Samuel's 8th birthday

Samuel turned a whopping eight years old on Friday, February 1st, 2019. We took him to Jump Craze for the occasion. But first we woke him up with the birthday song and a kitty.

Fancy videographer in his pajamas and a kiss for the kitty.

Waffles for breakfast. 

One, two, three, four kids! Also, take note of the carpeted stairs over Samuel's shoulder... We'd been working on changing over the main floor's flooring since the middle of January. We finished the living room on January 17-19th and the dining room and kitchen the 20-22nd.

 Behold the beautiful floor! But really the point was supposed to be that we're watching The Price is Right altogether, our usual thing for Terry's day off. 

Cute little birthday boy with his dog.

As soon as the show was over Terry went to work tearing out the stairs' and landings' carpet. It was going to be a beautiful day in the 50s so he wanted to visit the dump and get rid of all the project's junk once and for all. 

Afterward all of us chipped in to start pulling staples out from the risers and treads. Terry just looked over my should while I typed this and asked if I was seriously posting a photo of his butt, saying I have no shame. 😂😇😆

Bare stairs!

Then we went to the dump.

Finally we made it to Jump Craze to celebrate the birthday boy. 

Here's a little taste of the fun they had. 

A friend very kindly borrowed us a gift card to make the trip more affordable (Kaleah H.). That place is expensive!

Most of the coupons I see are for a half priced second hour after paying pull price for the first hour. The kids were pretty ecstatic the first ten minutes but by the end of the hour they were exhausted. 

Noah and Evie gravitated to the dodge ball area to the left.

After launching themselves into those pits, they went to the check out the rest of the place, which included running up these slanted trampolines and sliding back down.

Taking a rest.

There's the dodge ball area.

Noah looked so incredibly tall compared his siblings and all the rest of the kids there.

He's all arms and legs now-a-days.

Check out how high he could go!

I had him jump again, this time without the girls in the way.

A video of his big jumps.

Evie's turn.

She had perfected her flips on our own backyard trampoline and spent a lot of time on them here.

So flexible.

I liked the progression of her flips...

Ha!

Landing it. 

Zooming in on her face is so funny. 😂

Samuel's turn for flips.

He enjoyed playing dodge ball too. 

Flippity flip.

Boing.

And finally, Ezra's turn. 

Bring it on!

Upside-down boy.

He's floating!

I took all my favorite mid-air photos and put them into one.

One more.

From there the kids rested in the car while Terry and I grabbed some new stair treads at Menards.

Once home I still had to make dinner and cake! 

Finally time for cake!

Happy birthday to Samuel!

Happy birthday to you!

Noah took the video for us. 

Just my parents were able to come over but we celebrated with Terry's family later.

My parents got Samuel a new red watch. We put my dad in charge of that since he loves watches. He got him a very nice G-Shock, but it's huge. Samuel loves it. 

He also loved his little Pokemon Charmander toy. Happy birthday to our beloved Samuel!

Our third Stick Horse Rodeo

On Saturday, January 26th, Ezra was the last of our family to compete in the Stock Show's Stick Rodeo. After this year he'll be too big!

We only discovered it three years ago so it's a bummer we never had Evie in there too. But since Samuel won two years ago and Ezra won last year, we probably shouldn't complain. 

We were a little worried he would win again this year since that costume is awfully lucky, but he didn't. 

Best buddies.

Getting in line.

There were lots and lots of tots!

I zoomed in on Terry and his parents across the way. Shari and her crew couldn't come this year due to Upward basketball, which was a bummer. 

Lined up for the anthem.

Ezra kept putting his horse in the air and before long all the boys were doing it. They'd also dig in the sawdust with the sticks. Boys are funny. 

Barrel racing.

Those rodeo queens are so much help. None of the kids know what to do. 😂

Video footage

Pole bending.

He fell down once, which was quite cute. But really it was because his boots are like two or three sizes too big. Ha! They're all we have.

Pole bending video.

Terry stayed until Ezra just finished up because he had to go to the mall for a mission trip. He's organized these in-town mission trips for an opportunity to have spiritual conversations and share the gospel. Noah's gone with him twice!

Waiting to be released for the free-style portion where they just run wild. 

Off he goes, clomping around in those huge boots, the poor boy.

So cute.

They didn't even play music this year!

Afterwards we went to the petting zoo per usual.

Samuel attempting to pet a sheep who was so much like Luna.

Adorable little lambs!

The escalator is the high point of the kids' year. See what I did there? 😂 Unfortunately, the cousins weren't there, and neither was Evie, and they're the ones who get the most excited. She had a birthday party to go to. 

This was by far the coolest display at the Stock Show. SDSU put it on. Not sure what they use it for, but it was like an interactive topographic map displayed on sand. You could manipulate the sand; dig in it for water and build it up for mountains. 

Huge tractor = Grampa eye candy. From there we went to pick up Evie and eat at Culvers altogether. 

Noah's second Suzuki recital

On Sunday, January 20, 2019, we took a break from our wood flooring project of the previous three days for Noah's Suzuki piano recital. Noah and Evie have been playing piano with Miss Kathy since the summer of 2014. I cannot believe it's been nearly five years! Mind blown. 

Anyway, she does Suzuki music with them, which basically means they learn more advanced music than they can read, and they learn it by ear. They also memorize it. All of it. In September of 2016 Noah completed and performed his first Suzuki book (Oh my word, those pictures). And on this day, we finally got around to his second book performance. 

He memorized and performed 13 songs! It took him about 20 minutes to get through all of them. 

We invited Amanda and her crew over to listen. They were particularly interested since Abigail and Julia also play with Miss Kathy. My and Terry's parents came over too. 👍 Only notice how the girls are seated on all the remaining wood flooring boxes, ha ha.

A small sample.

Miss Kathy had shown me the gift that she had made for him a couple weeks before and all of the sudden I was a lot more motivated to make the recital happen (was supposed to do it over Christmas but forgot amidst all the chaos). Notice the card...a Star Wars TIE Fighter...

She sewed him a Star Wars duffel bag! She used RCC colors and figured he could use it for track and cross country. How perfect is that?! 💙 There's that same Star Wars fabric on the inside. 

I made all of Noah's favorite snacks (brickle bites and puppy chow) and everyone stayed to hang out and chat for a while afterwards.

Noah, Abigail, Julia, and Samuel on the old carpeted stairs. Don't they look terrible? The stairs, not the kids. The kids look great. The following week we began completing those stairs in new wood flooring.

See?

The guys in the empty but beautiful new floored living room.

Once everyone left, the kids went to play their weekend video game quota and we hung out upstairs enjoying the fruit of our labors. 

Terry did Luna's tricks with her. Here's Play Dead. 

She'll also keep a treat on her nose until we give her permission to eat it. This time she launched it off her nose. You can see it flying away, left of her ears. 😂

She can also catch snacks thrown at her, unlike some of those broken dogs who can't. Ha! You can see the snack just about to go into her mouth. 😹