Blessing pictures

Six weeks old and already being posed for pictures.

Grandma JoAnn sewed all the sashes, made Drew's tie and the adorable flowers on the girls.

I can't tell you how much time that saved me. She also made them look about a thousand times better than I ever could've imagined - Thank You!

To keep the kids sitting for pictures we let them take some "funny face" pictures.

See that gap? I think a little boy would fill it perfectly. Maybe one day, maybe.

This is the normal face the Jocelyn gets when Madison holds her. It's her way of calling for help.

And another one of Madison trying to hold Jocelyn unsuccessfully.

Most of the  pictures of Jocelyn have her head turned to the side, she does not have a neck problem, she was merely looking for food as she was hungry!

Blessing day

John enjoying himself more than he thought he would!

For the blessing we made four sheet cakes and decorated them with homemade fondant.

I don't have any pictures of mom and me making all of this but it took the entire day. We spent about 4 hours making and baking the cakes. Mom made the fondant and it took her 4 -5 hours to get it all done. Then we had to put it all together. Had we not forgotten to take the wax paper out before we put the fondant down, the fondant may have looked a little better. Oops. John wanted to do a fun ship and island cake for the blessing. Because this was for a little girl I put pink frosting inside of it. It was delicious!

A group of people ready to go to the blessing.

We ended up having just over 50 people show up. It doesn't seem like much, but when you consider we're in a little apartment, it's a lot. Luckily we have a fabulous back yard and the weather cooperated.

Grandma JoAnn helping Madison get more drink.

Jocelyn slept through much of the party except for the part when she had her first true explosion. Yuck.

Aunt Judy, Clarissa and BJ.

This swing kept the kids and some of the adults entertained for most of the afternoon.

Alexis

Mary

Josh

Katie

"G"

Grandma Tobi and Russ

Christina

Angie and Carrie. Carrie is scheduled to have her baby on 9/08. Angie is due in a couple of months.

Jocelyn is 6 weeks old and her cousins will be very close in age. They are both boys so hopefully she enjoys playing with little boys!

When all was said and done, we'd used 12 lbs of taco meat, 6 lbs of tortilla chips, 40 tomatoes, 1 jar of salsa, 2 1/2 huge bags of salad, a few lbs of cheese, lots of ranch, 9 gallons of juice, 3 1/2 sheet cakes, a melon salad and 2 cans of refried beans.

And a special thanks to Jenn Gaede who took most of the pictures from the last two posts. I forgot my camera at the reservoir and I was too busy running around Sunday to remember to take pictures. Because we were so busy running around and because we came home from church at different times we didn't get any pictures of the kids all dressed up and looking cute. So, last night we dressed the kids up again and took pictures. Can you guess what the next post will be?
Also thanks to Cody for cooking up the extra 3 lbs of taco meat that we needed and finishing cutting up the tomatoes! What a life saver.
And then Jenn, Angie and my Mom cleaned up the kitchen after the party - that was SO nice.

Hyrum Reservoir

Our old neighbors the Gaede's came to play this weekend. The kids were SO excited. We went to the Hyrum Reservoir Saturday afternoon. In true Cache Valley fashion it was super windy because I was near the water. The kids still had a lot of fun even though they couldn't get too wet without getting cold.

Mary

Christina and their exchange student "G".

Me watching baby Jocelyn.

Drew & Dallin

Alexis & Mary.

Little Madison wearing a swimsuit given to Jocelyn.

Studly daddy!

The Gaede's had planned on camping at Hyrum State Park but when they got up here every camping site was filled, clear up the mountain. So we had a camp out in our back yard. Here Madison is helping Russ fill the air mattress. I don't know if "help" is the right word but she thought she was!

Marshmallow stickiness, is there anything better during the summer?

The girls chose to sleep on the trampoline. Alexis and Mary ended up coming inside and sleeping on the couches. John, Drew and Madison all slept in their tent outside. It was Madison's first camping experience and she did really well.

The next morning, Sunday, we had a bunch of people to get through the showers before Jocelyn's blessing. Alexis and Mary put on their bathing suits so they could get things moving quickly for us. They had a bunch of fun playing together in the pseudo swimming pool. I will post about the blessing next but know that it went really well and we had a lot of fun!

Alexis' first day of school

Finding her back pack hook at back to school night.

Meeting her teacher Ms. Jones for the first time.

All the kids ready to take Alexis to her first day of school.

 Madison dressed herself and didn't want to change. She has on two different shoes, which seems to be the norm now, pink and white floral pants, her multi-colored checkered dress and then the peachish sweater. I'm sure people were thinking that I was a complete nut for letting her out in public like this.

At her desk the very first day.

We were there a little bit early so she was able to go and use the easel. She LOVES drawing on this. Maybe this is a good hint for Santa.

After school I took these pictures of her. Aunt Steph helped her find her first day of school dress and then Grandma Tobi helped her make the jewelry to go with it. She also bought a Hannah Montana backpack that she's so very proud of, it even has a lunch box that clips on as she'd tell you!

She was so excited after the first day because she'd already made some friends! She can't remember their names yet but they have fun at recess, which happens to be her favorite part already!