Homecoming

This utterly gorgeous girl was asked to the Homecoming dance by Tristan Lewis.

  

He delivered a "hot and ready" Little Ceasars pizza that said

 "I'm hot and I'm ready to take you to the homecoming dance".  

She answered with Little Ceasars crazy bread that said something like 

"I'd be crazy not to go with you"

And here we are. 

Dress from Dillards.

Straps added by me. 

 Her hair only took about 40 minutes to curl.

 His boutonniere...

 With any luck, by the time she's out of high school, she will know how to pin these things on so I don't have to help her.

 Her gorgeous and huge corsage!

 Yes, she is wearing 4" heels, but he is also not much taller than she is.

They are too cute!

{homecoming}

This little darling was asked to homecoming by three boys.  

THREE. 

The first one is a long story.  

She didn't go with him.

The second one she did go with.

The third one she had to tell no to. 

I kind of wish she'd gone with the third one.

But, she looked gorgeous and had the time of her life.   

{powder puff} football

My daughter, the aggressive, no fear, kick butt and take names socialite, did something I never would have dreamed of doing.  

Powder Puff Football

And she had the time of her life.  

 This is the new high school being built across the football field from the current high school.  It's huge.  So huge I couldn't get it all in one picture.  Hard to imagine that a town with less than 5,000 residents has a high school with over 800 students (and that doesn't include freshman).  

 Running out onto the field.  She's the one in grey.  Number 24.

Arriving late to the huddle is number 24.  LET ME IN!

 They lost to the juniors right away.  It was sad.  But they kicked the seniors butt right away.  It was epid.

 She spent most of the senior/sophomore game on the sidelines.  She didn't care.  That's where the boys were anyway.

 Bring it on, senior....

And then she scared the flag right off number 34.  She was awesome.

Oh, the joys of having a high schooler with a social life.  It makes Ishee feel like an only child.

Sweet Sixteen

I am not a party planner.  I don't host parties.  I don't even attend parties if I can help it.  So when Arilee started entertaining the idea of having a sweet sixteen party, I did my VERY best to talk her out of it.  She did not listen.  Instead, she starting pinning.  Lots and lots of ideas on Pinterest came to her attention and she wanted to do them ALL.   I told her this was all she was getting for her birthday.  She agreed. 

My sister in law offered to make fruit kabobs and she likes to do things big.  She did NOT disappoint!

 We had jello parfaits in plastic wine glasses. 

 We had veggies and dips and chips.  Decorations included pink sparkly flowers, zebra striped everything, and tin can lanterns.  Music was provided by her iPod. 

 Margarita glasses from the dollar store painted pink was placed between two heavy plates (wedding presents from my inlaws, actually) made our cupcake stands.   We also had dark chocolate dipped marshmallows.  

 Arilee made mustache straws to go with our pink lemonade punch and homemade rootbeer.

 I borrowed some glassware from my mom and dad told me not to bring it back.  haha.  These little apple bowls were wedding presents of my parents, so they are almost 64 years old.

 And of course, a party with Arilee wouldn't be complete without popcorn.  

  It doesn't mean I plan to do another one anytime soon (though Ashlee will no doubtedly be expecting to have one of her own in four years), but her party was a success.  The handful of girls who showed up didn't say much, but the boys who came complimented the set up left and right.  That made me laugh. 

Good times.  

Other {August} moments...

It was a crazy busy month.  So many milestones.  

Justin moved out.

Arilee got her braces off, turned 16, and had her first half a dozen dates.

Ashlee broke her arm, turned 12, and is the proud owner of a frog. 

The girls have their own rooms now.

More on that last one later. 

In addition...

Ashlee and her dad had their last daddy/daughter date (for activity days).

It was a Hawaiian luau.  Daddy really dressed up for the part. 

They had a hula hooping contest - which daddy won. 

They also blew fire with powdered sugar. 

I'm told they rocked it.

Arilee still doesn't have her drivers license, but we are working on it.  

She is finally getting good at the driving part.  It's everything else she needs to work on.  

Still.  

I drove to St. Anthony to visit an old friend, Rena, at Baubles and Bits.  

She gave the girls free jewelry (because she is AWESOME). 

We found our way to the island at the St. Anthony Sand bar and I got brave

and let Arilee drive us home.  

She only almost killed us once.  

I told you... she's getting better.

I am not a pickle fan, but I have an abundance of cucumbers and the husband wanted to try making pickles, so I went with it.  They are actually kind of tasty.  

Good thing, since I have 14 quarts so far, with another batch waiting to be made.

Our cucumbers are HUGE and plentiful.  

I also canned 25 pints of beans and 8 pints of dilly beans.

My bestest, sweetest friend, Melanie, is turning 40 this week.  

And as a birthday present, she surprised herself with a positive pregnancy test. 

Her baby is 13.  Or was.  Her new baby will soon be born. 

So I made her up a cute little baby quilt to celebrate.  

This was a new pattern I found on pinterest.   

I loved it so much, I decided to make the girls quilts for their beds using the same pattern.  

More to come on that later.  

Happy 16th Birthday

Two and a half years ago, she looked like this.  

On Thursday morning, her smile was extra big because later that day she would.... 

Look like this... 

The next day, she looked like this....

Another year of fabulous for my beautiful "sweet sixteen" year old girl...

She wanted chocolate marshmallow fondant for her cake.  It tastes like a tootsie roll, in case you are wondering.  (We had a little boo-boo in that one spot, which I asked her to cover up with a flower, and she... didn't.)

She's easy to buy for.  Money and jewelry.

Pay no attention to the backside of the cake which is blank.  She was tired of decorating.

She's always such a good sport to let Britnee help blow out the candles.... 

And a birthday wouldn't be complete around here without a bunch of balloons from Aunt Wendy.

Now it's time to polish the shotgun - she has her first date on Monday.  

I feel spoiled to be blessed with such a gorgeous young lady as my daughter.  She is seriously the most FUN teenager I have ever met.  Ask anyone.  

We love you, Air-bear!  Happy Birthday, sweetie girl.  

Awards

Last night marked the end of the golf season at school.  The coach found a few pennies laying around and he put on a nice banquet and awards ceremony to honor the kids for all their hard work.  

This is our varsity team... 

 Seniors.  

 Arilee played varsity every tournament and earned her letter.  She worked hard but needs to learn to keep her feet planted and how to putt.  Her coach even razzed her a few times during the ceremony about it. She's such a good sport.  

 Justin also played varsity every tournament.  He placed three times, was finally given his "bars" to add to the letter he received as a freshman (which he's earned the past three years but never awarded) and was given a plaque because he is one of them super cool seniors.  

Both of them did fabulous this season and I am very proud of them!

Miscellaneous March

Beyond taking a picture a day, which when life gets chaotic, I am not very good at... 

other things have happened at our house.  

Ishee was clearly under the weather for a couple of days.  

Otherwise, she'd never take a nap in the middle of the day.  

 We had the relief society birthday party and the 

ward clerk asked me to take a few pictures for the ward history. .  

We had a fabulous sister in our ward talk about getting to know each other on a personal level.

 Cody's grandpa turned 85 so we all went down to Pocatello for dinner with the

extended family at Mama Inez, and then back to grandma's house for 

cake and icecream.  

 The girls were being super silly one night. 

It was fun to just laugh and laugh at them. 

 Justin turned 18!  We didn't do anything special, because we are boring like that.

I made a coconut cake with salted caramel frosting and 

even found the candles that were on his cake when he turned

one and eight.   We had hamburgers at the inlaws house, cake and icecream, 

he got 18 different candybars and balloons from his aunt Wendy and lots of money

then we went home and watched "Despicable Me" with his girlfriend.

 Air-bear was in a play at school.  We've already forgotten the name of it. 

The spotlight broke right before it started, and while it wasn't

necessarily needed, it would have made for better pictures.  

She played the loud, opinionated, smart-alek.

In other words, she was playing herself.  haha.