"SHE'S WHAT???"

One morning last week I was upstairs cleaning when Rena runs up the stairs in a panic and says "Mom, Maleah has scissors and is cutting her hair!" "SHE'S WHAT???" I say. I run downstairs and this is what I find................

A big pile of hair on the kitchen floor (and more in the garbage). I say to Maleah "What are you doing?" and she replies "well, Rena did it!"

Here is what Maleah's hair looked like by the time I stopped her scissors.

And Rena (the one that forgot to mention that she cut her hair while she was tattling on Maleah) took one big chunk out of one side. Apparently she had a comb stuck in her hair and figured instead of asking me for help it would just be easier to cut it out.

The next day we took a trip to the beauty salon and Maleah had her first ever hair cut. She did good and her hair looks good too!

This is Maleah's "after" shot. Rena didn't end up getting hers cut -- the hairstylist suggested I just "tuck it behind her ear" until it grows out a little bit more.

After the "talk" that we had I'm pretty sure neither of the girls will be cutting their own hair again anytime soon!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY RENA & ISABELLA!

Rena had another (and last!) birthday party yesterday. This one was with her friends and was at KidzBounce. She celebrated with her good friend Isabella who we have known for a few years, goes to preschool with Rena and has a birthday 1 day after Rena.

They were both treated like Princesses all day long!

And, of course, they both chose princess cakes........Rena went for just Cinderella and the Prince while Isabella chose them all!

Everybody had fun "bouncing" and playing!

And the cake, ice-cream and snacks were a big hit with everyone!

Now, this concludes Rena's birthday celebrations. There will NOT be anymore posts titled "Happy Birthday Rena"..........until next year when we start all of the celebrations over again!

A BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION AT SCHOOL

Rena got to celebrate her birthday today in her classroom at preschool. She got to choose (and provide) the snack, she got to wear a birthday sticker and hat, she got 2 different happy birthday songs and she got me in the classroom for the whole day! :)

One birthday song was sung by the class with the candles lit on the cake and the other birthday song was a musical birthday cake. It was really amazing how quiet it was in the classroom when all of the kids were trying to hear the birthday cake sing. I'm pretty sure it was the only time all morning that the room was completely quiet!

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY (AGAIN) RENA!

Rena had birthday celebration #2 today. Mike, Stacy, Megan and Alex came over for dinner and, of course, birthday cake and ice cream!

The McCullough's and Aunt Peggy definitely know what Rena likes -- fancy dancing clothes and pretty jewelry! We'll have many fun days playing dress-up with all of these new things!

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY RENA!

Today was Rena's 4th birthday and celebration #1. Rena was very excited this morning to wake up being 4 years old. She did a few laps around the downstairs to show us that she really was 4 -- because 4 year olds can run faster than 3 year olds -- and "aren't I running faster?"!

Last year I posted Rena's "at-home" birthday pictures (Happy 3rd Birthday Rena!) so here's a look back at Rena's last 4 years with professional pictures..........

Rena is 3!

Rena is 2!

Rena is 1!

Rena is 1 month old!

OUR WEEKEND

We headed up North for a night this past weekend to attend a wedding in Blaine, Washington. We met up with Stacy, Mike, Megan and Alex in Bellingham and spent the night at a hotel with them. There's not a lot to do up there (especially when it's cold) but we managed to find plenty to keep up busy and had fun doing it!

First, we went bowling. It was Cameron, Rena and Maleah's first time bowling. They would all push the ball down the lane and turn around and run back as fast as they could to where we were all sitting. A couple of times Rena & Maleah's balls didn't even make it all the way down to the pins, but they didn't care -- they still thought it was great.

Next, we went swimming. The pool at the hotel wasn't very big, but luckily there weren't many people there. Plus, it wasn't hard to clear the pool out. When people saw our group coming (with 5 kids) they cleared out pretty quick!

It was a beatiful day on the day of the wedding so we went over to The Semiahmoo Resort where the wedding was and went out by the water. Only problem was that it was cold! The kids only got to throw rocks for about 30 seconds and then it was time to head back indoors. Of course it wasn't the kids who wanted to go back indoors, but the parents!

And lastly, we made it to the wedding. The groom, Erick Roff, is an old family friend from Puyallup. Our mom's were best friends, The Roff girls were in Stacy & Mike's wedding and Stacy & I both (Stacy more than I) did some babysitting for them when they were little. So, everyone was a little bit tired by the time the wedding started (Rena and Maleah actually slept through the ceremony) but it was a beautiful wedding and reception we were glad to be there celebrating!

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

We had a Happy Day yesterday celebrating Valentine's Day. The day started with flowers for everyone.....

Mine are the middle ones....I got them the night before from Jeff! The kids each got a flower attached to a little bag of candy.

We had heart pancakes with red sprinkles on them for breakfast.

After breakfast we broke out the candy. Cameron seperated all of his skittles into piles by color and then started trading with his sisters -- his favorite color is red and he went from only having 2 reds to 8 reds. He thought that was pretty cool!

Jeff arrived home from work with a "real" flower for Rena and Maleah. Rena was a little upset the night before when I got flowers and she didn't -- she is very "girly" and loves flowers. Maleah didn't care a bit about the flowers, but if Rena would have gotten one and not Maleah I think we would have had World War III here last night.....and the flower would not have survived!

So, the day was filled with lots of treats (thanks also to Grandma and Grandpa Keyes and the fun box of goodies that they sent) and we had nice enough weather to play outside for awhile. It was a good day all around and when it was over and it was time for bed -- everyone was tired.....(including mommy)!

NOT MUCH HAPPENING!

It's been just over two weeks since I last blogged and my only reason for not blogging is that we really haven't done much to blog about. Between kids being sick, rainy dreary weather, and just plain laziness we haven't gotten out and done much. So, you would think that since we have been home quite a bit that my house would be clean.....or that I would have finished a project or two.....or maybe that I would have even started a new project. Well, I hate to admit it, but none of these things have happened. We have watched quite a few movies, read A LOT of books and invented many new games to keep us busy indoors.

So, although it wasn't really "blog material" when it was happening here's a look back at our past two weeks........

We had a "picnic" dinner of cheese & crackers and chips & salsa in front of the t.v. while we watched the superbowl. Eventhough I didn't even know who was playing when the game started we still had fun watching the game (and the commercials)!

One day we spent the whole afternoon in front of the fireplace (some of us sleeping). Cameron wasn't feeling good and actually ended up missing over a week of school. Luckily he's feeling much better now.

One of the games the kids made up was "camping in the little closet". Not much room, but they thought it was great.

This is the "little closet" and they are camping underneath the bottom set of stairs.

Cookies, of course!! We can't have a holiday around here without cut-out cookies. The kids however were not impressed with my 2 heart cut-outs and 1 lip cut-out so we ended up with Christmas trees, reindeer and stars to celebrate Valentine's Day. Oh well, it was still fun making them and they still tasted good!

Cookie decorating is serious business around here!

Sugar, sugar and more sugar! These are Rena's cookies and the only good thing I can say about these is that Rena did what she always does with the cookies -- she spends the most amount of time decorating, but she doesn't even take one bite. She does, however, eat her fair share of frosting while she is decorating!

This game isn't really new, but it's been a big hit lately -- "beware of pirates"! The kids turn Cameron's bunk bed into a pirate ship and dress up in anything that they think prepares them for battle. They wait for the right time and the right person and then they attack!!! Last night it was Jeff -- as soon as he got home from work he had three little pirates attacking him with a sword, a nerf shooter and a flashlight (don't ask about the flashlight that was Maleah's weapon of choice).

And this is one of our lastest new games.......building towers with Lincoln Logs just to shoot them down with the Nerf shooter. Atleast he's shooting at the tower and not his sister!