Leprechaun Trap

Ali brought home the assignment from school to build a leprechaun trap. Yikes! I immediately told Ali we needed to call Grampa Mikey! After a bit of leprechaun research, (they are a little less than 24 inches tall) we spent the next few Saturdays over at Gramma and Grampa's working on the grand project.

After they talked about her ideas of what she wanted, they went through Grampa's recycled wood pieces. Ali measured, hammered, and drilled (with Grampa's help!) her amazing trap.

Trav helped her take the leprechaun trap to school where he said the class was super impressed! He said her trap was a hit... and Alison was very proud of her masterpiece!

Pre-School Field Trip

Merilyn's pre-school class took a field trip to the city Public Safety building. Lucky for me, Travis went along as a parent chaperone. He's an expert chaperone on field trips with the girls... I sign him up for all of them! (Merilyn told me about each picture.)

We checked out the inside of this police car. We got to go into the car and he turned on his flashy lights.

I'm climbing out of the police car. It was so neat inside.

Then we got to go meet the fireman and his truck.

He showed us his uniform. He has a nose-breather and a hat.

This fireman showed us a smoke detector. He pressed the button and made it beep. When you hear this sound you're supposed to cover your ears.

Here I am! I thought it was a good field trip. I learned that I am not supposed to answer the door because they're strangers.

Happy Birthday Alison!

It's hard to believe, but Alison turned 8-years old this year! How did this happen?!

Daddy surprised Ali in the morning with a special donut. :) She wore her new birthday outfit she picked out with Gramma.

She chose to celebrate her birthday dinner at Olive Garden. The most special gift she got was the awesome bike from Gramma and Mike!

Alison invited a few friends to celebrate with her at JJ Jump. (One of her favorite places to have a birthday party... as shown here and here.)

(And, she got to wear another new outfit from Gramma!)

It was a really fun night! Ali is very happy to be 8, but I'm still trying to wrap my head around it...

No More Binky!

The binkys have been slowly disappearing, until we were down to one... and then that one was MIA. We convinced Miss Meri that maybe it was time to call the Binky Fairy! She agreed (maybe only because there was a present involved??) and woke up to find a special gift.

Proud of you, big girl!

Love My Little Girl

A glimpse of our everyday...

Vegas, Baby!

2011 is a big year for me... the big 4-0!! (And, Travis, too!) Several of my sorority sisters and I gathered together to celebrate turning 40 properly... Vegas! Judy and Natalie had already had their birthday, and Shari had her birthday while we were there. (I was the baby!! Ha!)

Our flight was delayed, so we hung out at the Beaches happy hour.

Our taxi driver from the airport to Paris. He was full of information about what to see and do.

We had pedicures and met Elvis...

We visited M & M World and shopped at Caesar's Palace.

My friend Justin was in town for a soccer tournament, and came out with us on Shari's birthday. Happy Birthday, Shari!!

It was an amazing, crazy, FUN, memorable, hilarious weekend. We all agreed that one of our favorite parts of the trip was just hanging out in the hotel room laughing... laughing so hard my sides hurt the next day. (Can't wait to see what 50 looks like, ladies!)

A Second Christmas

We celebrated a belated Christmas with Trav's side of the family; the Shulls and Catrows. It was another delicious meal with lots and lots of laughter!

It was a good thing to have such laughter on this night... Kurt recently discovered he is battling Stage 4 Lung Cancer and is beginning chemo very soon. We love you, Kurt!