Megan's Birthday...

Megan turned 5 and asked for a Dora birthday party.

She seems so old at 5 for some reason...

My MIL made the cake and Megan loved it. I'm glad she can decorate cakes because. although its fun to make my kids cakes, sometimes their requests calls for someone with more experience!

She has been asking for a Baby Alive that talks, eats and poops for quite a few weeks so she was so excited when she opened her gift. She was so fun when she was opening her gifts too. She had the best reactions, gasping with excitement and saying "Oh my DIY!" It was awesome. And yes, she does realize that 'DIY" means Do It Yourself, but it has become her catchphrase when she's excited. Ü

We had her party on a Sunday but her birthday was on a Tuesday. I wasn't able to take the day off so I left a couple of hours early from work and she and I went out for ice cream and then wandered around in Toys R Us just looking at toys.

Madi had a little party with a couple of friends from school so Megan asked if she could have a friends party too. So we made up little invitations and had her cousins and besties Chloe and Bailee over. We played, went to Arctic Circle (where the girls said the silliest things ad giggled so much that I struggled hearing the drive thru person over the speaker), and then we watched a movie.

Meeting Baby Daniel...

My kids have been the only grandkids on our Cawley side so we were SO excited when we found out my brother in-law and his wife were expecting their first. So when he arrived we made a quick trip to Utah to meet him.

Daniel Rex Cawley a.k.a. D-Rex, DR Cawley Ü

I had him in my arms 30 seconds when my kids demanded I share...

Of course, they all loved him!

 

 

We left for Utah Friday afternoon so we stayed in a hotel overnight. It was fairly late when we finally got there so after the excitement of being in a hotel room wore off we went right to bed. The next morning we had breakfast, helped Papa Cawley shave, and went to see Daniel and his parents one more time before we headed home.

The kids thought it was the coolest thing ever that they got to help Papa shave.

I hadn't taken any other pictures while we were at the hotel so I told the kids I wanted one of them just standing in our hotel room and this is what they did....stinkers. Ü

The four Cawley cousins.

I had to take a picture of his ridiculously long toes. They are like fingers on feet, haha!

The kids were so excited because just before we left Daniel had his eyes opened and was 'looking' at them- notice Megan standing behind Madi.

My awesome SIL and Daniel- she is such a great little Mommy already!

I'm not sure how this all went down since I was focusing on driving through Saturday traffic in Utah but at one point I realized both girls had stripped down to their undies. Megan takes her shirt off a lot in the car because she's hot so it wasn't as unusual for her. After I laughed at them I asked them to get dressed again and offered to turn up the air instead....kids!

Girls Adventure...

Madi didn't have school one Friday so I took the day off to spend some extra time with them. Chet was home as well so we took the kids to lunch at Arctic Circle for kid's meals. This is already a treat for the kids because we don't get fast food often, especially kids meals. But this day was even better for them because the Halloween flashlights they talk about all year and use until the batteries die were in the kids meals. I should have snapped a picture of their happy little faces when they opened their kid's meals and figured it out.

 

Afterward the boys went to run errands and the girls and I went to the park in Rigby where I showed them the big tank. They had never even realized it was there and they were thrilled to get to climb on it and play. Megan kept saluting every time she noticed I was trying to snap a picture.

Then we played at the park.

It was such a great way to spend a beautiful fall day.

Corn Maze...

We haven't been to the corn maze in years so we planned a Saturday to go and we were not disappointed! This must be a yearly fall activity for us because we had a blast!

Chet riding the zipline

Madi and her cousin Gabri on the zipline

Tube slides

Chase and Brennan playing in the bounce house

Getting ready to ride the barrel train

 

Waiting in line for the zipline again. Megan didn't want anything to do with it at first but she finally decided to give it a try after we'd been there a couple of hours.

And she loved it!

Then I had to try too with the girls.

Then into the corn maze we went. It rained on us a bit while we were there so the maze was a little muddy. Chase kept falling and ended up covered in mud but we had fun.

The kids found all the clues

Chase coming down the slide and Madi up top watching.