Dad turns 84!

Sunday was Dad's 84th birthday.  We had a fun celebration at Lani's house with LOTS and LOTS of family!  Here he is modeling the new BYU jacket we gave him, he looks pretty good for an 84 year old guy don't you think!

The girls eating the cake pops Krista made

The guys just standing around chatting.

Just visiting after dinner.

more visiting

and even more visiting

 Skyler, Kara and baby Lucy

Me and sleepy Gabbie

Lani and Kelsi

Ric and Taylor

Krista and Merijane

High five for Taylor!

 Abbie

Jeff and Jen

Hailey lost her first tooth

Notice anything different about this darling little girl?

Yesireee, she lost her first tooth,  Hailey is our first granddaughter to lose a tooth.

Katie can ride a 2 wheeler!!!!!

This week when we went to tend Josh's girls, Katie had been practicing on her balance bike, which is a bike that Josh took the chain and peddles off (no training wheels) of so she could learn to ride a bike.  This is how Molly and Libbie both learned so easily.  Anyway, I was watching her ride it, and she had such great balance, I told Josh he should take the training wheels off her regular bike and let her try that out.  

  He did, and she was AMAZING!!!!  Here are some cute pictures of our little 3 year old riding a 2 wheeler after 5 minutes of no training wheels.  

Here's a little short video of Katie on 2 wheels, she was LOVING it!!!!
(Just click the arrow key and it should play)

Sisters are the best!!!

All our little girls are so lucky to have sisters!  I hope they love theirs as much as I love mine!

Hailey and Aida

Molly, Abbie and Kelsi

Libbie, Katie and Gabbie

Back to school!

I've been back to school for 2 weeks now, and just thought I would post some pictures of where I have been spending MANY, MANY, hours each day.  Here are my bulletin boards

A cute little flower pot

The front of my classroom

                                      

The file cabinet right by my desk with a simplify sign to remind me to keep it simple

Here's a view of all the desks crowded into my little room!

A couple of my classes have 36 students, so it's pretty cozy.

So far the year has been going really well, hope it continues that way!!!!

The FACS sign in the back stands for Family and Consumer Science, that's what the old Home Ec is called now.

Welcome Elder Chessbrough

Transfers again already!  Elder Amundsen is off to be a Zone Leader and Elder Chessbrough from Minnesota is our newest Elder.  He and  Elder Banks are tearing Taylorsville apart trying to find people to baptize!

Here they are enjoying their breakfast burritos, we sure love having them at our house!

Kelsi's Blessing Day

 Today was our sweet little Kelsi's blessing day.  She looked BEAUTIFUL in the dress that Emily's mom made for her.  Krista made all the flowers for her headband, dress and shoes.  She was such a nice girl at the blessing and luncheon afterward.  Jamie gave her a beautiful blessing.  She had lots of family there to see her blessed, Great Grandpa and Grandma Birks, Great Grandma and Grandpa Cline, all of Emily's family except her brothers family that lives in Wyoming and all our kids except Jordan and Jamie.

 Here's a full body shot of our little angel.  

Here she is with her big sisters all ready to go to Sacrament meeting.  Three absolutely gorgeous girls!!!!

Gabbie is growing!

This is the first picture we have of our two 2012 babies together, they are so much fun and I know will be great little friends!  

Gabbie turns 5 months old this week, and LOVES playing in her little sit and spin.

She is usually standing in it while she plays!

If she doesn't have any toys, she is totally happy just playing with her toes.  She is such a little doll!!!

Mike's new calling

A couple of weeks ago, we got a call to meet with the Stake Presidency.  After a few minutes of chatting, they called Mike to be a counselor in our new bishopric.  He was sustained and set apart last week.  His dad was able to ordain him as a high priest and  gave him a beautiful blessing.  We had all our kids but  Jordan and Jamie who are in Georgia, and our parents we all able to come too.  It was a great day, Mike is such a good man, he will do a wonderful job!