Ashlyn

What a rough birthday! Yesterday afternoon, Ashlyn wasn't acting like her normal self and we realized she had a fever. I was hoping it would go away quickly but was pretty sure it wouldn't and I was right. She ended up with fifths disease and felt miserable.

Thankfully there were moments of brightness. She got to open her presents in the morning and got all four Frozen Barbies, which was just what she wanted. It was a great way to start the day.

The rest of the day was quite busy. Grandma and Grandma Bohman had their mission farewell and Dad had meetings in the evening.We knew it would be like that so we asked her several days earlier if we could celebrate her birthday with extended family on Monday. She thought that was a great idea until tonight. She really wanted to have grandmas and grandpas over. Instead we frosted cupcakes which seemed to take her mind off of things.

I thought she was pretty lucky, though. She got to eat cake and ice cream two days in a row! Fancy cupcakes the first day and.............

Ariel the next. And even though we had to uninvite her cousins (to avoid spreading the virus), she got to spend time with her grandmas and grandpa which put a smile on her face.

Some Things We Love About Ashlyn:

Her face is so expressive. Her eyes smile before her mouth does and they get big when she has something exciting to say. She is such a good big sister. She is always helping Emmalyn do something and loves to share with her, especially her food. She is very very smart and likes to tell us what she has learned at school.  I can't believe how well she knows her letters, numbers and shapes and she still has another year of preschool before kindergarten. 

Nine

Kali is growing up so fast. She is already nine. This year her birthday fell on a Saturday so everyone was home to share in the fun. In the morning she opened presents. Then she got a haircut. Then she played with her sisters and her toys.

She also spent some time trying out her sewing machine. I hadn't given her any instructions and next thing I knew, she had already sewn a pillow for her Barbies.

I told her several times that I wasn't going to do anything fancy for her cake after her eighth birthday. Yet she somehow managed to talk me into doing something and this is what we ended up with. It was a bit of a challenge but turned out pretty cute as long as you don't look too close. Family came over to spend the evening with us and she was in heaven.

A couple of the things we love about Kali. She loves to be the center of attention which means she's willing to try anything new. She's very driven and likes to be good at everything. Her determination and drive have allowed her to excel in many areas. She is an excellent writer and very intelligent. She's dependable and very sensitive to the spirit. On the other hand, she's still a kid at heart. She loves princesses and dolls and doesn't want to ever grow up. She is such a good example to her younger sisters and a big help to me.

My Birthday

I had such a wonderful birthday this year. My girls made me some homemade gifts. Kali made a huge flower out of paper and Sadie colored pictures of elephants (my favorite animal) on pieces of tissue paper. Then Josh met the girls and I at Red Robin so that I didn't have to cook for the evening and surprised me with these beautiful flowers. Afterward he took the girls and let me go shopping for myself, child-free. It was fantastic!

Josh's Birthday

Unfortunately Josh had to work on his birthday. But in order to make it a special day, we made sure he woke up to presents on the piano bench. The girls did an excellent job making him some special gifts. Sadie gave him a homemade card with very kinds things written on it and Kali made a horse (Josh's favorite animal) out of paper. She had Ashlyn help her color it. It was very cute.

Sadie

Josh had scouts on Sadie's birthday so we invited family over the night before for cake and ice cream. Sadie requested a castle cake and loved how it turned out.

She was all smiles the morning of her birthday and loved opening her presents. It always makes you feel good when you get a good reaction, especially when you're struggling to know what to get them.

Here's the goods.

I have no idea where her desire for a guitar came from, but she's been asking for one for quite some time now. Kali and Ashlyn got her that. And Josh and I got her the jewelry box. She loves little knick knacks has been storing them in an old broken jewelry box. She loves her new one.

Then on the evening of her birthday, we used a leftover cupcake for her candles and sang to her before Josh headed off to scouts. She didn't seem to mind one bit.

Ashlyn

Our cute little Ashlyn is now three. She had been telling people for months that it was almost her birthday. Thankfully 90 days and 10 days is all the same to her. It didn't seem to matter that her birthday was months away when she'd ask, she was simply excited that her birthday was coming up.

She chose pizza for her birthday dinner.

And Aurora for her birthday cake.

Some of the things we love about Ashlyn:

She loves Barbies. Rapunzel is one of her favorites, but she calls her Re-pun-punzel. She also really likes Ariel and Sleeping Beauty. Her favorite color has been pink for a long time but she has recently added purple to the favorite list too. She looks forward to going to aerobics in the mornings so that she can play with her best friend, Asia. She also likes to run errands with me and is constantly asking how many more stores we need to go to. She's disappointed when we're done and always tries to convince me to go to one or two more before heading home. She also loves her cousins but is often confused and calls them her friends instead of cousins and tells us that she's going to marry them (boys and girls alike). She has such beautiful big blue eyes, but they disappear every time she smiles into squinty little lines, especially when you're asking her to smile for a picture. She loves her baby sister, Emmalyn, and is usually in her face until Emma screams or hits her. She is also very independent, insisting she can do everything by herself including what her big sisters do. She's constantly telling us she loves us and insists on repeating it until you repeat it back to her. In the car, she loves to say, "Mom, mom..." until I look and ask, "What?" Then she says, "I love you." and giggles. I've started doing the same to her and it's our fun little game. Last of all, she loves to sing and can actually hold a decent tune for her age. But my favorite is when she sings at the top of her lungs. She's kind of hard to understand and her singing is no longer in tune, but she loves doing it.

Emmalyn

Our precious Emma has turned 1 year old. It's hard to believe because she's still so tiny and just started crawling last week. Her birthday was a little different because Josh had scouts, but she didn't know any better and probably enjoyed it even more having it dragged out over a few days.

We started the celebration with the Smith side of the family on Sunday. I made pudding poke cupcakes and we let her have at one. She loved it! As a matter of fact, every time we glanced away, she stole another one. I think she ended up eating three cupcakes all by herself and would have had more had we let her. She's a girl after my own heart. She also put on a show while eating because she heard music playing on Grandpa's iPad. So she starting moving her shoulders to the beat while smiling and shoving cake in her mouth. It was pretty cute.

Then on Monday, we invited Grandma and Grandpa Bohman over and had her official birthday cake. After the previous night, she knew what was in front of her and wanted it badly. We were doing all we could to get a picture of her near the cake without having her grab handfuls of it. She was in tears until we distracted her with the smarties on the table. The sunshine cake was Josh's idea and thankfully turned out cute. I was just excited to put the mini M&M's on it because Emmalyn had eaten some on Valentine's Day and loved them.

On her real birthday, we let her open her presents. I guess I should say we let the other girls open presents for her. They were almost more excited than she was. Since Josh had scouts in the evening we didn't do much else, but I made sure to have some play time with her and tried to make her day exciting.

Our special little Emmalyn has been such a joy in our lives. We love her cute little personality. My personal favorite is when she blows us kisses, but everything about her makes us smile.

Pajama Party

We let Kali have a birthday party with friends this year and I think she started planning it during the summer. She knew almost right away that she wanted it to be a pajama party. She even bought footsie pajamas for the special day with her own money because I wasn't about to buy them for an eight-year-old. Then we had to come up with a cake. It took us a long time to figure that one out, but thanks to Cindy, we came up with this cute bed idea. I was pretty proud of how it turned out and Kali loved it. She said she was the girl with the short blond hair and that her best friend was right next to her with the long brown hair. I didn't plan it that way, but it worked out.

To start the party off, they each got to decorate a pillowcase to take home with fabric markers. Kali's was a jungle with monkeys. Each monkey was one of her friends. I was a lizard and Josh was an elephant. She also had the great idea of having all her friends sign the back. For games, we played a snoring game and musical pillows. In the snoring game, all but one person climbed inside sleeping bags while that person was out of the room. The person then came in and tapped each sleeping bag to listen to the snores and tried to guess which was Kali. It was pretty entertaining.

Kali's Birthday

Kali is officially eight now. She woke up to some very exciting presents this year too. Sadie picked out a cute fairy dress-up costume for her. Ashlyn gave her a heart necklace that she really wanted for herself. And Josh and I gave her an iPod nano.

We had a fun day listening to music, painting nails and doing makeup. Then we invited her cousin over for a playdate. For dinner, Kali chose Cafe Rio. I wasn't about to argue because it meant I wouldn't have to cook.

And then in the evening we invited family over for cake and ice cream.

Some of the things we love about Kali:

She is very friendly and likes to have fun. She is such a good big sister. She loves playing with her sisters and especially likes to help take care of Emma. I think Kali is Emma's favorite person next to me. She's very smart. Not only is she a quick learner, but she retains information very well too. She always wants to do her best and because of that she is sometimes very hard on herself. She's also very sensitive which makes her quick to forgive and quick to recognize the spirit. And last of all, she isn't afraid to try new things. As a matter of fact, if it involves climbing or anything physically challenging, she jumps at the opportunity.

Ears Pierced

Kali's grandma payed for her to get her ears pierced for her birthday present this year. She was so excited that she stopped counting how many days until her birthday and started counting how many days until she would get her ears pierced. She talked about it with her friends non-stop and could hardly wait. When the day finally arrived she was still very excited. She picked out her earrings and then suddenly she got very quiet. I could tell that she had gotten nervous about the painful part of the process. She is one girl that DOES NOT like pain. It was like she couldn't focus on anything anyone was telling her and I could tell she was thinking about what was about to happen. Thankfully the store clerk gave her a stuffed animal to hold on to. I was afraid they would do one ear and she would decide not to get the other one done.

But wouldn't you know, she ended up being very brave. She didn't even say "ow", and calmly let the clerk pierce her second ear too. She admitted that it hurt a little, but it was the best I've ever seen her deal with pain.

Ninety-Four

Grandma Bair has turned 94. Between her and her dad, it's apparent that longevity runs in the Astle blood. For the last two years, all the grandkids have sent her homemade birthday cards because that's what she has done for each of us our entire lives. It's been kind of fun to personalize them and send meaningful photos in them. This year we added a dollar bill just like she always did for us when we were young. I love this woman and the example she has always been to me.

King Daddy

The girls spent a lot of time preparing a birthday present for Josh this year. Kali learned how to play a simplified version of his favorite Hymn (How Firm a Foundation) on the piano. Sadie and Ashlyn colored him pictures and then all three of them worked together to make him a crown so he could be a king. They actually made him two crowns because they didn't know how big his head was. It was pretty cute.

Grandpa Parry's 80th

Grandpa Parry turned 80 years old today and we got to go to a fun celebration in his honor. Seeing how Grandpa is a cowboy at heart, they had a cowboy theme and it turned out so cute. This life size poster of him was probably my favorite thing.

They had pinatas, hats, yummy food, fun dancing and more. Josh really got into the spirit of things. But if you know how much he's like his grandpa in that he loves horses, hats and westerns, it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise.

A Princess Party

Grandma Parry turned 75 today and was thrown a princess party. It turned out so much fun. The girls dressed up in their prettiest princess dresses and insisted I put makeup on them. They played fun games, got their nails painted, and danced to fun music with disco balls. Grandma seemed to be enjoying herself too. She got to wear a crown and dress in pink (her favorite color).

Sadie

Our little Sadie is five now.

She has been looking forward to this day for quite some time now. Probably not for the usual reasons you may think of. She's a little random that way, and is excited that I will now let her brush her teeth by herself one time a day (which is such a Sadie kind-of-thing to be excited about). Not only do random little things mean a lot to her, but she enjoys random little toys. I really struggled knowing what to get her for her birthday, but thankfully she seemed to be happy with everything.

Here are some of the things that we love about Sadie. She is such a good girl. Any time she gets in trouble, it's a one-time-thing and done. She knows what her boundaries are and follows them. She's also good at making sure her sisters are doing what they're supposed to and lets us know when they're not, but not in a tattle-tale sort of way. She loves to be a helper, particularly with folding laundry. And whenever I ask one of the other girls to go do something or get something for me, Sadie quickly jumps up and tries to beat them to it. We also love her laugh. It is so genuine and infectious. She's usually the last one sitting at the dinner table every night because she doesn't want to eat her vegetables, but does as she's told and slowly but surely eats them. She's also usually the last one at the breakfast table because she always eats a bowl of cereal with no milk in it. I think it's because she doesn't like soggy cereal, but instead of eating smaller portions or less milk, she just eats plain cereal. She's also our little poser. In almost every picture she's doing a fun little pose and it actually makes her quite photogenic.

And lastly, she's very kind, smart and beautiful and we love her very much.

Candy Land Birthday Party

Thanks to a friend, I got the wonderful idea of throwing a Candy Land themed birthday party for Sadie. She's our little sweet tooth so it was perfect for her. A lot of time and preparation went into a short two hours of fun, but I think it ended up turning out pretty cute.

The kids started off by creating their own large characters to use while playing a large version of the game. All of them turned out so unique and so cute and they had so much fun making them.

Then they played the game. I simply made large squares that instructed the kids to do fun little things to keep them laughing and playing with each other. Unfortunately the kids got a little distracted toward the end and became more interested in playing with the toys in the toy room. It would have worked a lot better outside, but it had become quite windy and we were worried the game would just blow away. Oh well, you live and learn.

The path led to a huge golden castle and the winner got a gigantic lollipop.

Then we moved on to more candy!!! I made a pinata that looked like a big piece of candy (which was way too much work) and filled it over half full of candy. The sad thing is that the candy ended up being too heavy and after two kids hit it, it broke in half. Thankfully the kids didn't mind. They were excited to fill their bags full of candy and then beat the broken pinata on the ground.

And last of all, the kids got to enjoy some brightly frosted cupcakes with fun candies on top. Needless to say, I sent a bunch of little kids home on sugar highs with bags full of candy. They couldn't have been more excited. And what a way to celebrate a birthday.

Two and Mischievous

Our little Ashlyn is now two, which most anyone would be able to guess after being around her for a few short minutes. She's exactly what you'd expect any two year old to be like--silly and full of mischief. She likes to try and make us laugh by putting things over her eyes or on her head and saying, "Look at me." She can often be heard saying, "Knock, knock. Who's there? Cock-a-doodle. Cock-a-doodle-who?" She loves to sing. Some of her favorites include: all the Mary Poppins songs, Can You Feel the Love Tonight, Jesus Wants Me For a Sunbeam, Down By the Bay. She also loves to color, but unfortunately uses her artistic abilities on toys and books too. She still loves lip gloss and chapstick, as well as glue sticks because she thinks they're supposed to go on her face too. She uses stools and chairs to get anything from scissors to water and she thinks she's old enough to do things like use Clorox wipes or pick up Emma's vibrator while she's in it and move it. And even though she seems to be in trouble all day long she's quick to say she's sorry and gives hugs.

For her birthday, we made sure to go to the park. She loves being outside and can't get enough of slides and swings.

And while she had fun opening and trying out all her gifts, one of her favorites had to be the Care Bear that Kali and Sadie gave her. It's grumpy bear and when we asked her to show us her grumpy face, this is what she gave us: