Happy Birthday Hannah!

Our little girl is 5!!! It is so exciting and bitter sweet at the same time! Hannah's birthday luau party is on August 11th so for her actual birthday we took her to a place called Peter Piper Pizza (per her request) where they have games and pizza. A great place for kids. Hannah had a great time and was especially excited when her Auntie Lauren came! Here are some pictures of Hannah enjoying PPP and also of Grace enjoying Hannah's birthday cupcakes! After she was all finished with her games she cashed in her tickets for vampire teeth! HA! She had fun with those! Time sure does fly! I can't believe she is going to start Kindergarten next week! Oh, I better stop now before I start sobbing all over my keyboard! Happy Birthday Baby Girl!!!

HARRY POTTER!

I am a HUGE Harry Potter fan! So it is no surprise that I was eagerly awaiting the release of the 7th and final book! Every time a new book has come out I've always read about the local book stores having parties and I've always thought about going. Well this year since this is the final book (sniff.. sniff) I thought I would go to the book parties. Fortunately, I didn't have to go be a dork alone! Melinda joined me! So we put on our way cool Harry Potter t-shirts and went to the party. We started out at Barnes and Noble and got our pics taken and even made a craft! HA! Then we went to a store called Changing Hands and it was crazy! They had a fire show and there were all kinds of people dressed up as characters from the book. We had a great time! And needless to say.. I read the book quickly and enjoyed it very much!!!!!!!!

Family Visit

My uncle Kenny came out to visit from Florida with his wife Lynn. We had a really nice visit. I haven't seen him in quite some time and we were amazed to realize that he and Jake haven't seen one another since our wedding 10 years ago! I have some great childhood memories that involve my Uncle, so it was wonderful to spend time with him as always. Here are some pictures from the night we all had dinner together.

Sickies!

My family has just been hit with one sickness after another and another. It started with horrible colds and sinus infections. Then I had the flu and then strep throat. I've never had strep throat before and it is NOT FUN! Then my poor little Gracie got it. The bad thing is that she also got sores inside and outside of her mouth. They were causing her SO much pain. Here is a picture of the poor baby. She is doing MUCH better now! Thank goodness! I hate it when my babies are sick!

Just a lazy weekend

Well the Howell's didn't do much this weekend. I was tempted to go to Mom's to swim and work on my tan, plus, the kids love going swimming at Nana's, but yesterday Grace had a nasty case of diahrea and I didn't think that would be a good idea. Then today, Grace's nose is running and she is a bit congested so I wasn't sure if swimming would be smart. So instead we stayed around the casa all weekend and didn't really do much. A little grocery shopping and laundry. That is about it.
My Uncle Kenny is coming in this week from Florida. We are excited to see him! My Mom is having all the family over for dinner Wednesday night so I'm sure I will have some pics to post.

Love to everyone!

I went to a fun party on the Fourth and thought I would post some pictures of me and my girlfriends. The girl in the orange is my friend Heather. We became friends through our daughter's dance class. Her daughter Rae and Hannah are in ballet and tap together. The girl in the gray and white is Michael's girlfriend Melinda. She is one of my favorite people! So fun to be with... we laugh a lot! The one with blonde hair on the bottom is my friend Jess, we work

together and met through work!

We all had fun if you can't tell!

The View

The scenery in Colorado was absolutely gorgeous!
The top two pictures is the view from the stables where
we went horseback riding. The bottom two pictures is
the view from the condo we stayed at. JUST BEAUTIFUL!

Vacation

Here are a few pictures from our vacation in Colorado! We had a really nice time with Frank, Rhonda, Jenna and Jynell and her family. There is a picture of Jake and Hannah in one of the Hot Springs pools we went to and a picture of Grace on my lap eating her snacks at the Hot Springs. Then the one of me and Grace is us after we went swimming at the place we had a condo. Then there are some pictures from the horseback ride we went on which was absolutely beautiful. The scenery and just the ride itself were wonderful! Then there is the picture of the four of us that turned out really well! We are standing in the back of our condo. I will have more pictures shortly!!!!

What is the deal with boxes?

I don't know what it is about boxes, but we had this shoe box sitting on the floor and Grace thought she would just climb right on it and take a seat!