our favorite birthday guy.

happy birthday to our favorite guy!!! we started the morning off right with strawberry shortcakes for breakfast. followed by a hike an picnic up little cottonwood canyon in the albion basin. we hiked to cecret lake and had our picnic. connor has been dying to fish any chance he can, so we took a couple poles up just in case. turns out there aren't fish up there, but there are some pretty ugly prehistoric looking salamander larvae. the kids {and cory} had a fun time trying to catch them. luckily we brought a net and were able to successfully catch 3 of them. the flowers throughout the basin were in full bloom and so, so pretty. 

we came home and had the birthday boy's requested steak fajitas for dinner. then off to football practice.

on the way down the lake, this little miss climbed up on some rocks and shouted, "i'm the kind of the world" only to then topple down the rocks in her efforts to get down. :( she cried a bit, said her arm hurt, but complained mostly about her bruised legs. when we got home, we iced her elbow and didn't think much more of it. then at football practice, she was running around and moving everything except her right arm just hung there. she came unglued if i moved it at all. so, we decided to take her to the instacare that night and were grateful we did. turns out she broke her humorus. :( poor girl is such a trooper and has such a high pain tolerance!!

all in all it was a pretty great day for cory...

...minus the broken arm thing...

miss else.

our sweet elsie turned four last week. she brings such a joy and life to our home. she is our free spirit who loves life, wearing pajamas, her buggy blankies, yellow, polka dots, having her hair down, the zoo, playing with her sissy and ruff housing with her bros.  

for her fourth birthday celebration she requested we go to javier's for dinner so she could order her favorite, rice & beans. she even was spoiled with a birthday song and fried ice cream. thursday we went to the zoo with cousins, a few days before the big day because of baseball games. luckily we were watching 4 cousins for a few days and so that made elsie's bday even more special. we got to see the new safari park at the zoo. and...best part of elsie's birthday zoo trip was the train is working again!! wahoo! 

on her birthday she requested blueberry muffins for breakfast, which she doesn't really eat, just the sugared muffin top, mini corn dogs for lunch, and waffles for dinner. we went to 2 baseball games that connor said he won for elsie. after dinner we had water world with cousins. she requested an umizoomi cake, which we accomplished by printing off umizoomi pinwheels and putting them on top of the cake. i made her favorite, carrot cake, which is almost all of the siblings cake of choice. 

for presents she got a suitcase, 2 new buggy blankies and a skirt. she was also spoiled with presents from grandmas & grandpas, aunts & uncles and cousins. it was a great day indeed. 

elsie, we sure do love you!

our brown-eyed birthday girl.

our beautiful mabel turned 6 yesterday. crazy to believe that my baby girl is now 6!! she's so grown up and the best helper and many times seems older than 6. she is such a great sister and friend to everyone around her. she loves meeting new friends. everywhere we go, she meets someone new. the park, baseball games, school, wherever. she is so very smart. she's improved so much on reading this year and loves to read to others. mabel is a great organizer and helper around the house. many times she's the first one done with her jobs and helps the others with theirs. and sometimes she surprises us with making our bed or connor or elsie's bed. we love our miss mae!

she asked to have a friend party this year, and since i put it off last year and told her this year would be the year, i had to agree. it was so very fun to plan though and was a fun princess party with the cutest princesses ever! mabel just wanted to play games and that was easy enough to plan. so we played pin the crown on the princess, musical thrones, princess bingo, opened presents, and had a treasure hunt that led to cake and ice cream. very fun indeed.

the invites. attached to a pink polkadot balloon.

off to deliver the invites.

the birthday girl with her princess cake.

the spread.

playing musical thrones to "let it go". 

cutest girls belting out all the words with hand actions and all.

a group shot of all the princesses with their must have princess crowns/party hats.

it's official. will is one!

wow. can't believe a year has flown by. my baby is one!! i keep thinking to myself, how did this happen?!? anyways, he's still as precious as can be. he is full of energy, always on the move and loves to play with connor and the girls. it's been a month already since his birthday and he's a walking machine. he walks everywhere and i love, love to see his little body walking about. he has 4 teeth. 2 on top and 2 on bottom. he loves, loves people food. loves to drink chalk. he makes the cutest dolphin sounds. we're pretty sure he's gonna be a talker. so far his word tally is, mom, dad, ball and hat.

our birthday boy willem.

failed monster cake...covered that baby in sprinkles...

playing with the loot. tubby toys, mr potato head, 

and his very own rc car! {connor was suuuuper excited about that one}

pizza for dinner. mabel's choice for will.

he loved his cake. we noticed that he is a very neat cake eater. 

ate lots of it, but didn't have a lot everywhere else. 

made for a quick cleanup though!!

love how he crosses his ankles when he eats.

happy birthday {a month ago} my sweet boy!

big birthday boy.

we sure love this guy. he's pretty much the best ever. he had a birthday last week and we partied it up. 

we found a natural water slide in alpine. it was so fun! 

it was pretty refreshing at the bottom...

...the kind that takes your breath away. 

we hiked up to a bike jump near the slide. we watched a couple boys go off it and land in a pond. looked pretty fun, but i had to remind connor it wasn't very safe... :) looked like an afv (america's funniest home videos) accident waiting to happen...

we made a homemade pinata. fun to make and very messy! the kids loved it and couldn't wait to see what the pinata fairy filled it with. everyone took a turn swinging. i have a video of me doing it too, but pretty much i looked like a crazy lady...

we sure love you cor - happy birthday.

our "birbay" girl.

cute little else had a wonderful birthday on friday. she could hardly wait for it to finally be her "birbay". she was lovin all the attention, completely ate it up! we went to the zoo thursday night because connor had a baseball game on her birthday. but her day was still pretty special, filled with everything yellow and rapunzel. yellow is her favorite color and tangled her favorite movie at the moment. cory worked half day and we had a mini water world that afternoon, then headed to the game and then back to roast hot dogs and have "yellow cupcakes with yellow frosting" per her request. she has worn her crown, new rapunzel princess gown and her very own pair of glass slippers (thanks ry, sara & kids) every day and night since... i finally snuck it away from her this morning and it's in the wash...hopefully she doesn't notice! there could be drama if she does!!

will was jumpin like crazy during water world.

he loves his jumper!

our cute "herd"

elsie sure does love her daddy!

happy birthday sweet girl! we love you!

connor's big day.

he's been waiting for a while and the day finally came. connor turned 7. seven!?! oh, where has the time gone?

he had a magical day, full of birthday wishes. first he wished to go to javier's for lunch. they even surprised him with a plate full of nachos dulces just for him, though he did share with us after a little coaxing! he also wished to launch rockets in that snow at the park. then he wished to build popsicle stick houses with the intent to burn them to the ground. yes, it sounds like a pyro thing to do, and it was, but sooo much fun! 

he wished for sweet 'n sour chicken for dinner followed by homemade oreos for his birthday "cake". then for the finale we went outside and watched the burn and set off the chinese new year fireworks atop our snow tower.

enjoying the streamers surrounding his bed.

rockets @ the park.

building the popsicle stick houses.

houses all ready, filled with fireworks.

connor's bday dinner of choice.

watching them burn!

it was pretty cold, so elsie enjoyed the show from inside.

happy chinese new year!

me and my boys. 

can't believe connor's 7. so grateful for that sweet boy.

happy birthday conna-man!