Family Weekend

On Friday, I went with my mom to pick up my aunt Patty and cousin Kevee at the airport.  It was fun getting to hang out with my mom; we had coffee while we waited and we browsed around at a cute (and overpriced) shop at the airport.  Then we took Patty and Kevee to lunch and had a great time.  Later, we went to my aunt and uncle's and hung out with my grandma for a while.  It was the kid's last day of school; and, of course, Taryn's birthday, so everyone came over to our house for a bit after I got the kids and then we all met up with my aunt Becky, uncle Dick, and cousin Steph and her boyfriend Ryan for pizza later.  (Pietra's... YUM!)  I got Taryn a chocolate, whipped cream, and oreo cake, and managed to fumble the piece she wanted and dropped it all over the table (much to her dismay, oops!)  Despite that, I'm pretty sure miss Taryn had a good 8th birthday day (even though she was upset that her teacher forgot to pretend spank her) : )

On Saturday, Taryn had a party at her karate school, and was joined by a few of her closest girlfriends and Ryan's parents and sister Kate and her new husband Eddy.  My brother John (Taryn's bestie) came, too, which was nice.  The kids got to run around and burn off a TON of steam, it was fun to watch (I kinda wish I had participated in some of the activities!)  Taryn got to cut her cake in half with a samurai sword (PRICELESS facial expressions!)

And she got lots of cool gifts, including a black watch with skulls (too cool), a seashell jewelry making kit, and a Justin "Beaver" (UGH) shirt, which she loved!  Right after that we headed up to Evergreen (so pretty!) for Trent's boy scout holiday party, which was held at one of the leader's parent's ranch.  It was chilly (it was held in a barn), but there was lots of good food, a visit from Santa, and the kids got to go "sledding" (there wasn't much snow, so some **brave** grown-ups pushed the kids down a little icy path on the sleds).  We headed home around four for a little r&r, but that plan was thwarted by a call from my mom, wondering if everyone could come by and watch a movie and hang out.  That sounded like fun, so I straightened up the house, dug out a bunch of boy scout popcorn (some I still had from LAST year-yeesh), and was interrupted by the door bell ringing half an hour EARLY.  WTF I thought.  Turned out my mom had been trying to call, and everyone was going to Steph and Ryan's, instead.  Oh, well, at least our house was clean (for a day, at least).  We decided to pass, and instead had an early dinner, then went to see Tron.  It was TOTALLY AWESOME!  (Even for the fifty bucks it cost for the 4 of us to go).  BUT, my poor little lady crashed within 10 minutes of the movie starting : )  She slept through the entire movie in my lap (awwwww!)

On Sunday, we had plans to meet my mom, grandma, Patty, and Kevee at church, but my aunt Pam (Patty's twin, and Steph's mom) had flown in that morning (the weather was too bad for her to come on Saturday, like she had originally hoped to), so Patty and Kevee went with Steph to get her.  We met up with Ron and Becky (my in-laws) and my mom and grandma, and I was glad that my mom enjoyed the service.  It was a good one-- a Christmas message about king Herod being threatened by baby Jesus' birth, and how we still are threatened by Jesus because if he is in charge, if he is king, then we are not.  It was a good lesson about control, and struggling to let Jesus lead our lives and be the one in control.  Afterward, my mom, grandma, Patty, Pam, Steph, and Kevee came over and we hung out and chatted for quite a while.  It's always a crazy time when my mom and the twins are together (my mom is only 15 months older than them), so it was great to see them together, telling wild stories.  At five, we all met up downtown and had dinner at cafe Rialto, which was totally yummy, and then we headed off to see The Nutcracker ballet.  The Colorado Ballet does a great performance, and we've started to make it a yearly tradition.  2 years ago, my mom, Taryn, and I went; last year, the 3 of us plus Trent (who WANTED to go, who'da thunk it?) and Pam went, and this year there were NINE of us!  (I wonder how many will go next year?!)  I felt bad for not thinking to invite my mother-in-law and her mom, and my sis-in-law, Kate. : (  Trenty gets a BIG kick out of the male dancer's tight tights, it's fun to tease him about for weeks to come!  Unfortunately, Pam, Patty, and Kevee all are leaving Monday morning, so we bid them good-bye after the ballet, but it was really awesome to have such a nice weekend filled with fun and love from much of our big, wild, family.