Benner Cousins

My sister and her family stopped by for a night on their way home from the beach. As always Emily and Sarah loved all the attention from their cousins. Sarah especially loved getting pulled around the kitchen floor on a blanket. Emily loved having a "slumber party" with Afton and Leah in her room. She was jumping from her bed to the trundle bed. I told her it was time to settle down and go to sleep. She said, "No Mom! It is a slumber party. You jump, not sleep!" I really need to find out who told her that!! They are in trouble!

Tine and I rented a chick flick while the boys went and saw a movie. Of course, we had to put the kids to bed too and didn't even get the movie started until right before they came home. Not fun for Tine and I... Todd and Andy are the worst people to watch a chick flick with!

Then Dad and Layni joined us the next morning for breakfast. Layni fits into the mix perfectly!

As a side note, Christine and her boys were in a car accident yesterday. Everybody is OK. Christine ended up with burns, scrapes, sprained wrist and is very sore. Not a scratch on the boys. I am so thankful they were being watched over, however it really makes me put everything in persepective and never take a moment for granted. I love my family so much and so thankful to have them.

Summer Fun

During the summer, our town has a fun concert series every few weeks. We went recently to see Band of Oz. The girls had lots of fun dancing, singing and just running in circles.

Band of Oz sings beach music and as we were leaving I asked Emily if she liked the music. She said, "I like bluegrass music better!" Our southern girl!

Beauty and the Beast

As I mentioned in the previous post, I won tickets to a play of Beauty and the Beast. The play was put on by a kids/teens drama camp of a local theater group, so the cast was all kids under 18. I wanted to stop by Chick Fil A because I knew the cast would be there, so I thought Emily would enjoy seeing Belle and etc. If she seemed interested, I was going to take her to the play that afternoon. And then we won the prize package!!

We invited some friends to go with us since we had some extra tickets, but it didn't work out on such short notice. So Emily and I just went for a special mommy and daugther date (and I sold the extra tickets when we got there :) )

However things didn't turn out as planned. Emily was very excited and anxious for the play to start when we got there. However after Belle's opening number, Gaston comes out on stage and she suddenly needs to go to the restroom (even though we stopped by on the way to our seats). In the bathroom, she says she is done and ready to go home. She said she didn't want to see Gaston and the Beast fight... and didn't want to hear beast roar....and didn't like their costumes. So after 2 attempts of getting back to our seats and her yelping and crying in fear, I just packed it up and left.

I must admit I got overly emotional about the whole situation. I was upset that our fun outing was a bust. I was upset I didn't get to watch the play (the few minutes we saw were very entertaining). I was overwhelmed by the task of raising a secure, happy, confident girl. I felt like going to meet the characters before should have helped to alleviate any fears. It made me sad that she was too scared to enjoy a story that she loves to have read to her. I want my girls to be happy and secure in who they are and to be proud of who they are. Hopefully with the help of our Heavenly Father, Andy and I will know how to teach our girls these important values and provide experiences where they can learn and grow (and overcome their fears).

We Luv Chick Fil A!

Really we love free food and since we seem to get a lot of it at Chick Fila... we love them!

Recently they had their annual cow apprecation day, which is where you get a free combo meal if you dress up like a cow. So of course we dressed up!

Two of the cutest cows I have ever seen!

Such a cute cow family, if you ask me

We usually also stop by Chick Fila after dance class for Family Night (Free kid's meal with adult combo). They are usually doing a craft or have a clown there for face painting.


On Saturday, they had the cast of Beauty and the Beast there. A local theatre group was putting on Beauty and the Beast this week, so they were there to promote the show. There was a drawing and I won! I won 4 tickets to the pay, 2 backstage passes for the play, 4 combo meals and a stuffed cow!

Do you understand my love for Chick Fila now??!

Layni

My little sister Layni came to visit for a few days. The girls love when she comes over, as do I. We went to the pool, did our usual mall/storytime trip, saw Shrek 3 at the free summer movie, went to the park, played outside in the sprinkler and I even managed to survive a grocery shopping trip with 3 kids!

I love this picture of Layni and Sarah!

Layni had a blast jumping into this tiny pool. I am not sure how she didn't break her tail bone since there really wasn't that much water in there.

Even though Layni thinks she is too cool to play princesses and my little ponies, her and Emily had lots of fun playing with the ponies!

I let Layni take lots of pictures of us. This is our "funny face" one except Sarah got cut out of the picture. Sarah's funny face is just too cute, so we had to take one of her by herself.

We had such a blast with Layni and can't wait for her to come back again.

It was my dad's birthday while Layni was here, so we made him some cupcakes to bring when we met him to give Layni back. As you can tell, Layni was not in the mood for anymore pictures, but I'd like to think she was just sad to be leaving me.