Kiersten's actual birthday was on Sunday so I thought it would be fun to make a new dessert and let her blow out candles one more time. Everyone loves to blow out candles I don't can how old you are.............it's a fun thing! I made this Chocolate Dipped Strawberry Pie! YUMMY!
The kids loved the sparkler candles and they all wanted a turn to blow out the candles. So they each got two turns and we sang Happy Birthday to each of them and let them blow out the candles.
We are a Rockin' Family! I just love parties with a theme and I had so much fun planning Kiersten's party. I had a lot of help from friends and family. Thanks Donelle for your ideas I stole! Everything turned out so fun and Kiersten LOVED it all so thats what really counts.
We all had some kind of Rock-n-Roll shirts on. Logan just loved his shirt and even wanted to wear it the next day!
ROCK OUT LOGAN!
We're a pretty Rockin' couple i'd say!
Everyone walked on the red carpet as they entered the party!
Each kids had their own star with their name on it. Kiersten and Hunter really liked this part.
All the kids loved decorating their own guitars that Grandpa Boswell (Grandpa with the kitties, as my kids call him) made. My wonderful dad made 18 wooden guitars for Kiersten's party............a BIG THANKS to him for that. He's so talented!
Maliya got some help from her mom with hers!
Logan loved putting on the stickers HIMSELF! He kept saying, "I do it, I do it."
Cambry showing off her awesome guitar. She was quite the ham while RoCkInG oUt!
Kiersten stopped decorating to pose for a picture......she's defianetly been trained!
Crazy Kiersten's Canaries went down to their "recording studio" in our basement and ROCKED OUT! They practiced their moves to "I Love Rock-n-Roll!"
Justin was the band leader and really showed the kids how to Rock Out! He was hilarious to watch. He doesn't mess around with a fake guitar. He said, "Just think what I could do with a real guitar!"
Kiersten, Kaely and Maranda had a Blast practicing their rock moves. Tif was the choreographer and she did an awesome job! Thanks Tif!
Isn't Logan stinkin' adorable with his Mohawk? He really Rocked Out! He followed one of the kids moves and got down on his knees to play some air guitar!
After their practice in the "recording studio," the band performed for parents and grandparents. The kids really got into it and it was so fun to watch!
What a SWEET cake! Kiersten turned 7 and had a "Party Like a Rock Star" themed party. Isn't this cake too cool? What a mom huh? Actually I have a friend, Debbie Green, who makes all my kids cakes and I in return take her family and kids pictures. Works out great for both of us. She gets nice pictures and I get very creative homemade cakes without the hassle! Thanks Debbie for another wonderful cake! Everyone at the party commented on how cool it was. Debbie is so creative I love it!
Look at the little stage and pretzel people rocking out! Kiersten LOVED her cake!
Look at our little Rock Star Diva!
This Hannah Montana outfit was one of Kiersten's presents but she got to wear it to her party. She was a bit excited and asked me about every 5 minutes how many more hours until her party would start. I love seeing her this excited! Kiersten even bought these Hannah Montana ear rings to go with her outfit, when she went with her Grandma Cluff on her sleepover. Justin's mom is such a fun grandma, my kids are so luck to have her (we ALL are)! Grandma Cluff (Grandma with the dogs as my kids call her), lets the kids have a birthday sleepover once they turn 3. She takes them out to dinner, to the dollar store or Walmart once they get older and lets them spend as many dollars as they are old, they rent a couple of movie and have a great time sleeping over! My kids look forward to this tradition so much! Thanks for being so fun Mom!
Justin came home early (6:00 p.m.) on Thursday and surprised us! He brought the skidster home to "pull weeds Justin style." The boys were so excited! And I mean Hunter, Logan and JUSTIN!
Aren't they so cute in the tractor as Logan calls it. Hunter kept telling him, "No Logan it's a SKIDSTER!!!" What was suppose to be a fun evening turn out a bit scary.................... 
What we thought was going to be a nice evening of bonding with Dad, turned out to be a scary accident. Hunter was sitting on Justin's lap in the skidster. Well he put his feet up where he shouldn't of and they got pinned by the hydraulic bucket. Justin had to raise the bucket to get Hunter's feet out. Hunter was in an extreme amount of pain and Justin was in shock! So I took Hunter and Logan and we headed to the ER (Kiersten wasn't home), I called who else but my mom and she met me at the ER to get Logan from me. Justin just felt horrible and needed time by himself. After hours in the ER, Hunter had no broken bones, a possible fracture and bad bruising. It's a miracle that's all that was wrong. Seriously! 
See how it bent Hunter's boots up and these are some thick souls.
Hunter wouldn't put any weight on his foot. I either carry him or he crawls. Poor little guy! I went and got an umbrella stroller so I can push him around the house instead of caring him. He's a heavy guy! So from Thursday evening (the night of the accident) until Saturday evening Hunter wouldn't walk on his foot at all. Both his feet were pinned but the left one took most of the pressure. About 30 minutes before Kiersten's party on Saturday Hunter said "I think I can walk now." Sure enough he started walking slowly and is doing much better now. What an answer to our prayers! We have a follow up appointment with Dr. Bryce the orthopedic surgeon tomorrow, but I think everything is just fine!
Monday, August 11th was Kiersten's first day of second grade. We decided to put her in a Charter School this year. It's called Discovery Plus Academy. It's K-6 and it's just right up the road from our house which makes it really nice. Kiersten is loving it so far!!! Her teacher is Mrs. Skinner and Kiersten already feels so comfortable in her class. Kiersten came home from school the first day and told me that she's not scared this year, so that made me happy. There are only 16 kids in her class and along with Mrs. Skinner there is two aides, four hours a day. What a great ratio that is huh? I am excited to be a part of this school.............I hope we continue to love it as much as we do so far! Kiersten was very excited when she found out that she won't have school on Fridays. I am looking forward to this as well! It will be nice to have my kids home on Fridays, but not the whole neighborhood. We are the only ones in our subdivision that go there. Kiersten was so ecstatic about the strings program the school offers. You can elect to join the orchestra and play either the fiddle or the violin. Kiersten is going to play the violin...............she wants to get a pink one! She will go to strings everyday for 40 minutes (during school). Each grade goes at a different time to Strings. In her class there are only 7 kids that go. She already passed memorizing all the parts of the violin and bow. She was the only one in her class that knew them all. She was so excited! I am excited to see the growth in Kiersten! She is very smart and does extremely well in school!
Hunter started preschool on Tuesday, August 12th @ Brighter Day Preschool. This is the preschool through the school district here in Pima. Hunter was so excited to go and came home even happier. He said his teacher was the best teacher in the world! Before we knew who his teacher was, we were standing in the office waiting to find out and we overheard several moms talking to each other saying who their kids had. Everyone said the Mrs. D'Anne was the best and how much everyone loved her. I was happy to find out that's who Hunter has! YEAH!! It's only been a week and he already likes it more then the preschool at Dorthy Stinson. Hunter did like that preschool the first year when Mrs. Tony was there, but when she left he really didn't like it much. I am so excited for Hunter to love his preschool. His speech is improving so much and it's going to be sad when he doesn't have his " Hunter Accent!"
One nice thing about Hunter's preschool is that they pick him up and drop him off. I love it! He likes riding the bus too. He has his bus buddies and he is set! Kiersten has to be picked up because there is no buses at her school. It's no big deal for me because we live like 2 minutes away. 
We Had A BLAST At Legoland, CA! Our kids were the perfect age to go, the lines were short and the weather was perfect.............what more could you ask for? One of my favorite things about having kids and a family is making good memories!
Hunter and the Legoland worker riding together. One great thing about Legoland is that if you have a child that is tall enough to ride the ride, but isn't tall enough to go by themselves they have a worker ride with your child. This really made it nice for us.
This pirate guy was so funny. Him and Logan must speak the same language because they carried on quite the conversation.
One thing we absolutely LOVED about Legoland was all the fun play areas where the kids could just play and not wait in a line. They have water play areas and this giant play ground, so fun for the kids!
We are blown away by the Lego replicas that they've made here. This is down town NY, all made out of Lego's. It was so cool and the details were amazing!
There was a little boat ride that took you to different replicas they've made. The ride itself was a little lame but the Lego stuff was sweet!
This was a fun ride the kids liked it especially. You whip in and out, but you get to control it, so that part was cool. You get a little wet because over to the side there is a place where people walking by can push buttons to make water squirt up. So if you get that one annoying little kid standing there while you're on the ride, pushing the button every time you go by, you get even more wet. There is a little boy with red hair, a blue shirt and swimming shorts on, that I would of love to have found once I was off the ride :) It's probably better I never found him! (I was watching for him thought)
Kiersten was at AWE with all the stuff made out of Lego's. She said, "I can't even make things out of Lego's when I have the instructions!"
SUCH A FUN PLACE!
Hunter courageously fighting Darth Vader. Looks like your causal pose but oh no there was a battle that had taken place believe me!
Kiersten just had to charm Darth Vader and he was a goner.
Logan was so happy to have his turn fighting Darth Vader. It was so cute when Logan said, "Mommy he BIG!" I seriously think Logan thought this was real! It was funny. Logan kept saying, "he no get me, he no get me."
The family on our last night at Legoland :( And yes Hunter is giving himself bunny ears! Logan looks a bit scared?
We LOVED this boat ride. You can steer the boat yourself and the kids thought that was awesome.............so did I. I acted like I was confused and Kiersten and I turned the boat around and went back up the stream, it was so fun.
Looks like Hunter has devil horns from my hand.........some days it would be fitting! We went on this ride many times because the lines were so short and well we loved it! We got luck and the ride broke right after they let Justin go, so they told us to take our time because it would be awhile before it was fixed. Justin, Hunter and Logan were in one boat and Kiersten and I were in another. We kept going up and down the paths, everyone else had got in the line to return the boats because they didn't know the ride had broke. It was broke for a good 15 minutes, which made for some fun time for our family...............we were the only two boats out cruising around that whole time! Seriously FUN!
Wow what a fierce looking bunch! Such Warriors!
Logan LOOOOOOOOOOVES Thomas the Train! He loves anything and everything to do with trains. He was so excited to get his picture with Thomas! Kiersten must not have been as excited because she said "Is this picture for Logan or what!"
Hunter enjoyed driving the little cars and especially loved getting the "real" drivers licence. He did say he likes the quad better cause it goes faster. Our kids are so use to the dunes, that slow rides really don't excite them much.
Logan is a Pro at driving! He was better then most of the 5 year olds out there. He drives the putt-putts (power wheels trucks) at home everyday so this track was a walk in the park!
Kiersten was on the big kids track and loved it. Of course she really was trying to obey the traffic rules that they went over before they started and several of the kids where trying hard to NOT obey any rules. Needless to say she got bumped a few times. When she was done she said, "Mom was I the only one out there following the rules..............crazy people!" I explained to her that California people aren't known for being the best drivers!
Hunter just asked me if I would add a picture of his sand crabs...........see even almost a month later and he still remembers how much fun he thought they were. He is ALL BOY! So here is Hunter with a few of the MANY sand crabs he found while at Mission Beach!
We all had a great time at Mission Beach!
The kids sure enjoyed playing in the sand. They could do this everyday I think! I would love to live near the ocean someday, probably won't happen but it's a very nice dream of mine! 
Kiersten really surprised us this year. She wasn't afraid of the big waves at all! It kind of made me scared because she was so brave and would get out clear up to her neck. She even got knocked down hard by the waves several times, but she said she just loved it. She would just get back up and go back out in the water. It was fun watching her having so much fun and exploring the beauty of the ocean!
Hunter is such a fun kids, he is a character for sure. His favorite part about Mission Beach was finding all the sand crabs. Him and a little boy we met from Gilbert, found tons of sand crabs. It's just pure fun watching your kids explore new things, seeing the excitement in their faces and listening to them explain things the way they saw it! Priceless!
Logan was a bit shocked the first time he fell down from the waves! His faces tells it all! Every time I look at this picture I smile and laugh. I love pictures that do that for you.
The kids and I were practicing our surfing moves. I was surprised how hard surfing actually was. Last year Justin and I went on a cruise around the Hawaiian Islands and we took surfing lessons. It was harder that I ever thought it would be. I got up several times but had way more wipe outs! 
I Love Beach Pictures! I would love to have a really nice picture of our family on the beach. 
The kids loved playing in the waves at Missions Beach. Justin and I realized that it was much more work with the waves then the beach at Campland.
This was about all the boogie boarding our kids did, but they thought is was so fun! Justin and I were lazy this year, neither of us got out and boogie boarded. We usually love to do that. Maybe next beach trip!
Logan and Daddy! This little boy LOVES his Daddy! It's so fun to watch them together, you can just see how much they adore each other.
