries. One from Austria and Tonga. They were really nice. They mentioned that across the street there was a building with some things for the kids to do. I had no idea where they were talking about and they were more than willing to walk over there and show us. I am glad we ran into them and got talking because we always just go to the visitor center and you can only do that so many times. I am glad to know there are other cool things around. Made me wonder how many other things we were missing! Ha ha

The building was the Church History Museum. I would have never thought about going in the building. Pretty cool stuff in there!

Downstairs was filled with pictures kids around the world had drawn. It was really interesting and neat to see the ages and countries the kids were from. A lot of the pictures were super good! Kaiya was amazed.

Here is one  up close that was amazing. A 10 year old from Taiwan drew it.

There was a little station where Ella and Kaiya could draw a picture and it would show up on a tv screen playing drawings the kids made.

We went up a couple of floors where there there was an area with a lot of kids activities. One was this boat they could play in. Jett liked to fish with Cirdan.

There was an area the kids could dreess up in Mexican dance clothes and there were a couple of tv's showing them how to do a Mexican dance.

Wood blocks of vegetables the kids could pretend to plant

I need to get some of these for our house. After I get rid of the other millions of toys the kids have...

Ella absolutely loved playing with these dolls. There was little outfits that you put on them. We had to pull her away from this to leave.

I need to get this picture blown up to put on her bedroom wall...

Outside the Conference Center. Jett loved watching the water.

State Capital

The plan was to go to University of Utah with Kaylee after she got out of her meeting. We waited but then found out she went to Orem to do some last minute wedding stuff. So, we went back to our hotel. Cirdan ended up taking the kids to the pool to swim.

Kaylee and Rusty Get Married

Kaylee got married around 1:00 or 2:00 (I can't remember) so we had some time in the morning to relax and get ready. We headed to the Salt Lake temple and waited outside for them to come out. The weather was nice...no rain...but it was windy with a cold chill. The girls did good waiting. Jett got a little impatient after the first 30-45 minutes.

Run, run, run!

Those pink heels + a pregnant lady = not a good combo.

Here they are! Married!

My parents with the happy couple.

His parents...

Gram...

The Eads family drove from California to be there...

Here are some pictures from the reception. Kaylee did well pulling everything together for the reception in Utah. It looked beautiful!

My happy Jetty

They served fondue. I was so busy with the kids and visiting with all the people that we knew from the past that came to the reception that I didn't even try it. I am still bummed. :) I heard it was yummy.

Caught in the act.

I think the last time they saw each other was Nate and Amy's wedding? This is my friend Sonnet's daughter. Sonnet and I have been friends since 4th grade. They live in Utah now. It's wonderful that Kaiya and Averie can just pick up and play together like they saw each other last week.

Kaiya and Noelle Eads

Troublemakers

Friends since 4th grade. It was awesome seeing them and spending some time together!! I miss these girls!

These University of Utah kids got their car decorated with BYU colors.