Happy 6th Birthday Naomi

We celebrated Naomi's 6th birthday yesterday. She is so much fun to have as part of our family. Naomi is spunky, self-assured, creative, determined, adventuresome, a bit sneaky and ready to play all the time. To celebrate, Naomi took treats to daycare, then more treats to Kindergarten where they have a birthday song tradition of using the first letter of the birthday kids name to replace the first letter of every word in the birthday song, so the Kindergarten class sang "Nappy Nirthday No Nou!" to Naomi. She loved it.

After school it was hailing outside, so Naomi chose to watch a Scooby-Doo in Hawaii movie while eating her favorite meal, Kraft Mac and Cheese. We then went to Grandma and Grandpa Pitcher's house for a family party. We opened presents and had butterfly cake and Little Mermaid cake. It was fun to create a special day to celebrate Naomi!

Enjoying childhood

It's so fun to see kids just let loose and have fun. Here are a few shots of the kids enjoying life.

A few weeks ago we acquired Guitar Hero and Graysen has been absolutely loving it. No one at our house can come close to playing at his level. There have been some funny questions asked of Kory and me about "music when we were young", like "did people really jump all over the stage like that?", "did people really break their guitars by slamming them on the stage?", "did people really dress like that?" all of which were answered in the affirmative.

Naomi has been perfecting her head stand. Now she has moved on to cartwheels, but those are harder to capture with the camera.

Naomi and I went to Disney Princesses on Ice with her cousin Stephanie. They loved the magic of Disney and I'll admit that it was much better than I was expecting!

(yes, the crown does light up and yes, hundred of crowns were flashing all through the show) Thank you to Kelli for the crowns and the fun trip to SLC!

Spring Boarding

We spend a day at Beaver Mtn. a few Saturdays ago. Naomi and I waited at the lift line and debated the pros and cons of snowboarding vs. skiing while Graysen boarded to his hearts content. I tried to talk Naomi into snowboarding since that's what everyone else in the family does, but she's determined to ski. She said she already knows how to ski and doesn't understand how to make a snowboard stop. Let me clarify that Naomi has never strapped on skiis. It didn't help much when she happened to see her best friend (Tori) in the lift line on some magnificent pink skiis.

Here's Gray in the lift line. What a brave kid. He just jumps right into line and away he goes.

Here the kids are at the end of a gorgeous warm afternoon!

PowWow

We went to a PowWow here on campus last week and had a great time! It was in a huge gymnasium, so imagine the deafening sound of at least eight drum circles. The kids were a bit nervous about all the warriors walking around, but by the time we had finished our Navajo taco's, they were ready to check things out.

This sure was a far cry from the PowWow's in Wisconsin. I remember mom taking me to one when I was in high school. It seems like we drove out of the city quite a way and ended up in the middle of the woods where there were tons of Native Americans gathered dancing, singing, selling their jewelry and other wares. It certainly felt like we'd traveled in time. Thanks for taking me Mom, I loved it!

We tried to take pictures of the dancers, but the men move so fast that most of our shots look like a big feather blur. It was fun though.


I love this shot. What a cut little girl, she's probably 4 yrs old. And, ckeck out the little boy, he thought it was a bit loud too.



This little guy was having a blast! It was sure fun to watch the boys dance!

Aebleskivers

So I made my first attempt at aebleskivers. The lemon zest added just a hint of something different and the kids loved them (no, Kory was not brave enough to vary from his classic pancakes). I was a little leary about turning them, that pan is a bit intimidating,but it worked out. The recipe (we used the classic Danish recipe from Sarah's booklet) made a lot and the I think Gray had them for breakfast over the next week. I'm pretty sure we'll keep making them. Thanks for the Christmas gift Ben and Sarah!

Grand Central Stood Still

Here's a fun video to watch. This would have been so crazy to come across. It's probably the first time people have stopped to pay attention to what was going on at Grand Central Station. I love the papers strewn across the floor.

Snowshoeing

The kids and I strapped on snowshoes a few Saturdays ago and hit the Bonneville Shoreline trail. We didn't make it very far, but we had fun. Gray was all over the place blazing trails and jumping into snow drifts. When we were done, Naomi admitted that she would have rather been in the bike trailer (using the ski attachments instead of wheels) with the drinks and snacks. That's how her previous snowshoeing trip had been, Kory pulling her while she was bundled up with blankets enjoying the scenery.

It's so much fun to have my kids reach an age where we can go out and do stuff like this.