We interrupt our regularly scheduled blog to bring you this important news update...

***This just in!***

As reported last week, Ryan recently had lasik eye surgery done on both of his eyes.  It's simply amazing that in only 5 minutes, he went from having 20/70 in his "good" eye and 20/200 in his bad eye to having perfect 20/20 vision in both.  By that night, he felt great and could see perfectly.  Since then, though there has been no pain, he has gotten a bit of attention because of one of his eyes.  When they suction cupped his right eye, a blood vessel burst.  Originally, it was way up under his upper eyelid and hardly noticable.  But in the last week, gravity has been at work and now the blood red blotches are quite visable.  I took some pics at dinner today.  Here's my husband's creepy/cool eye.





*I now return you to our regularly scheduled blog, already in progress.*

Birthday Presents

Yay!  Presents are always fun!

Cadi opened up her presents from us today (yesterday... it's late).  Rori gave her Tink shirts - one for each of them.  Here they are in their matching shirts...



Even though she claimed that "the only thing she wanted for her birthday was for Julie to come visit", Cadi still seemed pretty excited to open her gifts.  Lucky for her, I shop way in advance, so even though she offered to forego presents, they had already been purchased, so she still got some. ;)  She received a couple more TinkerBell things, a Hannah Montana purse/bag, and her favorites - some Littlest Pet Shop "stuff" (a storage case, a little electronic game, and some Littlest Pet Shop toys).  She did pretty well for someone who wasn't supposed to be getting any other presents considering her cousin IS flying in tomorrow afternoon. ;)

Ryan got a present for Cadi's birthday, too.  The Celtics totally dominated the Lakers and won the series!  Yay!!!  Good for them! :)

As mentioned, the fun just continues tomorrow (today... what am I doing up so late?)!  We're excited to have Julie come visit us!  I'll try to remember to put my memory stick back in my camera so I can get some pics of the girls playing together.  (Unlike how I forgot to put the memory stick back in my camera when I took said camera with me to school when we brought cupcakes for Cadi's class.  Yeah, that doesn't work out so well.  And therefore, I don't have any fun pics from that. :S)

Cousin Fun

We have an extra person at our house! :)  We've all been very excited to have Julie come visit.  She arrived safely this afternoon and the girls didn't waste much time before getting down to business - PLAYING!

Even though just being here was enough of a present for Cadi, Julie also brought her an actual birthday gift: a tennis racket (and carrying case)!  Cadi is so excited!  Julie also brought her own racket, that way they can play together.  So, right away they headed out to the front to play some ball.  Some neighbor friends joined the fun and I got a few pics.











The girls and I went shopping, Cadi used her giftcards to get books for her and Julie and then we went to buy some real tennis balls.  After shopping, we picked up Ryan and went out to dinner.  It was the last day of school today but also, it was Cadi's birthday yesterday so her meal (and dessert) was entirely free!  Score! :)





This is the new purse Cadi got from her grandma for her birthday.  She LOVES it!  She even bought the bracelets she is wearing in the pic specifically to match the purse. lol



So day one: Lots of fun!  And it's just the beginning, though I told the girls that we are NOT going to shop and eat out everyday. lol  We'll have to find other ways to have fun, too.  I think we'll figure out something. ;)

Nine Years

Today is Acadia's 9th birthday! 



There are a lot of things that I took for granted when I had Cadi.  First, I took for granted that I was able to have a healthy baby so easily. 





And as she grew, I took for granted what a good girl she is.  Of course, for the first six months of her life, she was colicky and crying nonstop and that was challenging.  But as soon as she turned 6 months old, she all of a sudden became the perfect baby.  She slept 12 hours at night and took 3 naps during the day that totalled about 5 hours of naptime.  Of course, she did have some independance in her blood and was a typical toddler but even though she had her headstrong moments, she really didn't get into trouble much.  She has always been a very obedient child.  She never got into things under the sink, never ran into the street, never played in the toilet (except for the one time when she was trying to clean it).  Not that she was perfect, there was the time she got into my nail polish... she painted her nails and didn't get a single drop of polish on anything else.  Or when she got my lip gloss and painted her whole face with it. lol  Or like Debi pointed out in another blog post, she did put foot powder all over Ryan's bed... twice. (So he could "smell pretty". lol)  But for the most part, she really didn't get into much.  When she was a toddler, if I wasn't feeling well I could just lay on the couch and nap most of the day while she played quietly and watched TV.  I could never get away with that with Aurora!  I actually thought Cadi was a handful at times, but little did I know!!!  lol







Now that she's even older, Cadi is still a pretty good girl.  She has a sincere desire to do what is right.  She tries to think about how her actions would make others feel.  She has many friends because she is friendly with everyone.  She is forgiving and patient with her friends.  She has her own personal testimony of the Gospel and is continuing to develop that by exercising principles that she has already learned are true for herself.  She has great faith and is quick to turn to her Heavenly Father in prayer knowing He will hear and answer her.









Acadia is talented!  She is creative, willing to try new things (except at the dinner table), and is a wonderful, loving big sister!  I am excited to watch her grow and see her develop even more into a beautiful young woman.  I like to hear her ideas and opinions.  I like to see her develop her talents and interests.  I love to hear her testimony.  I am so proud of her!











Happy Birthday, Acadia!  I love you!!!

If I had a hammer...

Even though we had Cadi's piano recital on Saturday, Ryan did manage to get some work done on the shed.  Still not finished... but we're closer!  You can start to really appreciate how big this is going to be in the pics I took.  He's building it 14 feet tall and there will be A LOT of extra space up in the loft.  Ryan estimates that this shed will have twice the storage capacity of the old one, even though the footprint is exactly the same.













We did cut some of the siding but we haven't attached any of it yet.  Next weekend! ;)

Published!

Again.

The third 3rd grade classes had their final Publishing Party today.  Rori and I stopped by to hear Cadi and her classmates share their stories with their family members.  This first pic shows how excited all the kids were (there are two classes shown here). lol  Also, this is Cadi's teacher.

It's definitely a Monday.

Cadi was always a really good girl when she was little. She never tried to get into anything. We never had to put locks on our cabinets. She listened and obeyed and just didn't have that desire to get into anything or push the limits. The ONE AND ONLY time that Cadi got into anything in the bathroom was when she was probably about 3 years old and tried to clean the toilet. I found her with the toilet brush in the toilet bowl. I quickly told her that cleaning the bathroom was my job but thank you for trying to help. And that was it - she never got into anything like that again.

*Warning... next paragraph not for anyone with a weak stomach*

Rori is a whole other story! She has taken to sticking toothbrushes down the drain in the bathroom sink (Ryan really needs to get the stopper put in the sink!), I've tossed at least a half dozen toothbrushes in the last two weeks! (Today I'm buying a toothbrush holder to be kept OUT of her reach!) But that was nothing compared to what I found today. She came out of my bathroom with Ryan's toothbrush in her mouth. Not that big of a deal. Except. And it's such a big "except"! When I went to put the toothbrush back, the toilet seat was up. I KNOW it was down before she went in there. Oh yeah. I have no proof, but I suspect that she went there. I'm so disgusted!!! So now Ryan is required to keep his toothbrush in the holder on the counter where I keep mine, I don't know why he didn't before anyway. But I have no idea what to do with my monster. I wanted to wash her mouth out with soap or something but I don't think it would really make a difference at that point. At least we have one of those toilet cleaning tablet thingies in the tank so with every flush it gets a little cleaning. BUT STILL!!!

We do keep the bathroom and bedroom doors closed but sometimes someone will forget to close a door. Or like today, Cadi got Rori up before I knew it and so I hadn't closed my door yet. I don't want to have to go back to keeping her locked in the family room but my goodness, she just looks for ways to get herself in trouble! I've SO got my hands full with this one!!!