Hogle Zoo Field Trip

My friend Missy, a fellow homeschooler and church member, has a family pass to Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City and invited us to go with her as her guests one lovely day the end of March.  I am pretty sure everyone else in the metro area also took advantage of the gorgeous weather and showed up the same day (seriously, it was crazy busy for mid-week), but we all had a great time!

Lily’s 5th Birthday

This year – Lily scored in the party department!  It always seems that her other sisters get parties and Lily never does.  Not so anymore.  We invited all of her preschool friends over for a party the Saturday before her birthday.

I tried to come up with a theme and since I didn’t want anything character-based (like Dora or Elmo), I settled on “rainbow.”  My inspiration was most definitely Jill’s birthday party, but a quick Pinterest search also revealed other fun ideas:

Lily invited all of the kids in her preschool class.  Here is our invitation (which I found here): Rainbow cupcakes with rainbow sprinkles


Rainbow pom-poms

Thank you gifts (with Jill’s homemade tags): rainbow Twizzlers and marshmallow “clouds”

For lunch, each of the kids created their own mini pizzas, adding whatever toppings looked good.

The eating portion didn’t take nearly as long as I thought it would (ha!) so the kids moved right along to opening presents.  I had to stand there and police the presents – “let Lily do it, kids!” – as everyone wanted to help (as you can see from the photo below, Emma was one of the worst offenders).

The kids filled the rest of the party time playing with new toys and taking over the basement.  Lily had an absolute blast and was overjoyed to be the center of attention for a little bit.

Sunday we celebrated with all of our Kay family, combining Asher and Lily’s birthdays.  On Lily’s actual birthday (Monday), we went out to eat at Golden Corral (her choice, a popular request from the girls).  Piper fell asleep on the way home, so it was a small crowd opening presents that night.

Lily scored some new clothes and a Boz the Big Green Bear DVD (Christian children’s character), and a butterfly garden (caterpillars to come).  I think she had a perfect weekend.

It was a full weekend of celebrating Lily, which she relished and we loved to see.

Happy birthday Lily, my big 5 year old!

Piper’s VIP Day

Every year at preschool, the kids get a VIP day – a time when their family is invited to preschool for the day to help celebrate their birthday.  They get a birthday crown, bring their favorite book to read to the class (Piper chose to bring Pinkalicious), and bring their favorite treats for snacktime.  Piper’s VIP Day was February 12 and she had such a fun time celebrating with her family and preschool friends.

Life in Pictures {Winter Edition}

I got a new quilt top pieced.  The colors are turquoise, coral and lime green.  It doesn’t sound like it should work – but it does! I love it.  The color scheme grew out of some scraps I had, which I supplemented with a few new prints from the quilt store and an old Gymboree shirt I cut up (seriously, cutting up little girl shirts is getting to be a go-to bag of tricks; there are some cute prints).  I found the pattern on Riley Blake’s blog (who is one of my favorite fabric designers – Emma’s baby quilt is her fabric).

I wish I could tell you what they were spelling, ha ha!


I found an old puzzle which originated from my grandma’s house.  The United States is on one side, but apparently that was too simple, so Ava and Lily flipped it over and put together a puzzle of the world map.  What smartie pants!

Ava took some great pictures of Piper and Lily:


A thrift store visit produced a knockout dress that I picked up for my next hot date night (like I have a lot of those, ha!).  The hair’s not looking bad either.

Ava built an amazing tower out of whatever she could find around the house.  I don’t think putting it all away was as much as building it, but she was so proud and wanted me to take a picture of her accomplishment.

Middle of the night daddy lovin’.  Sometimes all you need is a hug.

Other Christmas Happenings

Church Children’s Program

The annual Children’s Program at church was on December 15.  Ava played an angel while the other two were sheep.  The girls were so excited that daddy came to watch them.  They all did a great job!

Children’s Museum

Our homeschool group organized a field trip to the Gateway Children’s Museum on December 18.  The girls love this museum, but I can’t handle all four by myself, so I was glad that Elliott took the day off (all those darn vacation days that somehow got saved up and he had to “use them or lose them”) and came along with us.  As always, it never failed to disappoint.  We had a blast!

Zoo Lights

Christmastime wouldn’t be complete without our annual pilgrimage to Zoo Lights at Hogle Zoo.  It was pretty cold this year, so we suited up appropriately (snow suits and all) but when push came to shove, we opted to hit the Reptile House and the tigers before heading home.  It was pretty busy the night we went and the kids were just too cold and overwhelmed to really want to see more.