The Enormous Lemon!

We have a huge lemon tree in our backyard and it produces lemons almost year round. This year has been a little less since we had some harsh frosts back in the fall.

The kids were playing in the back yard and came inside to ask if they could pick some lemons so we could make some lemonade. I said sure, handed them some plastic bags and told them no throwing lemons!! (they like to have lemon wars and many times we have caught them firing them at each other!)

All of a sudden Emily comes running into the house yelling that there is a bee's nest in the lemon tree. We hadn't seen many bees around the tree but you never know. Jason went outside to inspect and and when he came back inside he said you have got to see this.

Emily brought in this enormous lemon which looked kind of nasty with a super bumpy exterior. It had to have been at least five times larger than a normal large lemon. Hudson then found one that was a bit smaller than that one and brought it into the house. The pictures really don't get the size across that well but trust me when i say i have never seen a lemon that size before. It was the size of a small pumpkin!!

Valentine's Day

For Valentine's Day this year we told the kids that the new airhockey table was their gift but then me being me, i had to get them each a little something anyway. We had a coupon for Build A Bear and Max loves talking to his teddy bears so Jase and I decided to get a bear for Max since he couldn't use the airhockey table. Well...when I was there I saw some really neat outfits for the kids bears they already have. We got a Hannah Montana outfit for Emily's Hello Kitty, a Spiderman outfit for Hudson's dog Spike and a Dora the Explorer cat costume for Tori's pink bear. Max ended up getting a cute puppy with pink and red hearts on it and a cute Valentine's Day hoodie. He kept trying to give it kisses. Guess that meant he liked his dog!!

They each got a little heart filled with candy. Come on, what is Valentines Day without candy!!!

I have never sent flowers to Jason before and i thought it might be a nice touch so i went online and found a great deal on flowers and ordered him 18 different colored roses with a box of Godiva chocolates. I talked to his secretary and she gave me her number as a contact number so that Jason could be completely surprised. He said he got a lot of ribbing from the guys at work about flowers being for girls. One time Jason got up and as he went passed the flowers he bent down to smell them. When he did this one of the guys in his office started to make fun of him, haha. Jason told him he was just jealous that no one sent him flowers!!

Jason picked up some beautiful roses for me as well. They smelled really good! He also stopped by The Olive Garden on the way home and picked us up our favorite dinners!!! Yummy!

All in all it was a nice Valentine's Day had by all :)

Max and the Dog Door!!

Step one: test the door make sure its working and that no one is looking...

Step two: quickly make a dash through the door

Step three: I made it!! Just need to watch out for Cooper to not come and lick my face!

Max has this fascination with Cooper's dog door and from time to time we will see him messing with the door and when we either tell him not to play with it or move him he just giggles and usually goes right back to it. One day i was washing dishes and the big kids were outside on the trampoline and they came rushing in to tell me that Max had climbed completely through the door and was sitting outside...sneaky little turkey!!

On this day i stayed quiet and then got my camera and caught the little escape artist in the act! He thought he was pretty cool when he saw me on the other side and he was 2/3 of the way through the door!

Max's First Birthday!!

"Say cheese!" in your lovely Elmo birthday hats guys!!

Max and his birthday hat!

The kids and Grandpa playing on our new airhockey table.

Max made a grab for the candle and then the cupcakes and writing!

Our baby is one! We can hardly believe that a year has passed by and Max turned one today. We had a nice dinner with Jason's parents and his brother Tyler. The kids picked out an Elmo birthday cake made out of cupcakes for him. He really seemed to love the cupcakes he had and ended up mixing a red and yellow one to make a nice orange mess. It was a really nice party and we hope that Max had as much fun as we all did celebrating his special day.

No More Braces!!!

Well the time has finally arrived after two long years that was only supposed to be one....I got my braces off. I am super excited to say the least. I got the braces taken off on Monday and then got my retainer on Tuesday. Just in the span of a day, my teeth shifted which make the retainers pretty tight fitting but they tell me that this will ease up as i wear the retainer more. The photo I posted was my 'after' shot taken from the orthodontist...not fabulous but you get the jist of it!!! Emily was sad because she wants her braces off as well, but it looks like we will be waiting a little bit until all of her permanent teeth come in up top and get braces on those as well...poor kid. We keep telling her to look on the bright side that she will get all this done while she is young and won't have braces when she is in high school like a lot of her friends.