October 28

We had the girls at our house this week for Joy School. We were learning about B, so we had b-b-bananas, b-b-birthday cakes (and sang to everyone, and blew out the candles 5 times), and we caught b-b-boxelder bugs- boy, that was hard.














Cecily sneaking a few spoonfuls of peanut butter.














Cecily got herself dressed and Audrey thought it was so cute that she took a picture and let her wear the outfit. She's got her red hooded sweatshirt on backwards, shorts, and pink hiking boots.














Audrey at the High School's orchestra concert- this was actually last week. Oops. She's just to the left of center, turned to talk to her stand partner.














And this is Princess Leia playing the cello, even though you can't see her very well.














Elliot ended up not feeling well on the night of his birthday, so he went up to bed early and we decided to celebrate the next day. But the little girls were all ready to sing and blow out candles, so we stuck candles in peanut butter cups and sang to all of them and blew out the candles three times.














The kids get birthday parties when they're 5, 10, and 15. This was Elliot's lucky year. Here he is with Freddy and Austin, suited up for laser tag.














Here are all of his friends ready to go.














And since one of the boys didn't come, Nate took his place. He said he finally got to use all of the skills that he'd learned in basic training. He was crawling on the floor, and using barricades to block the laser sensor so that no one could get a shot on him. He blew everyone else away. We had to remind him that they are all 10 years old. Mary was much happier to know that this is how he used his basic training skills, though.














They have contests at the Fun Park to see which birthday party can sing the loudest. The girl said that Elliot's party not only won for the day, but that she may never have heard anyone that loud. But I don't know if you could have called it singing.














Freddy was having fun being Vanna White and displaying all of the presents in a stylish and exciting way.














And Stuart decided to get in on the fun.














The cousins played on the Soft Play with Audrey and Cecily during Elliot's party.














Harriet vs. Hailey in air hockey.














We finally celebrate Elliot's birthday! His friend Nathan's parents still weren't home from the football game, so he stayed at our house and celebrated with us after the friend birthday party.














Everyone singing Happy Birthday to Elliot. Mark and Hailey and Mary and Nate helped us to celebrate.














Audrey helped the little kids to clean out their pumpkins and to design their faces. Anna hanging out in the back.














Cec and Elliot with their pumpkins and Audrey just looking cute.


















Elliot's fourth grade school picture.




















Audrey's eighth grade picture. She's a little disgusted that she was just starting to blink.

Hi, Mommy and Daddy,

I'm sitting on Mary's lap. I'm still coughing, but mean Mary made me take some medicine, so maybe it will get better soon. I ate a whole piece of french toast when I woke up in the morning. I ate even more than Anna. Caroline and Anna and I went up to Grandma's house so Mary could clean her house for a potential buyer. I watched The Little Mermaid and cried a little when Caroline took the white bear from me.

Grandma took us to McDonald's for lunch. I didn't eat a single bite of my happy meal, so Mary brought it home so we could snack on it later. I did lick my ice cream cone a few times. It was lots of fun to go through the tunnels with Caroline, especially when I could look out the window and see Mary and Grandma. I liked to wave to them. Mary had to run some errands in Ephraim, so Grandma stayed in the car with us while she went to two different libraries and Wal-Mart. We watched Sesame Street on the little TVs in the car.

I fell asleep on the way home, but I woke up as soon as Mary said, "We have to go home so Cecily can take a nap." Before Mary even knew I was awake, I said, "I don't want to take a nap." Anna took a nap and Caroline and I had to be really quiet. We went outside to play in the sandbox and I got a little sand in my eye. Then Caroline threw grass clippings at me and made me really sad. She got clippings in her hair and it was really tangled, so she had to take a bath. I was really worried. I kept coming to Mary and telling her that Caroline was done taking a bath, but Caroline wanted to play for a LONG time.

Grandma bought a Barbie movie for us to watch. It's about Fairytopia. I'm not very into it, but Caroline and Anna are.

I love you and miss you SOOOO much.

Cecily

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