Happy Birthday William!

We celebrated William's 4th Birthday yesterday! He loved every minute of it, except having to talk on the phone. He was a stinker when people called to wish him a happy birthday. Hopefully he grows out of it soon! He spent most of the day playing and singing Happy Birthday! He is a funny kid and we all love him. William is always worried about everyone being included especially himself and yesterday was no exception. He let Katelyn and Taylor know that if they were going on a bike ride they had to take him cause he's the birthday boy!

I made him a dinosaur cake that I found at http://sdbytracy.com/dragoncake.htm, it has great instructions that I tweaked to my liking. It had to be red at my little man's insistence, red means a lot of food coloring! The eyes and claws are skittles and the spikes are candy corn which worked out rather well. I used two jars of red food paste, next time I'll insist on another color! He love the cake and that is all that mattered anyway!

Happy Birthday little man!

Happy Anniversary!

9 years of marriage
8 homes we've lived in
7 days a week
6 months of dating
5 kids to raise
4 schools conquered
3 beds to sleep in
2 people growing closer
1 love that endures

Well Mr. A & I have been married for 9 years today. We have endured and grown together. Our lives have definitely become one, our marriage has been quite the adventure and a joy! I love you Mr. A! Here's to 9 great years and a lifetime together!

Activity Days: Sculpting with clay

We will be having our recognition night for Activity Days in June and I thought it would be a great time to work on some art projects. Developing Talents #4 Make an item from wood, metal, fabric, or other material, or draw, paint, or sculpt a piece of art. Display your finished work for others to see. We will be working on our art pieces for the next couple of Activities so they will be ready to be displayed at our Recognition Night. The girls really struggled at first coming up with their ideas but once they decided what to make they were off! I found this great website: http://fun.familyeducation.com/ which had many different recipes for sculpting clay. I tried the Modeling Clay recipe which turned out great! Next activity we will be painting the sculptures.

While the girls were busy creating I decided to make edible play dough as a treat for them to enjoy. It was very easy and the girls loved it!

Yummy Edible Play Dough

16 oz can of prepared white frosting

1 cup creamy peanut butter

2 cups powdered sugar

Food Coloring

Mix first two ingredients until thoroughly combined. Gradually knead in sugar until stiff. Knead in Food Color and then add addition sugar if sticky. Makes 3 cups. This recipe comes from Rondi. Thanks!

BUSY...Birthday Party, Baptism and Blessing all in one weekend!!!

Taylor's School Day Taylor's kindergarten teacher, Ms. Tobler has a very fun set up for birthdays in her class. The birthday child brings in their favorite book which a parent or grandparent can read to the class and of course bring a treat in. Since both Eric and Kathy arrived on Thursday afternoon I thought it would be fun for them to read to Taylor's class on Friday. They walked the kids over to Taylor's class and all seemed to enjoy themselves. Taylor chose Smarties and Doughnut holes as his treat for the class.
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Visiting

We had quite the full house this weekend with family. All Zack and my siblings came with their families except Shen came alone, it is a little expensive to travel with kids! Our guests included: Zack's Grandpa (Chuck) Alvey, Aunt Paige & Emily, his parents - Eric & Kathy, sister -Shenille, sister & her family - Krystal, Ryan, Aliyah, Rylee & Elizabeth, brother & family - Charles & Erica, and brother - Jedediah, Alisha's Grandpa & Grandma Belt, her parents - Rick & Beckie, brother & family - Brandon, Goldie, Denton & Julia, sister & family - Jennifer, Cameron, Braxton, Awsten & Hailey, brother & family - Brian, Kelsey & Oakley, sister & family - Stephanie, Tim & Jaerick, and brother TJ
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Taylor's 6th Birthday Party

Taylor's birthday party was a blast for him. He had been bragging about how many people would attend his birthday for the past couple weeks. He thoroughly enjoyed himself and was spoiled relentlessly! I made a Star Wars cake and had found this great design on Peter and Stacy's blog. At first I had made an ice cream cake which was so easy I found this at About.com but couldn't really decorate it so I made a regular cake to decorate and served both, the ice cream cake was so worth making! I doubled the recipe and made it into two layers one strawberry and the other vanilla with chocolate syrup in the middle with the cookie crumbs for a little extra flavor! Warning: Extremely addictive!

Ice Cream Cake Recipe
1 package Oreo cookies
1/4 cup melted butter
1/2 gallon of your favorite flavor of ice cream
whipped cream

You will also need a springform pan, which can be purchased at any cooking store. Prepare by putting the ice cream in the refrigerator to let it soften. Set aside about 12 cookies for decorating the cake, and place the rest in a large Ziploc bag. Using a rolling pin, crush the cookies into fine crumbs. Make the Cookie Crust by pouring the crumbs into a bowl and mix them with the melted butter. Now press this mixture into the bottom of the pan, and place it in the freezer for 10 minutes or so to let it harden. When the ice cream is soft, remove it from the refrigerator and scoop it into a large bowl. Give it a good stir so it is all a uniform consistency. Combine the Ice Cream and Cookie CrustPlace the ice cream in the pan over the cookie crust. Then, cover it with aluminum foil and return it to the freezer. Leave it in the freezer for about four hours or so to let it harden. Take the cake out of the freezer, and remove the aluminum foil. Run a knife along the edge of the pan so that the ice cream does not stick when you take it out. Release the latch on the springform pan and remove the sides. Place the cake on a cutting board or a large plate so that it will be easy to move after it is covered with whipped cream. Coat the top and the sides of the cake with whipped cream. Return the cake to the freezer for another three or four hours until it hardens. You will want to soften the cake in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes before serving so that it will be easier to cut. Enjoy.
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Chuck-A-Rama
Since we don't have a huge amount of room in our house we had everyone meet over at Chuck-A-Rama for a luncheon before Katelyn's baptism. We took up a whole section at the restraunt and all had a good time catchimg up!
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Katelyn's Baptism
We are thrilled with Katelyn's decision to be baptized. She was baptized on Saturday, May 2nd at the Pine View Stake Center. It was a wonderful experience especially for her and her parents. Zack baptized Katelyn and then confirmed her shortly afterwards. She had all the men in her family able to be part of her circle except her uncle Weston, who couldn't make it: great-grandpas - Grandpa Chuck & Grandpa Belt, grandpas - Grandpa Alvey & Grandpa Bonewell, dad, and uncles - Brandon, Cameron, Brian, Tim, Ryan, Charles, and Jedediah. It was great!
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Matthew's Baby Blessing

Matthew's baby blessing was on Sunday, May 3rd. He slept through the whole thing! He is a wonderful addition to our family. We are so glad that Heavenly Father has blessed us with these wonderful children. After we all went over to my parents' home for dinner and then most of our guests left to their homes. We are so thankful to those who were able to share in these special events that took place this past weekend. We received a lot of support and I know it means a great deal to our family!

Matthew is 2 months old

Our little Matthew has grown so much. We took him to the doctor for his 2 month checkup and shots this last week. He didn't like that one bit and was fussy for the rest of the day. Poor guy! I love how the doctors make the poor nurse do all the shots so they aren't the bad guys! Matthew is now 12 lbs and 24.5" long, a very nice size baby! He is growing like a weed and going strong. He is now spending a little time on his belly everyday but doesn't really appreciate it.


On Sundays, I like to take the kids over to visit family. Daddy isn't usually home until a couple hours after church so going over to be spoiled by grandparents is a great way to spend Sunday evenings. It works out well for all of us. Last weekend I took them over to my grandparents home, "Gampa & Gamma" Belt's. My grandparents loved playing with Matthew especially when he smiled and cooed plus he loves all the attention! Joshua fell asleep on the way over but as soon as he woke up and realized were he was, he wanted a cookie from "Gampa" Belt. It is fun to see my kids enjoy my grandparents so much. They are all very dear to me.

The kids finished off their soccer season with their final games and received their trophies. They had a great season. Taylor even scored the final point for his team! Yeah for Taylor! He was very proud of his accomplishment! It was lots of fun to see both of them really get into the sport. I would say we had a rather successful season since they enjoyed themselves so much! I recommend trying lots of different activities until your child finds their niche. It really makes them feel good to have fun and play! With summer only a month away, I hope they enjoy swimming as much as soccer. We are going to be taking advantage of my parents pool all summer long!

Activity Days: Mother's Day Cards

This idea came from myself.


In the Faith in God book one suggested activity for Serving Others is to write a letter to a teacher, your parents, or your grandparents telling them what you appreciate and respect about them. I decided to have the girls make Mother's Day cards for their moms including what they respect and appreciate about them. They absolutely love to get all the craft things out and make projects so this was a hit! We used glitter glue sticks, colored paper, jeweled brads, stickers, ribbon and their creativity to come up with some very darling little cards. Once they dried they wrote what they appreciated about their moms and will present them to their moms on Mother's Day or anyday for that matter.

Congrats Tim & Steph!

Well since Stephanie has made the announcement already I guess I can blog about it. My baby sister is officially a mommy! She is a real trooper surviving 34 hours of labor including 2 hours and 45 minutes of pushing. Yikes! We are very excited for both Tim & Steph! We cannot wait to see the little guy!

Visual of a year's supply of Food Storage

I received this email from my cousin Kathryn and thought I'd share it!

Exactly What Does a Basic 1 Year Food Storage for 1 Person Look Like?These are the MINIMUM Basic Amounts of Food Needed for Survival for ONE PERSON for ONE YEAR:

BARE-MINIMUM LDS Church Food storage requirements for 1 adult male for 1 year Appx. 2,300 calories per day. (only 695lbs total)

Some people try to rationalize that we "really" don't need to store everything that we have been asked to store. The regular excuses of no money, no room, no time, don't know how to use wheat, or don't eat wheat, etc. Some have heard "that is so much to store", that "our family would never use 400 pounds of grains per person in an entire year". Also, "we don't use that much salt or oil", therefore they don't feel they need to store it."

As what felt like my last feeble attempt to try to help, the thought came to actually create a display to show 1) what does that one year basic survival food for one person look like (the amounts the First Presidency has recommended), and 2) how much does that really work out to be per day? This display has been amazingly successful.

When I measured out the amounts to show what you would get per day, per person it was impressive. We took all those ingredients and by adding yeast (which we know is not on the basic list – but hopefully we have stored), we were able to make one loaf of bread and 1/3 cup of beans. That would be your food for the entire day. Don't FORGET water!!!

Katelyn's 8th Birthday

What a crazy birthday for Katelyn!

We started the day out with two soccer games over at the Bluff Street park. The kids had a blast and have really enjoyed learning the sport! Their season ends this week. Next swimming lessons!


We decided to make Katelyn's 8th birthday very special for her. We threw a small friend birthday party with her best girlfriends. The girls arrived at our house where we played games, opened presents and ate homemade pizza for lunch. We then headed over to the Paul Mitchell hair school for some pampering for the girls. They had their nails painted and hair styled in an up do. They had an absolute blast! We finished off with some cake and ice cream.

I made Katelyn a Hannah Montana guitar cake.
It was fun to make and Katelyn really liked how it turned out.


Later the same day we had family come over to help us celebrate more and eat cake! Hailey and Braxton were able to join in the festivities, their parents were in Florida for a couple days. Katelyn got more gifts and played in the back with all the kids. She was very spoiled with gifts and entertainment this year. A perfect day for a terrific girl! Look at that loot!

Happy 8th Birthday baby girl!
Zack and I have loved learning and growing as parents. Katelyn and the boys teaches us new things everyday. Katelyn is a good student who loves learning. Her teachers talk about the wonderful example she is to those around her. Katelyn is very creative, enjoys artsy things and reading. She is a good girl! She is such a great helper and loves taking care of her little brothers. She has grown up so fast! Being 8 now, she is thrilled to be getting baptized in two weeks at the stake baptisms for April! This is quite the milestone for her, we are so grateful that she is in our lives and made such a good decision.

We all love you Katelyn!

Easter Weekend

Our Easter weekend was jammed packed!!! To start things off on Saturday morning we all arrived at the Easter Egg Hunt in Washington city to meet up with Brian, Kelsey and Oakley. I completely forgot to bring anything for the kids to put their candy in so Zack had to run over to Walmart to get some plastic bags for them, besides that it was raining. It wasn't starting off very well.

Katelyn cried because she didn't like being separated by age groups, Taylor already had an Easter egg hunt at school and at the birthday party on Friday so he didn't want to do another, William was just tired, and Joshua was up for anything. If it wasn't for meeting up with Brian and Kelsey there, I would have just went home and drank hot chocolate personally.

Zack and I finished planting our garden which turned out rather nicely. We are a little late this year but were focusing on the grass before undertaking our garden. We use a method called Square Foot Gardening developed by Mel Bartholomew. It uses raised beds and a good soil mix. Plus he is big into conservation which I really like. I read his book several years ago and have really enjoyed this method.


Brandon called later in the evening and asked if we were up for a visit. They were in town and wanted to come on over, I told him we would rather meet up with them at my parents' home because Zack had just been spraying texture on our walls in the stairwell so our house stunk!!! Goldie is pregnant so I know the smell would have bothered her immensely. I brought all my goodies over to have a fun evening together. We colored/dyed Easter eggs, decorated sugar cookies (may I recommend adding flour to the pillsbury cookie dough, our cookies turned out very flat!) and we all played games. Even the little kids got into it.


Sunday morning we all woke up late after spending so much time playing the night before. I am sure glad the kids were so accommodating for me. They came up to find "baskets" left by the notorious Easter Bunny. They were all happy about their treats and presents. We then hid the hard boiled eggs that we colored the night before in the backyard and had the children look for them. They were in much better spirits than Saturday morning.


I took pictures of everyone in their Easter attire! I believe I have myself a rather cute crowd! We made sure to let them know the real reason for the Easter holiday and even William seemed to understand what being resurrected meant.

Right after church I headed over to my parents house to help my dad with making an Easter dinner for the family. Brandon and Goldie had to leave beforehand so they weren't able to join us but Grandpa Belt came over, so did Brian and Kelsey. My mom had left up to Salt Lake to be with Stephanie while she gives birth to her baby. Zack wasn't able to join us until after 6pm since he had some bishopric things to attend to. The dinner turned out well and everyone was very entertaining! We sure enjoy having family around and enjoying the blessings of the Savior. It was a wonderful holiday!