Lizzie's Birthday Celebrations and General Conference

We tried this general conference store this year and it was so much fun. The kids had the opportunity to earn conference bucks for different things they did to listen. There was a "get ready buck" an "apostle buck" that you could get whenever an apostle spoke, a "prayer buck" if you were reverent during the prayers, a "reverence buck" if you were doing a good job at listening, and some "listen and learned bucks" that you could do activities like matching or drawing or taking notes on different talks to earn. After you earned bucks you could spend them on things like candy and chips or even some fun little toys like lego sets and puzzles. We still kept a jar full of jelly beans that you could get whenever you heard the work prophet. I felt like the kids listened and were more reverent then ever before. They really felt the spirit! Another thing that really helped is an apostle song we have been learning in primary. Brett and Alana (and me too) all know all the apostles in order now with a fact about each one. The song is sung to the toon of Beverly Hillbillies (as my Dad pointed out). Here are the lyrics =)

Russell M Nelson is the prophet we know

Dallin H Oaks is the next below

Henry B Eyring is the third you see

and that makes up the first presidency.

M Russel Ballard was in auto sales

Jeffrey R Holland studied at Yale

Dieter F Uchtdorf is from Germany

Where David A Bednar was a missionary

Quintin L Cook was an attorney

D Todd Christofferson served in the army

Neil L Anderson's from Idaho 

and Ronald A Rasband helped Temples to grow.

Gary E Stevenson speaks Japanese

Dale G Renlund did heart surgeries

a college professor was Gerrit W Gong

and Ulysses Soares ends our song. 

 Lizzie was excited to wake up to fun decorations on the morning of her birthday. Sean had to work the urgent care that morning so I took the kids to Brett's soccer game and we started listening to conference in the car on the way home. Sean got home about 1 pm and we had some lunch and Lizzie took a little nap since she was just so so tired. We watched the afternoon session of conference then let Lizzie open her presents. She loved her slide from us, her fun little chick from Alana, her cars and hatchimals from Brett and her chef set from Grandma and Grandpa. We endee up saving her big hatchimal for Sunday morning since we ran out of time.

 Sean built this swing set for us and the kids have LOVED it! It took lots of steps including ordering the parts, buying and transporting the lumber, cracking our van window while transporting the 12 foot beam, screwing it all together, moving it to its destination, digging down to make it level, and finaly digging down a lot more and adding cement to make it not wobble.

Lizzie saved one of her gifts for Sunday morning and enjoyed  hatching her egg before Sunday morning general conference.

 Sean brought home some donuts and cookies from the office the other day. they were all very very yummy!

 Elroy woke Sean and I up one morning. We though he just needed to go potty, but even after he went out, he just couldn't settle down. I got up to take a look and noticed he was bleeding from his bumb. We checked it out and took him down to my parents and woke them up. We all decided to take him into the overnight clinic. He had to have some glands drained and he had to wear the cone on his head for several days.

the start of building the swing set

The weekend before Lizzie's birthday we went to Pizza Pie Cafe and had some delicious pizza and Lizzie got the cookie monster. We all sang to her and she LOVED it! 

We were invited to one of Sean's work friends house for dinner. Andrew and Sarah and their sweet Irish Setter Birdie were wonderful hosts. Brett loved playing with Birdie. Birdie was also as tall as the table which made dinner interesting! 

Brett bought a fitness watch and was so giddy about it. He wore it for 3 days before it got lost at school, sad!

An example of one of Alana's conference notes.

The General Conference store had stick on nails and the girls bought those right away. They were unfortunately way too big for their fingers! 

Alana with her nails on

Grandpa tried his on too

Lizzie's pile of gifts she woke up to after her nap on Saturday

She loves her slide!

opening gifts

snuggling with daddy while watching Priesthood session

We invited Papa and Mimi, Grandma and Grandpa, Neil, Rebecca, Kaden, and Lexi over for some pizza and cake on Sunday. We had yummy homemade pizza and veggies and fruit salads, then we had some kitty cat games where the kids had to drink milk like a cat and then pop a balloon with paws (socks on their hands). We opened presents and ate this yummy cat cake with oreos inside. Lizzie was thrilled with all the attention and everyone enjoyed the get together!

Papa and Mimi got Lizzie some Minnie Bowtique legos =)