the birthday that never ends...

Kara's birthday lasted the entire month of July... while in California, we celebrated again at Chuck E. Cheese's. Here are some pics from that night:

In the car on the way:
















Brooke's favorite part - the spycams:















The whole gang, eating:
















Jeff copying the smile of the creepy artwork on the wall:















Aunt Ali & Norah:
















Brooke:



















Grandpa:



















All of this wore Norah right out:

Visiting with our baby cousin

The girls enjoyed spending so much time with family this past week including their baby cousin, Norah, Aunts Kari, Katie, Alisa, Uncle Alex, Grandma and Grandpa!

(Sorry I did not get pics of everyone!)

Fun at the beach

We spent an afternoon at the beach... it was like pulling teeth to get Kara out of there, she's ready to buy a house on the beach right now! The water was nice, and other than a spray-sunscreen mishap that felt like mace to the eyes, we all had a really good time! :)


So happy to be at the beach:















Brooke trying to catch seagulls:














Looking for shells:
















Testing the water:
















Looking for the best wave to bodysurf on:
















Brookie in her sandpit:

Amber's trip to California

We spent the last week in California, and this time Amber got to come with us!

Here she is in the car... she was a pretty good traveler.




















She made a new friend - little cousin Norah:
















She was a good puppy and didn't take anything that wasn't given to her. She didn't disturb anything in the house, and generally left people alone (except Jeff) while they were eating. Grandma made her a little perch to lay on near the window (which turned into her favorite spot by the time we left). Here she is having fun exploring Grandpa & Grandma's back yard:

Staples!!!

Staples is having a back to school sale this week with a few items as low as $0.01! I paid less than $8 and got the following:

2 packs of erasers, 2 bottles of glue, 8 glue sticks, 2 pkgs of 8 pens, 2 pkgs 5 mechanical pencils, 1 pkg of 5 sharpie markers, 2 pkgs of stickies tabs (I LOVE these for studying and marking in my textbooks), 2 clear plastic folders, 2 reams of white paper, and 2 pkgs of 50 pgs of photo paper! Total would have been $58.77... I saved appx $51! There were other items on sale, but I stuck to only things that I use and would buy for school even if they weren't on sale.

A picture of my items:


















and in a sad note, my camera is broken. :( hopefully it's a simple issue and will be fixed when we go to California in a couple of weeks!

Kara is 11!

And she is having a great birthday!

She started the day by playing video games, then out to lunch of her choice. A little shopping and running errands, then back home and she's playing a new wii game.

Later it's either bowling or antigravity (trampoline arena) - she hasn't decided yet.

4th of July - part 3: the fireworks (at home)

Living in Utah gives us the opportunity for many days of fireworks (the law lets us light fireworks for 3 days prior to July 4th and 3 days after). We bought a large multi-pack from the store which gave us plenty for two nights worth of fireworks (plenty for us to enjoy).

Here are some pictures of both nights combined:

Playing with the pop-its:

















Sparkler fun (waiting for it to be dark enough for fireworks):











































































































This year we let the girls each take turns lighting the fireworks under Jeff's supervision. Here are pictures of the first time each of them lit a firework:











































Enjoying the show:







































Some of our fireworks (I won't bore you with all of the pictures of them):