Happy 11th Birthday Emma!

I can't believe she's 11 already.  It sounds so old! This year spring break fell on her birthday so she didn't have to go to school.  She spent the morning with Amelia being "mother's helpers" with our sweet little girls from church.  They even got paid which was really exciting!  For dinner we had Chinese food, sushi, and toffee cupcakes.  There is going to be a sleepover this weekend.  Her favorite gift? A Kindle fire! Pretty soon we won't have to talk to each other at all around here :)

At dinnertime we all said things we love about Emma. Luke loves how she let him into the buddy group. I'm not sure what that means.  Amelia loves how sometimes she's generous and when they talk at night.  I love how she is kind to people who may not have many friends,  and Joel loves how she's helpful calming Luke down sometimes when he's throwing a huge fit.  There are many, many other things we love about her, this is just a short list.

More birthday

For some reason I couldn't post pictures on the other post so here are some photos from today.....

Misc. from November

Amelia's class did a great job leading chapel.

I'm not sure what prompted this.

Or this.

Molly had to make an appearance

Luke lost some teeth

Pretty Mia

Her birthday gift - piggy slippers

Are we having a tea party?  I can't remember.

I went to another concert (Dierks Bentley) with some friends from BSF.  It was so fun!  He's not even close to being as good as Neil, but he is one of my favorite country singers.

Video of part of Amelia's class leading chapel

More Christmas and Amelia's 9th birthday!

The kids did dress up for the Christmas program at school so I took as many pictures as possible.

I love this one.  I need to enlarge it and frame it.

Emma and her BFF

Amelia had 3 friends come over for pizza and cupcakes and then they went to VA Techniques for open gym.

Amelia's 2 best school friends - Alayna and Grace

Earrings that Amelia got for her birthday

Aunt Jill sent her Charlotte's Web because of her love of pigs.

Lots of nail polish

She wanted her own NIV Bible that she could use at school

The most fun Rainbow Loom kit ever

Christmas in Indiana and Greensburg

We spent a day in Indiana with Uncle Jeff, Aunt Kristen, Daniel, and Sarah.  The kids had a great time playing outside near the fire, it was a mild Christmas this year,

Luke with his new Lego toy

I really wanted a picture of all of the cousins together and this was the best I could get.

I did however trick Daniel into letting me take a picture :)

I'm not sure what Sarah is doing here?  With a stick and her Christmas dress?

The only picture of Luke and Daniel that I could take!

Universal Studios

In January we got to go to Florida for a week and spend 2 days at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure.  Aunt Jill, Uncle Brian, and Dylan also came.  This was the kids Christmas gift from Grammy and G-Pap, and they had a blast.  The Harry Potter attractions were definitely everyone's favorite, I personally loved the new Diagon Alley.  It really felt like you stepped into a book.  Here are some pictures from our trip.

Notice the sweatshirts, it was chilly!

Butter beer was soooo good.  You could get it frozen or regular.  How many times did we buy it??

Gringott's bank with a fire breathing dragon on the top.  Real fire.

A place to buy butterbeer

Diagon Alley.  We also visited the wand store and a wizard guy showed us how to pick the right wand.

Nanna and Pap Pap bought the kids gift cards and Amelia used hers to buy some love potion!  

Curious George land was awesome!  

My Christmas gift was a Neil Diamond shirt!

Dylan in the pool - our house had a pool and even though it was chilly, the kids swam in it every day

The train conductor was very friendly and fun.

A picture of the excitement before we went to the Islands of Adventure!

G-Pap and Dylan - Dylan really wanted whatever G-Pap was drinking.