It's been a really good month so far.

We started off the month of May with a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese for William and my nephew Spencer. Their birthdays are two weeks apart, so my sister and I always have a combined party for them.

The birthday boys: William and Spencer

And the guests:

Everyone played games:

I sometimes think using my tongue, so he gets this from me.

There were lots of presents:

hockey gloves from Uncle Bryan that William has been wearing every day since his party

We had cupcakes:

And we ended the night by fishing Braden out of a game he climbed into:

I guess he really wanted to play with the balls inside the game.

It was a great party. Hopefully the boys enjoyed it too. Happy 4th birthday, William and Spencer!

The month continued being great!

Monday Evening: After the birthday party, I rushed over to Oyshi Sushi to have dinner with Kellie, Brook, and Julie - three of my favorite people in the whole world.

Tuesday through Friday: I went to work the next day to find out that it was teacher appreciation week. I got a nice breakfast on Tuesday, some cute sunglasses from our principal on Thursday, and candy, cards, and a Viva Mercados gift certificate from some of my students on Friday. I have a student whose parents own Viva Mercados, and he gives me a gift certificate for every special occasion. And Kevin and I always go to lunch and spend those gift certificates the day I get them.

Saturday: I got to go to a wedding on Saturday, and I love weddings.

These two gorgeous people got married in the Las Vegas Temple.

At the Temple:

At the reception:

At the reception, the men wore kilts, except for Shane who said a kilt and his tall skinny frame combined would make him look like a teeange girl. Kristi was smart and got a bounce house for the kids to play in, and it was a HIT with all of the kids and even some of the adults. There was great food and good music, and except for the crazy wind, it was a great day for a party.

We're so happy for Bryan and Kristi. Congratulations to the latest Mr. and Mrs. Bowman!

And May keeps getting better!

Sunday: After Bryan and Kristi's wedding was Mother's Day. I got to sleep in and have breakfast in bed, I got a long-stem rose from the Bishopric after sacrament meeting, and I got some homemade bread and strawberry jam from my amazing Relief Society president Lor'e. Kevin had to work on Mother's day, but the kids and I had a relaxing afternoon watching movies together.

Monday: I had my first massage. I had a gift certificate that I had been itching to use, so I finally made an appointment for the day after Mother's Day. The lady came right to my house and gave me an hour-long massage. It was HEAVEN, and I can't wait to get another one.

Tuesday: My parents have been cleaning out their house in Las Vegas for my sister Jodi to move into, so I went over there one afternoon to look through their stuff and see what I could take. I found a $100 gift certificate to Lawry's that my parents had won years ago, and I took it. (I made sure it was okay with my mom.) Tuesday was the day Kevin and I cashed it in. I love Lawry's, but it is way out of my price range, so it was a nice treat to get some prime rib FOR FREE!

Saturday: William's actual 4th birthday was Saturday, and we had leftover tickets and tokens from his Chuck E. Cheese birthday party, so we took the kids to CEC in the morning to eat pizza and play for a couple of hours.

I've been very spoiled this month, to say the least! The pessimist in me keeps thinking that something awful is coming since I've had so many good things happen all at once. For whatever reason, we've had a great month full of fun things, and I'll never forget it!

I Love Impromptu Vacations

Last Thursday I decided to drive to New Harmony for a nice Easter getaway. Kevin had work and a side job to do, so it was just me, the kids, and Guillermo visiting Grandma and Grandpa this trip.

Sorry to be lame and post without pictures, but my little weekend vacation was so last minute that I forgot to take the camera with me. Here are a few of the good times we had in New Harmony, Utah:

- After loading all of our stuff, there was room for each kid's bike, so we took the bikes with us. My kids did a lot of bike-riding this weekend. The boys even tried out the steep paved hill next to my parents' house. They came away with no serious injuries, but I think the hill scared them both enough to not try it again on their bikes for a while.

- I figured out the four wheeler, and we took it out on a few rides. Guillermo chased us wherever we went on it. He was a tired little puppy by the time we were finished.

- New Harmony had an Easter egg hunt on Saturday morning. There were four sections roped off for the hunt: 1 and 2 year-olds; 3-5 year-olds; 6-8 year-olds; and 9 and older. Braden had about four other kids in his section, so he really could've cleaned up in the egg collecting department, but he and the other kids his age didn't really understand what to do, so they mostly stepped on and broke the eggs. His section was filled with candy spilled on the ground. The 1 and 2 year-olds were still fun to watch, and Braden still got plenty of candy.

- We went to church in Kanarraville where it hailed while I was walking the hallways with Braden.

- We had a nice Easter dinner with my brother Travis's family, and my sister Denise and her husband Buck. Ham on Easter is great, but leftover ham and rolls with Miracle Whip after Easter is even better. We enjoyed the leftovers for the rest of our stay.

- We took a trip up to Enoch to visit with our old friends the Stucki's. My parents talked with Bruce and Rosalee while I talked with Krista and Nicole and all of our kids played together. And I found out that Krista and I work right by eachother, so hopefully I will get to see more of her!

- Uncle Buck and Aunt Denise invited Travis's and my kids over to meet the new kittens, pet the chickens, and ride one of the horses. My kids were in farm animal HEAVEN!

I didn't expect much to happen on our last minute, unplanned vacation, but it ended up being a really great trip! There were so many fun things for us to do during our short stay in Utah. We can't wait until next time we can go and take Daddy with us.

Proud Mama

I will be bragging about my kids in this post, so feel free to stop reading if you don't enjoy that type of thing.

Rebecca

Rebecca recently tied with another little boy to win the kindergarten spelling bee at her school.

I'm not great at using my scanner, so here's a picture of the Friday newsletter her school sends out showing the winners. I asked her what words she had to spell, but she couldn't remember. She could only remember that "ball" was the word that got her out. She spelled it "bol".

For winning she got a giant Hershey's bar. And she shared it with her brothers. Sweet girl.

She is a great helper with her brothers and the dog. She pours juice and gets cereal for her brothers, and she'll take the dog outside whenever I ask her to.

William

William has always been a mini-Kevin in looks and personality, and he continues to become more and more like Kevin every day. Lately William has become a big tease just like his dad. He especially likes to tease Rebecca because she can't stand it.

Like today Rebecca went in the bathroom and asked, "Who peed in the toilet and didn't flush it?" And William declared proudly, "I did."

The other day at the library I got upset at William for running around the parking lot as we were getting in the car. I said, "You don't run around the parking lot like that, Bub. You'll get hit by a car." He retorted with "Mr. Bossy," said just like Dory in Finding Nemo.

When he's not making smart cracks, he is the sweetest little boy. His teachers at school love him and are sad to see him go when I pick him up in the morning.

And I think he is going to be a music lover like both of his parents, but he seems to prefer my alternative music. Sometimes I'll turn the radio down to call someone in the car, and it's always William who says, "Turn the music back on!" Most times I hear him around the house singing primary songs, but a few times over the past few weeks I've caught him singing Weezer and Cage the Elephant. Yesterday he was singing, "Shake me down. Not a lot of people left around. Oh oh." We hear this song a lot in the car, and it cracks me up that he knows it well enough to get it stuck in his head.

Braden

Braden can be difficult, as two-year-olds are, but he is also so much fun. He's really talking now. He is the best at saying "thank you". I'll hand him something that he wants, and I always say, "Say thank you, Mom." And he always says, "Sank you, Mommy."

ALL of the students, especially my kids, at my school love the music teacher Mr. S. He is the funnest music teacher ever. The other week when Braden was leaving music class, he said, "Bye, Daddy S!"

This morning I was thinking about wearing a dress to church, so I put it on to see how it looked. Braden was in my closet with me, and he said, "A princess, Mommy," as I put on the dress. (We've been watching a lot of Tangled around here since last week.)

Our kids are at fun ages right now. We are really enjoying all of their silly personalities.

Much better

I got my blog book in the mail this week. I asked Kevin how he liked it, and he said, "I like the first one better." He would.

I'm glad some of you got a good laugh out of the first book. I'm still not laughing. I'm sure down the road I will look back and think this whole thing is funny, but not right now. What I'm most worried about is if I received my book cover with someone else's book inside, did someone else get their cover with my book inside? My blog book is for me and my family to have, and I don't like the feeling I get thinking that some stranger might also have a copy.

But two good things did come out of this mishap:

1. I did indeed get my blog book for free.

Blurb credited my account this week with the full amount I paid. They even next-day shipped my book to me once the the right one was finished printing, and they covered the cost of the shipping.

2. Any desires I had for plastic surgery in the future are completely gone now.

Most of the people in the plastic surgery book don't look much better in their after pictures. Sure they're thinner, or bigger busted, or put back where they were before having kids, but the scars they have now are NASTY. I'll take what I have over the risk of surgery and the nasty scars that come with it.

I am really happy to finally have my book. Now I don't feel so bad for all of the scrapbooking I don't do.

I got my blog book in the mail today...

The outside looks great!

The inside is a different story.

I was a little nervous when I opened my book and found this page in the front:

It says, "This book is dedicated to Dr. Grant Stevens, who made it possible for me to transform the lives of the many happy patients pictured in these pages." Hmmmm.

So I kept turning pages to find a book filled with these types of images:

These don't really look like posts I've done on my blog, do they? And I don't want to make my blog a porn site, so I'll leave out the 200+ pictures of before and after breast surgeries.

I am trying to be patient about this, but I am so angry - especially after I had to completely start over on my book. And to make matters worse, I'd really like to know how this is going to get fixed, but there is no phone number to call. There is only a place to submit emails. And my email will not be answered until Monday. Needless to say, I am not happy with Blurb right now.

Hopefully this gets fixed and fixed soon. I promise to show pictures of the finished product and be a happier person after I receive the book I put together.