Birthday Girl

My Afton is 6 years old! She was so excited to get a baby sister, on her birthday this year. What a great big sister she is! She's so helpful. Sometimes I wonder what I would ever do without her! She is definitely a little mother. This week I have been thinking about her a lot. Just 6 years ago, on the Sunday after Mother's day Afton was born, my first daughter. What a fun relationship we have. I love spending time with her. Afton is very special and I love her so much. She loves to sing, play with friends, and playing dress up. She is a very good reader. Here are a few other things about her.

Name: Afton JoAnn

Nickname: Afty or "Girl"

Birthplace: Lehi

Age: 6

Hair Color: white blond

Eye color: Hazel

Shower or bath: loves baths

Favorite color: blue

Fav. Song: Called to Serve

Fav. Sport: soccer

Fav. Flower: tulips

Fav. Ice Cream: oreo shakes

Fav. Holiday: Christmas

Fav. Food: Mac & cheese

Fav. Book: Fancy Nancy

Fav. Smell: soup

Fav. fast food place: Wendy's

Messy or clean: messy

Board Game or Video Game: board games

Fav toy: barbies

Last movie you saw: How to Train Your Dragon

Biggest Fear: the dark

Trait you love about yourself: "my hair & I'm pretty"

Fav. Season: summer

Quote: "I just need a bigger bum, then my pants would stay up."

Happy Birthday Afton. We sure love you!

Bonnie Margaret

Bonnie Margaret was born on Sunday, May 16, 2010 at 5:05pm, Afton's 6th birthday. She weighed 7lbs 4oz and was 20 inches long. When she was born the nurse commented on all her dark hair, I didn't believe her until I saw for myself. Don't know where that came from except that my little sister had lots of dark hair when she was born too! That's a good sign because she got the good hair, thick and pretty.

Bonnie is doing great right now and is such a good little baby. The children love giving her attention! We really had a good experience at this new hospital. For my last dinner there I actually ate salmon, and it was delicious! There was also this cute little man that came around who called himself the candy man and he gave out. . . candy bars. Very sweet. I'm glad to be home again though, there is just nothing like sleeping in your own bed.

Mothers Day

This weekend I was soooo spoiled that I don't know if I will be able to go back to normal life on Monday. Dennis has pretty much been at my beck and call all weekend doing little projects for me to help me fend off the nesting reflex. He and I went out together Saturday afternoon to lunch and Home Depot. He's making me two more garden boxes that I probably won't finish before I begin my maternity leave but I just had to have them anyway. We spent way too much on bushes and flowers at the nursery and then I went back for just a few more to fill a planter box I just had to have! That and then breakfast and dinner, a flower and a nap on Sunday! All this and then love notes from our children. What more could a mom ask for?!?!?! They know how to make me feel loved!

I also wanted to give a shout out to my mom! This is my mom. What a wonderful woman she is. She's amazing sometimes. Such a creative person and always doing projects of some sort. She crochets, knits, sews, quilts, bakes, smiles, laughs, helps, supports, strengthens, loves. I love you mom! Happy Mothers Day!

Waiting and Waiting and Waiting

Not much going on just the usual trying to get through the last few weeks until our little one finally makes her grand entrance. I'm not good at the waiting game, but I'm making it. Just been doing a little nesting and scrapbooking and walking the dog and taking the boys to baseball practice, waiting for Dennis to get home from work and weeding in the garden and yard. That's about it.

Happy Birthday Dennis

I'm so happy every year when Dennis finally has his birthday. I love it when he gets older. I do wonder why men always get better looking with age and women just get older. At least that's how I feel. Well my honey is now the big three-three. What an amazing, talented, loving man he is. What a blessing he is to me. I love him so much!! Happy Birthday love!!

Our Spring Break

This week for our "Spring Break" we left the children at grandpa and grandma Sorensens' house for 2 days while Dennis and I were able to spend some time together. Dennis was invited to speak at the Utah Municipal Clerks Association conference in Springdale. He's becoming a very popular speaker at these kinds of meetings. He was a hit and had the best presentation at the conference. They just loved him there and he really can speak about any topic they give him. He knows his stuff. I loved watching him. I love that he comes home and talks to me about work because then at these conferences I know the lingo and can follow what he's saying.

There really isn't much in Springdale, besides Zions park, but we did enough to fill 2 days without putting me into labor. Dennis finally got to see Avatar in 3-D on the huge 4 story screen that they have there. I'll spare the review except to say that it felt a lot like Dances with Wolves to me and all the business about it being too political or about worshiping nature was a lot of hot air. It was a very good movie. Not too sure why it was in 3-D though. It was cool, but in my opinion 3-D can be a little too stimulating.We drove around some of the smaller towns in the area just looking around. I loved how green everything was there. They are about a month ahead of us in the season so it was all green and flowery and sunny. We drove to Grafton which is an old ghost town where there have been 5 movies shot there, like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. There wasn't much to it, but kind of fun to look around and take some photos.

(Small shed in Grafton)

(Bell on Top of old Church/Schoolhouse, in Grafton.)

We also walked down Springdale main street and looked in the galleries and shops. I'm more of a green forest person so to me they all started to look the same, with the oranges and browns, but there is such a beauty in that area around Zions that truly is amazing. We found a lot of fun things in the yards walking around.

(More yard art. Some people are pretty creative.)

(Windart - These were amazing to watch.)

We made it home in one piece and now we're glad to be home and have several projects planned for the weekend. It's been a beautiful week.

Fieldtrip

(Kids petting the sting rays)

Back in March when we were doing our classification unit, we promised the kids that we would make a special trip to the aquarium for our field trip on fish. We found out that the aquarium was adding a new penguin exhibit at the end of March so we thought it best to put off our visit until after the penguins arrived. This weekend we finally made it up there and as we drove into the packed parking lot, my heart sank. There was a line to get into the building clear down the sidewalk. At that point Dennis asked the kids if they wanted to see a movie instead, but they all agreed they wanted to go into the aquarium. By the time we found a parking spot the line was considerably shorter which was encouraging. So we dealt with a huge crowd of people there on this beautiful weekend, didn't loose any of the kids, and saw the marine animals and fish.

Favorites:
Jacob - the piranhas
Isaac - tough choice between the anaconda, cayman, the penguins and petting the sting rays.
Afton - the penguins
Khora - penguins jumping on the rocks
Dad - the sea horses
Mom - coral reef fish, of course the fish who swam with their eyes up out of the water were cool too!

Good news, the aquarium still isn't too big so it didn't take more than a couple hours to walk through everything even with the crowds. Bad news, it was a couple hours on my feet and I'm paying for it now. It's still way over priced in my opinion, as much as a zoo ticket, but we had a discount card which made me feel a little better.

(Dinner at the Mayan)

Dennis thought it would be fun, after seeing the new South American exhibit at the aquarium, that we should go to the Mayan Restaurant for dinner. It was a hit! The kids loved it!!! We had an amazing spot to watch the divers which everyone loved. The kids kept saying that it was like eating in the jungle and not a building. Afton mentioned that this would be a great place to go on a date. Isaac said when he's married and has kids he's going to take them there. Jacob was fascinated with the lighting which he kept pointing out to us as it changed.

It was a long but fun afternoon together! Now it's time for bed!