Birthday Festivities

Well we survived another birthday week at our house.  I am always so excited for our birthday week to get here and then usually end up pretty exhausted by the time it is all over.  We started a few weeks early with our celebrations when Greg threw me a surprise birthday party.  I was truly surprised which is hard to do for me and it was super sweet of Greg to think of me and make a special day just for me.  We had a great time celebrating with my closest friends and family.  Greg took charge or the inviting, the food and drink, and even got the house all prepared.  I felt very loved and lucky to have such special people in my life.

We threw Briggs birthday party the next weekend with our whole family.  Briggs wanted hot wheels and tracks and man were his wishes answered.  We now have a living room that is fully covered with tracks and hot wheels.  I can't complain because he is thrilled with all his new things.  We had a great party complete with a hot wheels cake and all his cousins to play with.  I always love hosting parties and even more when they are to celebrate our sweet boy. 

Greg's birthday happen to fall on a post season Royals home game and he was lucky enough to grab a ticket to.  He went with his brother Mark and they had a blast.  I was a little jealous of the text and pictures during the game, what an exciting time for royals fans.  Based upon the time he strolled in that night the after partying was just as fun.  I think he would say it was one of his favorite birthdays to date.

(lucky candy cane boxers, sure that is why they won!)

On Tuesday Briggs actual birthday he marched into our room at about 5:30 in the morning to announce "I am really 6".  Being that he is now is school birthdays are super exciting when you get to be the special person for the day.  He chose to take chocolate dipped pretzel rods with sprinkles and m&m's for his treat with juice boxes.  He got to wear the birthday crown for the day and had a few other perks.  For diner that night he chose to go to his favorite train restaurant Fritz's.  Overall another successful bunch of birthdays.  Love sharing my birthday with my two favorite boys.  

Lets Go Royals

I suppose this is an appropriate time to do a Royals posts as they are burning their way through the post-season.  We decided that we should expose our kids to one of the Kansas City gems, a Royals game.  This was their first time at a game and it turned out to be a good time more for them than us but none the less we can now say we did it.  It was a little disappointing to be at Kaufman and be riding a carousal while an amazing game was taking place but really what did we expect when taking a 3 ad 5 year old to a game.  We hit up all the kids activities and they loved that, Briggs got a great hit on the mini field and loved running the bases.  Of course as with any good baseball fan the food was the biggest hit.  They loved eating their pretzels and taking in the game.  We made it till about the 5th inning when Harper announced her legs were tired and she was ready to go home.  Glad we can say we went but it might be a few more years before we attempt it again with the kid.  Good Luck Royals on the rest of the season.  World Series Champs perhaps!!!


                                            
                                            
                                  
                                                                     
                                  
                                  

Kindergarten

While seeing our summer pass by is always bittersweet we had so many reasons to be excited as we entered into the new school year.  1st and foremost we having a big boy at our house who is now attending Kindergarten.  Briggs is attending Lansing Elementary School as a Kindergarten student.  We are so lucky that Greg was able to take Briggs to school with him this year.  Not only does it make our lives a bit easier with a lot less running around but it is so comforting knowing that Dad is just down the hall.  I have to say that he is by far the cutest Kindergartener I have even seen.  We have started the year off with flying colors.  He was adapted so great to a "real school" setting.  He loves going to school each day and loves his teacher Miss Ernzen, we love her too.  He has 18 kids in his class and currently his favorite thing at school is lunch and PE (go figure).  We could not be more proud of him being such a big boy. 


I was able to take a day off school to go on his first field trip to the Weston Red Barn Farm.  It was Briggs first bus ride, so exciting, and my first time on a bus with 40 kindergarteners (AHHH!).  Kindergarten teachers definitely have a special spot in heaven.  I have always loved the Red Barn Farm and it was so fun to see Briggs interact with his peers.  Not sure I will ever sign up to teach 5 year olds but it was sure fun to experience it for a day. 




                               


                               


                              

                                            
                             

Summer Getaways

While I love the time off in the summer to spend time with my kids I also love having a little more time for some adult fun.  Greg and I were super lucky this summer to be able to do a few adult only trips.  In July I attended a girls trip at tablerock with 18 fabulous women, mostly aunts and cousins.  We spent the extended weekend laughing, staying in our jammies till noon, shopping, eating incredible meals, and enjoying each others company.  I feel so lucky to have such amazing women in my life who love each other and can truly appreciate a good time.  Looking forward to our next trip.

                          

 

         


 Our last trip of the summer was a trip to Colorado with my cousin Jason and his wife Holli. Jason, another cousin Liz, and I were selected to be the planning committee for the Hoelting reunion in summer 2015.  Since Liz lives in Steamboat we thought it only right that we take a little trip to do some planning. We spent our first night outside Denver with my cousin Kathrine and her husband Paul before heading to Steamboat for the remainder of our trip.  I always forget how beautiful Colorado is, I think I could live there.  Between attending concerts, having patio conversations, hiking, and exploring we actually got a little planning done as well.  Great trip from beginning to end.  The Colorado girls as always were fabulous hosts.


                               


                                




                                




                                

Tablerock

Don't judge me I know that my last post was in July and I literally let the summer pass by without any documentation.  This is going to be my poor attempt to re-live our fabulous summer via the blog. I always want to keep up with the blog because I love looking back at all the great times we have had and having a space to keep all the stories that I would probably forget.



As always our family adores summer and all the fun and festivities that come with having 10 weeks off to just be together.  We really jammed packed so much into our summer this year that while it was fun I think we will plan on a little bit more of nothing time next year.  I believe I left off with 4th of July for summer posts so I will pick up there and give a brief recap of all our summer fun.

The second weekend in July we headed Tablerock lake for a getaway with the Herron clan.  As a child we visited table rock/Branson on a regular basis and I have so many fond memories that I am so excited to share with the kids.  We went down on Wednesday morning to see our great condo conveniently located right beside the pool.  The kids were ecstatic to have the pool and lake so close and could not wait to jump right in.  Thursday we decided to make our first trip to Silver Dollar City with our kids.  Growing up we went all the time and I love SDC, Greg however had never been so he was able to experience it with the kids too.  We had a beautiful day for the park and the kids were in heaven.  They loved the rides and all the novelty things that SDC has to offer. We saved the water rides till the end of the day so we would not have to walk around wet all day.  Little did we know that a massive rainstorm was rolling in and intended on getting all of us soaked.  We had a very soggy walk to the car but the kids did not seem to mind at all.



We spent all day Friday at the pool, swimming, and relaxing.  Briggs who had previously been a bit apprehensive about the water suddenly became a little fish.  He swam for hours straight and I am pretty sure he would have swam through the night.  It was fabulous having the pool within a few steps of our place.



Saturday we rented the mother of all pontoon boats to hit the lake for a few hours.  The pontoon boat had a top deck with slide attached.  The kids were thrilled to be on the lake and for the most part dying to get in the water.  I was pretty shocked that both Briggs and Harper got in the water and swam all over (there was lots of talk about sharks and huge fish pre-trip).  A few of the kids actually took a minute to catch a nap on the cruise.  Saturday night we headed into town for some go-carting and ski-ball action.  Briggs was over the moon about driving go-carts and we are still hearing about what an amazing race car driver he is.  I love all the arcade games and always end up spending way too much money on all of it.



All together we had a awesome trip and made some great memories with our cousins and Doe Doe and Papa.  Thanks for all your planning Doe Doe and everyone that helped make the trip a great success.