Colten's 7th Birthday

Colten turned 7 last week Wednesday and we had a small party for him this past Saturday. He wanted a "Surf's Up" party because he loves that movie, so I went online and ordered some plates, napkins, penguin squirt toy party favors and this cake topper set that looked really cute with a penguin, a surf board, palm trees and some other stuff. I received the package on Tuesday with most of the correct items, except that I had Surf's Up fruit snacks instead of a cake topper set. I was obviously upset about that since the party was Saturday, so I called the place I ordered it from and they assured me that they would get me the correct item by Friday. So I calmed down when I saw a package was delivered Friday. However, when I opened it up, low and behold, more fruit snacks!!!! ACK! I was pretty irked at that point, but they place was closed so I called them the next morning and told them they needed to figure out their problem with fruit snacks and cake toppers and got my money back. Now I needed to improvise to decorate the cake, so I took one of the penguin squirt toys and some palm trees toys that Ashlyn had and did the best I could. I couldn't find anything to replace the surf board, unfortunately, but I guess it turned out alright.
The party went pretty well, I just had to follow the boys around to make sure they didn't break anything. A few of Colten's toys bit the dust, unfortunately, but he was excited about his new stuff and having friends over, so he got over it pretty quickly. I'm pretty sure it'll be awhile before I have more than 1 of Colten's friends over at a time again, however. That was a little too crazy for me!!!

Barn Update

I kept forgetting to take pictures of the latest developments on the barn, but here it is finally. The outside is not yet complete. The wall above the porch still needs to be painted red and the eaves are all still open, but John has one of the lofts inside done, complete with stairs to get up to it and most of his shop set up so he can get some work done to start paying off this monstrosity. I really like the way the big doors turned out.

New Year, finally an update!

Hope everyone had a good holiday. I'm back at work again after having two weeks off... I could really get used to that! We had a pretty good holiday except for the fact that John ended up with pneumonia, but he's better now and life is back to normal again.

The Mason County Stockshow was this past weekend and the kids each showed a pig in it. Ashlyn got 1st place with her pig and was in the running for Grand Champion, which she didn't get, but that's fine, too. Colten's pig, which we thought was the better one of the two, didn't place at all, and Colten was pretty upset about that. We told him he couldn't do anything about the fact that the judge didn't like his pig and we'd just try again next year and maybe have better luck. Hopefully we do! Anyway, I was proud of both of them and we're glad to not have to remind them to feed piggies anymore!

Here are some photos of the kiddos showing their pigs: