BRANDEN IS 17!!!!!!

OK so I'm a little slow on this one too but hey if you read the previous post you know why....anyway let me tell you about the fun I had on Branden's birthday.

Branden turned 17 on November 7th. Being the teenager that he is he wanted to hang out with his friends, go to dinner and then to Off the Cuff at The Grind. For those of you that don't live in Cedar City, Off the Cuff is an improv show every Friday night. It is a family oriented show despite it's late starting time of 10pm. I have yet to go because for some reason I like to sleep at that time of night. But one of these Fridays I am going to go. Because of this lack of wanting to hang with his wonderful mom I had to do something. So I had a great idea and it ended up involving his girlfriend and her family too.

Branden had play rehearsal the night of his birthday so while he was occupied for a few hours we had some fun. I went and bought window chalk and a bunch of balloons.....can you tell where this is going??? So with the help of my kids, Branden's girlfriend and her family we decorated the van and filled it with balloons. But here's the kicker.....I had his girlfriend get his keys earlier in the day and we put them in a balloon. He also needed money for dinner so I got 40 one dollar bills and we put one dollar in forty different balloons.....so if you're staying with me on this he had to pop all the balloons to find his keys and all the dollar bills for dinner.

Earlier in the day I had asked Branden what time rehearsal was going to be over and he assured me it would be over at 7pm so i figured we had lots of time. We met at the parking lot at 6pm figuring we had plenty of time. So as we're decorating we kept checking the time. Well we were pretty much done at 6:30 but wanted to do some final touches on the windows and we look over and see kids coming out of the school. I told his girlfriend to hurry and go head him off while we all moved our cars across the street to watch the reaction. And what a reaction it was.....he was SHOCKED!!! It was the best thing I think I could've done for him. He was estatic. We all ran across the street and took pictures and then told him where his keys and money were and the popping began.....check out the pictures....they say it all.
















OK so after the balloon thing Branden and his friends took off and did their thing. But Branden didn't know that we were all invited over to his girlfriends house for cake. So the second surprise of the night happened. This brings us to the "cake" photos.....







HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRANDEN!!!! I love you very much and hope you enjoyed your day!!!

So I really am a slacker.....

Or could it be that I'm extremely busy? Whatever the reason I was kindly reminded by my best friend Vicki, that I haven't posted anything since November 6. So here's to you Vicki and all my other blogging friends out there a new post. Where should I start??? Probably with Talise's birthday party since that's what would've been next had I kept up on this. So here we go.....



Talise had her 11th birthday on November 2. She didn't know what she wanted to do for her birthday so I suggested going go Jumpin' Jacks in St. George. For those of you that don't know what Jumpin' Jacks is, it is an indoor inflatables place. They have about 7 or 8 different inflatables for everyone to go on. I even joined in the fun going down the slides. The best part about it is that it's unlimited jump time. So the kids got to jump as long as they wanted to (or as long as I wanted to stay there). We had the use of the "castle" room for an hour and then the kids jumped, and jumped, and jumped for 2 1/2 hours. It was a great place for a party and I highly recommend it. Here are some more pictures from the party and of Jumpin' Jacks.








If you want to check out their website it is http://www.jumpinjackskids.com/ Maybe you can have your next party there.

OK everyone this is the deal...one of my friends in the blogging world and in my ward Lara, is having a free giveaway going on her blog. Its this adorable hat. Check out her blog at http://lalakme.blogspot.com/ and register to win! She will be announcing the winner on Wed Nov 12 so you better HURRY! You can also check out this great website by KARA who makes these hats. There are other things on there besides hats so Check it out at
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6331078

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!!!

Halloween!!!!

OK since I'm home sick today I thought maybe I would take some time to post a few pics from Halloween. With my new even busier schedule we didn't have time to carve our pumpkins but most of them ended up rotting anyway. So they've just been sitting outside looking autumny. (and if that isn't a word it is now).

For Halloween Talise and Jacob went to Tricks, Trunks, and Treats at all the car dealerships in town and then we went to Hallelujah Night. It's put on by the Calvary Chapel and is a really fun carnival. It's all free, the kids play lots of games and jump on inflatables, and get a ton of candy, all in a very safe and positive atmosphere. We went last year and the kids were really looking forward to it this year. Then after that we went to IHOP for a late dinner. We did all of this with our friends The Laney's and Susie, Kerri, and Eli. What follows are some pictures from our fun night.







This is Jacob trying to get his donut off the string.....



And sweet success......



And the end of the night.....



I hope you all had as much fun as we did....

Exciting news....

The best and most exciting news came today when Kaitlyn told me that Erik Bettridge opened his eyes!!! Erik was in a very serious motorcycle accident a little over a week ago and had to be life flighted up to Primary Children's Hospital. He's been heavily sedated since then to keep him from moving and causing more trauma to the brain. I've been IM'ing with his mom and my friend Sandi whenever I get a chance but mostly keeping tabs on him through his care page online. You can read the updates at http://www.carepages.com/carepages/Erikspace Sandi is using this to keep everyone updated on his condition and you can leave messages there for Sandi, Keith and Erik. Everyone should check it out when you have the chance. Please keep them in your prayers as Erik has a very long way to go and is not out of the woods yet.

On a different note work is getting better. We've had some changes that I think are going to be for the best and I'm looking forward again to a great year. Each day brings new challenges but I'm ready to face them again. It's amazing what people can do for each other when they want to and I've really found out who I can count on when I need to.

So that's it for now....I'll post pictures from Talise's birthday and Halloween when I have a chance. Till next time....TTFN!!!