Lauren's Birthday

Last Friday I finally got to hold my friend Melissa's baby, Arielle. She was so small and so perfect...I can barely remember when my babies were that size. My baby is now 8. 8! Geesh. 8 going on 18.....she is one spoiled little girl!

She is on C track..which meant she went off track February 3. This means I had to have all of her Valentines ready for her class PLUS all of her invites to her class for her birthday party. She couldn't wait for the day of her party. For the third year in a row she had her party at the West Valley Fitness Center. She wanted a boy/girl friendly theme so she went with RIO. Here is her cute cake...(sorry it is upside down).!

My friend Dawn came with her daughter, Shelby and her son, Brody. Brody was so cute pushing around this shopping cart!

Here is Shelby, Lauren adores her! She is such a cute girl.

Here is the whole gang in the partay room.

See...look how big she is! I wish I woulda taken pictures of her by this ruler the past two years!

For the second year in a row, the boy that she had a crush on came to the party and sat right next to her! His name is Robby and he is very tall and very smart-and very polite too (I might add).

Jamie was more than happy to come along...look at that cheeser!

My sister, Sarah, for the third year in a row came to help me wrangle the kiddos. They are much easier this year and I told her she didn't NEED to come, but I was thrilled to hear that she WANTED to come help. Do we all look we are related?

Throw cousin Bella in there too. My kids love hanging out with her.

Lauren will proudly tell you she is a "Daddy's Girl".
(I didn't get too many pictures of the party....I am always so bad at it. If I was rich-I would hire a photographer for every event so that I could have plenty of pictures).

Here was the scene awaiting her on her REAL birthday, Sunday the 26th.

After church, Lauren got to pick where we went to lunch. She chose her favorite-Red Lobster. They even came and sang to her. She loved it-I don't know why she looks embarassed.


That night we had her family over for another party. Here was HUGE cake #2. Costco only makes one size= TOO BIG.


I thought I was hillarious...I put fake candles on her cake...it was like whac-a-mole but with blowing out candles. What a good sport.


My adorable little poser!


AND meet the newest two members of our family-Snowball and Princess. Robo Dwarf Hamsters. They are so cute.
Lauren's birthday wish. Oh, what have we gotten ourselves into!
AND...my traditional picture of my baby asleep on her birthday night. It took her a while to get to sleep after the cake, the presents and all the excitement. Still..so sweet.


OKAY and TOTALLY unrelated...but too crazy not to share. THIS was my car on Thursday night, a couple of days after Lauren's birthday!! We have had so little snow and then we had this storm. AND here is Utah for ya today, SUNDAY...four days later...it is completely sunny and warm, all the snow melted. NONE of us even wore coats today. Our weather is so crazy!

My baby is SEVEN!

And so begins the weeklong celebration of her birthday! Here is a shot of her a few days before her birthday! She is so big! I thought she looked rather stylish-so I snapped a shot.

So here is how the birthday-weekend went:

*Friday...Lauren went to school. She brought treats and had fun passing those out. Matt and I both took the day off so when she was off we picked her up, and we went to say hello to her Pa Pa Leo at work. Then we went to get her birthday pictures taken at JC Penney. (I can't download them so I will have to wait a week until I get them, then I will scan them and post them-they turned out sooo cute!!). Then we went to see the movie of her choice-Gnomeo and Juliet. She loved it and it was, um, alright. Then we went home for a dinner of Ramen Noodles. It was off to bed early for her real birthday.

Growing up, my family didn't have a ton of money...yet for every holiday and every birthday my parents went out of their way to buy us more than we needed as well as going out of their way to make the day super special. My mom would always (and still does) make signs. I am happy to carry on the tradition...and since my handwriting isn't as great as hers...I used stickers:

I used to love to wake up to run to the table to see the set-up that was there for me. This year I was quite proud of what I put together for Lars:

I had a pink-theme, if you couldn't tell.

Close up:

And here she was in the morning, in her bootie-short PJs.

*Saturday. After waking up to the presents above and opening them with the family, she bathed and got ready for her friend party at the West Valley Fitness Center. We had pizza, played, and had cake and ice-cream. I wish I would have gotten pictures of everyone and everything...but these will have to do! Special thanks to my sister Sarah for coming JUST to help me wrangle all the kids...wh0 actually didn't need much wrangling at all...(so we just played some Dance Dance Revolution instead). Here was the DARLING cake that they had for us!!

They have this play grocery store at the Fitness Center, I think all the kids enjoyed it. Here is Jamie and my cute niece Madeleine.

Here is my other niece Bella and Jamie shopping too.

Here is my neighbor Chrystie and Jamie at the checkout. Jamie really wanted to be the cashier, but he was a patient customer instead.

I told him to show me his "I am having fun" face. What an adorable boy.

Not to be out-posed..here is the birthday girl herself, beautiful Lauren!

And now really pose Lauren, yep, that is my girl! If Lauren likes a boy, he is INSTANTLY her boyfriend. Well, at least she CALLS them that even if there is no mutual feeling or agreement for such a title. We were both pleased as punch when her recent BOYFRIEND, Toby actually came to her party! He was such a cute and well behaved little boy!

And he posed arm in arm with Lauren with NO coersion at all! They are both students together in Mrs. Lance's first grade class at Valley Crest Elementary. Matt is such a handsome fella, even if he is in a kiddie chair! Seriously, how lucky am I?

After her party, we went back to our house for a quick nap..then we went to a birthday party for one of Matt's cousin's kid's birthdays. They had it at Bouncin' Off the Walls. It was pretty cool to have our very own inflatables that even the adults could ride down. Even I went down this bad boy a few times. Here is a shot of Matt and the kiddos.

We had pizza again, and cake and ice-cream again. This is Jamie with another "I am having fun" face.

After that party, we took Lauren to her choice...BONSAI. It is a Japanese steakhouse. YUMMMY!!! THEN we came home and finally relaxed, I tried to unpackage and put away her new treasures. Jamie was helping me and HERE is his TRUE "I am having fun" face!!! This will be blackmail material when he has his first girlfriend, I am sure!

Last year I took a picture of Lauren at the end of night. I had to snap another one, after seeing this when I went to kiss her goodnight. Obviously, she was POOPED. She was asleep on the floor!

I can't believe that my baby is seven, although I barely remember my life before her. She is just so precious to me! She is smart, and beautiful, and funny, and energetic, and sweet (it is my blog I can brag if I want to!!).

*THEN finally ending on Sunday. We went to church, then we went to Sams Club to get her cake and to have a delicious $1.50 hot dog for lunch. Then we cleaned the house real quick and had the family over for cake and ice-cream and present opening! I was really bad and didn't take any pictures. Thanks to my mom and dad, Ashley, Victor, Zander, Sarah, Poopie, Leo and Tina, Greg, Alex, Bella, Maddie, Kristen, Dave, and Ethan for coming over to complete Lauren's birthday celebration. She got such nice gifts and everyone was super generous as always. We have the best family and it was great to see everyone again.

Well, that was her birthday for 2011. I hope that she had a great one and that she always knows how much she is loved.

Lauren's birthday weekend! (warning, lots of photos)

There is not really no such thing as "birth-DAY" at my house...more like "birth-WEEKEND"..especially when it comes to our kids. Lauren's birth-weekend was no exception! Forgive my long post. I wanted to document our super fun weekend!

The day before her birthday, we had Parent Teacher Conferences. Lauren got rave reviews as always, it makes me so proud. I realized that we were "twinners" that day, and not on purpose at all! Her teacher musta thought we were a little crazy. LOL!

As a kid, I remember waking up to a table full of presents, I enjoy carrying on the tradition, this is what Lauren woke up to on her actual birthday.

Matt and I both took PTO on her birthday and we both picked her up from school, she was excited to see the whole family pick her up.

We also suprised her by taking her to one of her favorite places to eat! IHOP or IPOD as she calls it. Matt looks so handsome in this picture and Lauren looks tickled pink!

Then we came home and she got to open her presents. I think that she liked the jewelry box that I decorated!

After opening her presents from Matt and me, I bathed her and took her to get her 6 year pictures taken..(see previous post for those shots).

Then we went to the West Valley Fitness Center for her birthday party. Here is the cake she chose, "Sponge Bob"! I couldn't talk her into anything girly!

The kids had a great time playing in the "Edutainment" room.

The mini-grocery store was a hit with all the kids.

Jamie loved the cash register!

Renting the place was affordable and came with pizza, drinks, and cake! Here is everyone enjoying the pizza.

My sister Sarah and friend Beth not only matched each other, they also matched the color of the tablecloth! So cute! I love these girls and couldn't have pulled off the party without them!

Beth's daughter, Harbor had a fun time playing too...I hope Sarah had fun in the jungle gym as well. Maybe she even loved playing like a little kid again!

Everyone sang Happy Birthday to the birthday girl. She loved being the center of attention.

Here is Lauren and her friend and neighbor, Chrystie.

Lauren and her friend and classmate, Morgan.

Lauren and her cousin, Brookie, Morgan and Aunt Sarah.

Lauren and her friend Sammy from daycare (whom she misses very much!)

Jamie had no fear when it came to climbing.

Lauren had such a good time and was SOO tired that she quickly fell asleep in my lap! Awww! She doesn't do that very often, so it was a nice treat for me. Where did my baby go?

I don't know what he was thinking but I caught Jamie after he had ripped off some or the stickers to my jewelry box! DOH! Luckily, I was able to fix it quickly with craft glue!


Saturday, the next day we went to a birthday party for Matt's cousin John's son. They had lots of festivities going on. One special thing was a clown who painted faces. Lauren had to have her face painted like a cat!

Lauren even got to be the clown's assistant as she did her magic tricks!

Jamie had a blast just playing with his cars on the gym floor.

They also had a pinata. Look at my cute fam waiting for the candy to rain from the sky!

Lauren waiting to hit the pinata.

SHE actually is the one who knocked it down! What a strong girl!


On Sunday, we ended her birthday weekend by taking her to her other favorite place to eat...RED LOBSTER!

She LOVES the lobsters in the waiting room!

They even offered to let her touch one!

She actually picked out a girly cake for her family birthday party.

Everyone singing "Happy Birthday"!

Here she is with her Uncle Stephen and Uncle Collin.

Here she is with her Papa Leo and her Grandma TT.

Posing with Aunt Kristen and Uncle Dave.

Here she is with my parents and sisters and her little brother!

And here is a shot of her and her parents. She is such a sweet little girl. She is just the apple of our eyes. We love and adore this little princess soo much! I hope that her 6th birthday is one she will always remember!

We love you Lauren! Okay, now no more getting ANY older!