The big 29! Birthday weekend.

On the 28th of November I celebrated my 29th birthday. Since it was Black Friday it was a perfect day to have a birthday...the biggest shopping day of the year...my favorite "sport"! That is my kind of birthday!

Cirdan woke up and went shopping around 4:30 in the morning so I woke up to him texting me every 20 minutes letting me know how many people were at the stores. He came home with some fun gifts a few hours later. I had a nice relaxing morning, got ready for the day and decided to go out and see for myself all the people shopping. We had some lunch at a yummy Thai food restaurant and then went to Costco (my new favorite store). Cirdan had arranged for my sister to watch the girls that night so just the 2 of us could go to dinner and see a movie. The movie was good and it was nice to have a night out with just Cirdan.

The card and gift Kaiya gave me...

Saturday morning we woke up and the plan was to decorate the house for Christmas. Cirdan went and got some Starbucks for us and an hour later he finally made it home with some surprises for me...

Sunday night we went to my parents house for a Lasagna birthday dinner and some cake.

I blew out the candles...

And all but one was blown out...

So they re lit the cake and I tried again...

And once again all but one was blown out....

Maybe I am really supposed to be turning 28!!

Random picture of Nathan... :)

Thanksgiving

I love Thanksgiving. It's my favorite holiday. I love getting together as a family and eating my most favorite meal in the world...turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy. YUM. This year we had a small dinner at my parents house. Nate and Amy were in Utah so it was just Cirdan, Kaiya, Ella, me, Kaylee, Stacey, Casey and my parents. After dinner we drove to my Grandma's house where some extended family were playing volleyball at the church across the street. I couldn't play because of the shoes I had on but I had fun watching Cirdan, Stacey and my mom. I was impressed!! :)

Ham

Kaylee's mound of mashed potatoes

Where is Ella's other shoe??

In Casey's mouth!!

Gotta check out the ads for after Thanksgiving sales!


After volleyball we went to my Grandma's for some delicious pie.

Stacie's shower

Saturday I went to Stacie's baby shower at Sarah's house. She is having a baby girl and is due December 15th. The shower was very nice and Stacie got a whole lot of pink. I cant wait to meet her little baby girl Mazie.

Steph made the diaper cake...

Hangin' Tough

Besides giving birth to my 2 beautiful daughters and marrying my wonderful husband, Cirdan, I had one of the best nights of my life. This had been a long time coming. When I was in 5th grade I was in LOVE with New Kids on the Block and I mean IN LOVE. I had a pillowcase, t-shirt, posters, folders for school, key chains, bracelets, backpacks, you name it. I was never fortunate enough to be able to go to a concert...until now. Took me about 18 years but I finally made it.

Sarah, Stacie, Stephanie, Emily (who drove up from Portland), Lael and I packed into Stacies SUV last Saturday night and headed to Tacoma. After stopping to get something to eat at Fatburger we were on our way.

The first thing we did when we got to the stadium was wait in the line for NKOTB t-shirts. Sarah, Stacie, Steph and I had to get matching tees. We rushed to the bathroom to put on our new shirts and headed to our seats.

Not quite sure what the weirdo girl was doing behind us...

The first act was Lady Ga Ga. I really liked her and thought she brought good energy to the show.


The second act was Natasha Beddingfield.

THEN came The New Kids.

At one point they showed up in the middle of everyone which happened to be right in front of us.

It was funny to me that most all the girls there were married women my age. All of us were screaming like little girls.

We saw a lot of fan t-shirts...

The 2 pregos...

Thank you Steph, Stacie, Sarah, Emily and Lael for such a fun night!

My Nanny Boo is growing up so fast

I received a walker from a co worker friend and I brought it home for Ella to try. She is crawling around, pulling herself up on furniture and getting into everything. She loves the walker! I really think she is going to be walking very soon. She has such a desire to be a big girl like her older sister.

There she goes!

Good times...

My friend Robin was in town from Utah this past week. It is so nice to see her and her cute little kids. We were such good friends and I have really fun memories of our teenage years.

Robin...Do you remember?

EFY

Housekeeping

Airplane

Oh my gosh that guy is cute...ummm isnt that your brother?

Clint

Happy Birthday lil bro!

Yesterday was my brother's birthday. Amy took him on a scavenger hunt during the day and the rest of the family met at my parents house last night to surprise him. We sang happy birthday, had some cake and hung out. I cant believe he is 27! It makes me feel old.
Nathan lighting his own candles??




Kaiya gave Nate a picture of him playing the piano.


Amy giving Nate his well deserved birthday spanks

Nate and Amy had chinese food for a birthday dinner. The fortune said...A Pleasant Surprise Is In Store For You.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NATHAN!!!!!

Baby showers are a lot of work!

My friend Kristel is pregnant with her 5th baby and she has NEVER had a baby shower! She has always moved right before she had a baby or right after. After she told me that, I HAD to throw her a baby shower. I invited all the women in the ward. Kristel was making me nervous that no one would show up :). I planned for around 25 which was perfect because there was about 22 people that came! The shower went well and everyone seemed to have fun. I am not sure if I will do that again because it was really stressful especially with me working full time...but it was definately worth it! I am lucky enough to have a wonderful husband who helped sooo much with the preparations and my mom helped me the day of the shower. Everything came together perfectly.

Election Day

Tuesday morninng when I was getting ready for work Kaiya came into my bathroom and I said, "Do you know what today is?" she said, "the day I vote for McCain!". She was so excited to vote and has been talking about it for the past few weeks. I instantly got worried since she is 6 and cant vote. I let it go and thought that I would figure something out by the end of the day.

I guess she was talking about her class at school voting?? I think I got lucky.

Kaiya walked out of her classroom on Tuesday with a sad face. Cirdan asked her what was wrong. She started tearing up and said that 18 kids in her class voted for Obama and 8 kids in the class that voted McCain. Sad...


One more thing...
Kaiya informed Cirdan yesterday that when she grows up she is going to be a detective. If that doesnt work out though she is going to work at Starbucks and if THAT doesnt work she will work at McDonalds.

I think we need to have a talk...

A Special Award

I received a letter from the school saying that Kaiya was receiving the P.R.I.D.E award. This award honors students who exemplify any of these particular character traits...

P - Positive Attitude

R - Respectability

I - Integrity

D - Dependability

E - Effort

The letter also said this is quite and honor so dont tell your child you receive this...lets keep it a secret.

Cirdan, Me, Ella, Meema, Papa, Stacey, Casey, Kaiya's dad and his co worker were all there to watch her receive her award. She ended up receiving an award for the letter P.

Now for the funny part - this award ceremony was last Friday at school. The Kindergartners and 1st graders were still in their costumes. She was sitting in the front row with all the kids in the school in the gymnasium. They called her name and she just sat there. A couple of people (including Cirdan) yelled, "Kaiya, stand up" and her teacher got up to tell her to walk up and accept her award. After the ceremony she came in the back to where we were and she had no idea what the award was for. She later said that when her name was called she was so hoping there was another Kaiya Arvayo and once she saw her teacher walking towards her she was thinking...oh great...