Close Call

Alternative Title: Get your scissors off those curly locks!

Aurora is 3 1/2 and has never had her hair cut.  Lately, I've noticed that the ends of her hair are getting a little frazzled.  I decided it was finally time to get a trim.

The only problem: She has the cutest little curls at the end of her hair!  I know that won't last forever though, and I decided it was time to let them go.

Acadia had been wanting a trim too, so I finally made an appointment.  After Acadia's trim, we put Rori in the chair.



But when my friend asked how short I wanted her to cut it, I just couldn't do it!  She was hesitant to cut off those curls, too.  We went back and forth for awhile and finally I told her to just trim the teeniest, tiniest little bit off the ends, to clean them up a bit. 



I felt relief immediately!  Her curls are still there!  And they look much less frazzled.  *whew*  What a close call!

After cleaning up the ends, Sidnee played with Rori's hair and showed me some cute, easy ways to style it.  Rori loved the attention. lol



I know that Rori's curls won't last forever.  But for now, they are still here. :)

Rori's First Primary Talk

The children's sunday school portion of our church is called Primary.  During Primary, the kids get to sing songs, listen to stories, have lessons, and they also get to take turns giving little inspirational talks to the rest of the kids.  All of the kids get to take a turn, no matter what their age.  Of course, parents or teachers help with the younger ones, then as they grow they learn how to do it by themselves.

Aurora was asked to give one of the talks yesterday.  I helped her and she did great!  Ryan was in the back of the room and said he could hear her (there was a microphone), which was something I was worried about because sometimes her voice is super soft.  She really liked being up in front of everyone (surprise, surprise. lol).  She held up these pictures of Jesus as she said:

This is Jesus.  He is our older brother.  He loves us.

 
Jesus paid for our sins.
 
He died for us.
 

 
He overcame sin and death so we can repent and live with Him and Heavenly Father again.
 
In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Then He lived again.

Just your average Sunday...

• When I got home from my early meetings, Rori came up to me and said, "I feel old."
• Cadi fell and skinned her knees yesterday.  She was delaying getting ready for church today because she washed her wounds and wanted to them to dry first... Part of the getting ready she still needed to do was to take a shower. lol
• Ryan made smoothies for everyone this morning.  Cadi just brought me mine while wearing earmuffs.  (The smoothie maker is rather loud.)
• I sent Rori into her room so we could get her dressed for church.  When I went in there, she was nowhere to be found.  But there was a rather lumpy blanket on the ground.  She wanted to be a pillow.

All dressed up with nowhere to go.

My friend, Alia, is a very talented woman.  She is an actress, has worked at Sea World and an NBC station in So. Cal, owned a catering business with her husband when they lived in San Diego, was a personal trainer for 24 Hour Fitness until she got pregnant last year, and currently has a cake decorating business.  She is also my workout buddy. :)

On Thursday, she taught a cake decorating class for the RS sisters in our ward.  It was a lot of fun and I was surprised that my cake actually looked pretty good by the end of the night! lol  I took lots of pictures of the other cakes but I don't have permission to post the pics of the ladies decorating them, so I won't be able to share them.  It's really too bad because they did a great job, too!

Here are some pics of the process of decorating my cake:


Now we've got this big, heavily iced cake, and no birthdays or anything to use it for.  But no worries, I have a feeling we'll figure something out. ;)

A tisket, a tasket, our family won a basket!

Every couple of months, Cadi's school has a movie night.  It's free and you can buy popcon, candy, and drinks to raise money for the PTO.  (They even have the prices on that super cheap, we're talking popcorn for only 25 cents!)  This month, the movie was Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and as a fundraiser, they had a spaghetti dinner to go along with it.  $5 bought each person an Olive Garden spaghetti dinner, complete with salad, two breadsticks, a glass of sparkling grape juice, and a piece of cake.  Not bad!  And of course, since it was Olive Garden, it was very tasty.  Each family also got a coupon for $3 off their next Olive Garden meal. :)

About once a year, the school also has a raffle.  The classes are each given a theme and the kids collect things to put in their basket with that theme.  Cadi's class's theme was "sports".  I asked my gym if they had a temporary pass I could put in the basket, they gave me three 7-day passes!  :)  The baskets are always really good and this time they were awesome!  We bought some tickets, not expecting to win but figuring it was all for a good cause.  I divided our tickets in half and split them between the two best baskets (in my opinion). 

AND WE WON ONE!!!


It includes: a bottle of sparkling cider, two wine glasses, one $15 gift card to Cold Stone, one $20 gift card to the movie theater, and one $30 gift certificate to a local Thai restaurant.  That sounds like an awesome date night to me!!! :D

After having such a yummy dinner and winning the basket, watching a cute movie as a family was icing on the cake.  It was a great night for us and I think, judging on the huge turnout, the school PTO made out pretty good, too. :)

Because nothing says "I love you" like a Mexican Fiesta!

Every year, our church has a HUGE dance for Valentine's Day.  Each year they choose a theme and go ALL OUT for it.  Most years, it's elegant and often people dress up for it.  It's one of those events where you can go wearing whatever you want - anything from casual to formal.  We love going, it's always amazingly decorated, the food is fabulous, and there is a TON of people, so you always have lots of friends to visit with.  Oh yeah, and there's music for dancing... if you like that kind of thing. ;)

The Sweetheart Ball was last Friday (and yes, I'm late posting about it).  This year it was a Mexican Fiesta and this time people were encouraged to come dressed casual.  I guess formal gowns and fiestas don't exactly mix. lol  But that made getting ready really easy and no painful shoes this year, woohoo! lol  We went with our friends and then we invited all of the friends we ran into there, to join us after for desserts.  We had a fun not-so-little group at the end, eating pie and Shari's.  But I forgot to take a pic! :(  However, here are some pics of the dance:

Just a warning...

If you leave your camera lying around (even within the safety of your own home) and my neighbors find it, when you go through the pictures a few days later, you might find something like this...



You can't say I didn't warn you. ;)