Kenzie Turns 9!

We started off Kenzie's birthday celebration the day before at Odyssey One.

The played hide and seek almost the whole time.

They found a really good hiding spot :)

We brought some friends with us. Eden and Kenzie

Phoenix and Kenzie

After Jackson's soccer game that night grandma gave Kenzie her presents.

Kenzie was excited to find a lot of candy!

Kenzie was happy to start her birthday with some Girl Meets World.

Then presents!

She really wanted tall boots!

And booties

She was so happy Jackson got them for her.

She also got lots of Calico Critters.

Opening her card from Grandma Dance.

Trying on her new clothes!

Eating her breakfast of champions: applesauce and candy.

Next we had 4 soccer games. Coleman, Kenzie, and two for Jordan. Jordan was only supposed to have one, but three teams were all booked at the same time. So Jordan played both of them right after each other, which delayed the rest of the games for the day too. Doug took the kid, besides Jordan, to Chick Fil-A for lunch and ice cream.

Kenzie's last present came on her birthday. Wheelie Shoes! I almost forgot I was going to get them for her, so I only ordered them a couple days before her birthday.

After we got home from soccer we had about 40 minutes to get ready for Kenzie's party. Luckily Kenzie had made a list of games she wanted to play, because I hadn't done anything, besides getting the goody bags, for the party. We cleaned up, blew up balloons, made an obstacle course, and got the cake baking just in time for the guests to arrive. They played Legos while we waited for everyone to show up.

Then Going to Jerusalem.

They did an obstacle course.

The last obstacle was to sit on the couch, which got harder and harder with each kid finishing the course.

Next we did a balloon popping game. Camryn and Mikah opted out of playing. Camryn found a place far away so she didn't have to listen, Mikah stayed around to watch.

Tucker couldn't get his balloon to pop. He kept trying different balloons, and he tried using his feet. But nothing was working for him. After the rest of the other team had popped theirs he was finally able to pop it.

Doug went to pick up the pizza and the kids played Heads Up 7 Up while we waited.

After they finished eating they played Freeze Dance until it was time to open presents.

Then Kenzie opened presents.

And had cake. Then it was just play time until the parents came. The boys mostly ran around wild in the basement and the girls colored their hair. Then they all went outside and played soccer.

Cam and Alli stayed longer while their parents were at a birthday party too :)

We watched Mulan and then just hung out until Ash and Konrad came. Doug and the kids made up a synchronized ball throwing game. They were pretty good at it.

Kenzie and Cam played with Kenzie's new Calico Critters.

We had Alli and Kenzie's family party a week and a day after Kenzie's birthday.

Happy Birthday Kenzie Girl!

All about Kenzie:

She loves reading, soccer, drawing, writing, watching tv, and playing with friends.

She loves treats.

She hates breakfast. She'll find something she loves and eat it for a week or two and then doesn't want it anymore. I try to tell her to just rotate through the things she likes, but that also means I have to make sure I have a variety of food for her or she ends up trying to eat pretzels for breakfast. Right now she likes oatmeal, sausage, yogurt, and some cereal.

She's loud.

She loves dance.

She loves performing.

She's sweet.

She pushes limits.

She starts a lot of sayings that other kids pick up. Things like, "Oh, how interesting." (said in a bored voice, and is apparently from Despicable Me 2.)

Girl Meets World is her favorite show right now.

Before He Cheats and Can't Stop the Feeling are her favorite songs.

She loves playing music in her room.

She loves to organize her room.

She forgets to clean up after herself a lot.

She has recently decided she really wants to be a cheerleader, but doesn't want to give up soccer for it.

She doesn't sit still very well.

She loves to bounce around and wiggle.

She doesn't love math.

She's fun.

She's silly.

She's creative.

She loves her hair in a pony tail and hates buns.

She loves shopping.

She loves making lists. Packing lists, present lists, what do on her birthday (or other special days) lists, what to wear lists.

We love her so much and are so happy she's ours!

Swimming

We finally went swimming after getting our 3 month passes through the Covington Unplugged program. We went on a Friday night, but wasn't too busy. Our friends, the Rabans joined us.

The aquatic center shared a parking lot with a middle school and there was a football game going on so there was no parking. I drove around several times and there was nothing. The Rabans live really close to the aquatic center though so we ended up parking there and walking. Luckily they had a lot of flashlights so we could make ourselves known to the cars driving down the street we had to walk next to.

Jack and Kenzie

The boys ended the night by trying to make the floats flip over and knock everyone off. If you look closely you can see Mason is wearing Kenzie's pink flamingo goggles :) All the other ones I brought were taken so he got stuck with those. 

Puyallup Fair

We went to Puyallup Fair again this year. This year we met up withe our friends, the Ramsays, and bought Dizzy Passes (which gave the kids unlimited rides) so it was extra fun!

We looked at the animals first thing.

The kids milked a fake cow.

Coleman didn't want to color.

The other kids did.

The lady hung up their colored pictures on the wall. Kenzie's faace lit up as she hung her up.

We went to the petting zoo.

I'm still surprised when Coleman willingly touches the animals. He's not quite as scared as he used to be.

Mikah competed in the mutton busting. Coleman was the only one of our kids that was young enough to do it, but he didn't want to. Although late he wished he would have.

Mikah won first place!

The kids rode rides for most of the rest of the time.

And they played games. They mostly liked to play the always a winner games.

Jack and Jordan played against each other in this racing game.

Coleman tried the ring toss game. It was really hard, but we weren't too disappointed since the prizes were gigantic.

The kids were trying to get a treat with getting locked in the cage.

Kenzie and Mikah got huge cotton candies!

Kenzie shared hers with the rest of the kids since she was too full to finish it.

Braces!

Jackson got braces!

He wasn't pleasantly surprised to find they didn't hurt as much as he expected them to.

Mackenzie had to get another expander. The first one stopped couldn't expand anymore so they put in another one. The worst part of it all was that they had to make another mold of her teeth, which makes her gag. But she was more prepared for it and I get reminding her to breathe through her nose instead of her mouth. It went much better this time.

You can see Jack in the background getting them on.

Fleet Co-op

The kids and I are doing a co-op this year on Mondays. It's with a lot of other families. There are 2 classes for almost every grade. Jordan's is one of the only ones combined.  

I teach Jordan's Lego class. He also is doing an Oregon Trail class.

Coleman's classes are games and an outdoor class. He loves them both. Tonight he said we should have an outdoors class here. Then he said we should have a games class here too :)

In Legos, each week the kids will have a challenge and then they work in teams to accomplish the challenge. This week they had to build a tower with 100 blocks and make it as tall as they could. Jordan's group made theirs the tallest. They kept adjusting it to make it taller until class was over.

Mackenzie's classes are cooking and arts/games class. Today they played a game called Trash Panda and she loved it. She was not excited about it because she doesn't like games, but she enjoyed it so much she's added it to her ever-growing birthday list. I help out with this class the second hour of co-op.

It was a great day! We are excited for a fun year!