Girls Just Wanna Have Fu-un!

Do you know what is great about having a wonderful friend who blogs a lot? It's called "copy" and "paste". Ali wrote most of this (I have changed it to be from my point of view) and took all the pictures so thanks Ali!!

After having our girls BEG us for a night of fun, Ali and I decided to have a "Girls Night In" with them a couple weeks ago. The girls had fun getting dressed up, and picking out the clothes for me and Ali to wear. At first they wanted me in a sweater and after five minutes I was sweating so I made them start over. They didn't do too badly and even added necklaces for each of us. We met over at the Ellefsen's house and then started off the evening by blindfolding the girls and driving for about 15 minutes before ending up . . .back at the Ellefsen's house!

I have to say I loved the full facial blind folds the Ellefsen girls had on. There was no cheating there! It was rather warm though.

We counted to three and had the girls take off their blindfolds. The only one who was slightly disappointed with the destination was Brynlie!

Ali and I spoke in French accents (actually Ali did and I tried!) as we pretended to be the waitresses at the "Fancy Nancy Restaurant". We had a lot of fun being super silly to make the girls giggle. Each girl received her own menu to order from, and fake money. They had to budget so they would have enough money left over for dessert.

Then it was time to head to the spa (aka, the kitchen). We started by giving each girl a facial, with a homemade oatmeal facial scrub I had made (ground up oatmeal, plain yogurt, and honey). Since it had yogurt, we kept it in the fridge and the girls would scream that it was cold when we put it on them!

A facial isn't complete without some cucumbers to soften those puffy eyes!

Facials are messy!!

Next up, hairdos for all of us! Don't we look gorgeous?

Time for make-up!

The night wouldn't have been complete without beautiful nails!

And the last (and best) event of the night . . .singing and dancing to our favorite tunes! Ali started off the activity by singing along to Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun," cranked up as loud as it would go. She did some pretty awesome moves, too. Then the girls and I got our groove on, and we were all a happy, sweaty mess by the time the guys walked in the door. Brad, Ryan and all the boys had gone to dinner and done some shopping, so we would have the house to ourselves for the night.

A General Update

Lately every time I sit down to write something I go blank and think "I must be boring because I have nothing to say!" Actually I suppose I am far from boring since I am really running ragged with life. Earlier this week I spoke with my Mom, who has been working on our genealogy. I told her she's going to have so much done that there won't be anything for me to do. Her response was that I need to write my own history. Woops. Been slacking in that department. I've decided that a lot of my neglect stems from my part time job where I sit at a computer most of the time. Really, by the time I get home I'm tired of sitting. But, I do need to be better so I am turning over a new leave and will write more often now. :)

We are nearing the end of the school year and my kids are getting excited for summer. They've had a lot of school parties lately and they have really enjoyed that. Jillian is doing great; her last report card had all A's and a couple A-'s. We're proud of her effort. Logan is reading now and he finds that pretty exciting. He can even do his book reports all by himself now. Very cool. Jorja just finished up with her preschool for the year. She goes to the high school preschool, as part of their early childhood education class. The preschool only goes for 12 weeks and she has loved it! But, she is SOOO excited to go to school like her brother and sister. We signed her up last Monday and all of a sudden she is "in Kindergarten". The other day she even told us that she "celebrated preschool" which meant that she "graduated". So funny. Both she and Logan have made huge improvements in their speech through the speech therapy programs here. Logan can say the "L" sound now and is working on "S". Jorja's biggest improvement has been one of self-awareness; she can hear better now where she is saying things incorrectly. She's been working on the "K" sound and hard "G" sound as well as several others. She catches herself now a lot and we practice together on how to say words correctly. She even says "car" all the time now instead of "tar". You go girl!

On Friday my children's choir performed at the Senior Center here in town. They were so cute and did a great job. We will perform in three weeks at the Kid's Fest where we will open for Mr. Stinkyfeet, a local children's performer. The girls are really excited for that. Then I am done with choir for the summer--I'll start up again in August.

I stole these pictures from Ali's blog -- thanks! This is us before our performance. What cute girls! Ali and I made the hair ties for them.

We're singing "Attitude is Everything". Most of the songs have actions and harmonies to them. It's really a lot of fun!!

Brad and I hosted a booth at a business fair here in town. He was promoting his roll-out shelves and I was doing my choir. I had a lot of people who are interested in it for next year. Brad did well also and will have a few jobs from the fair. He is still doing remodel work when it comes in as well as the shelves. He has also decided to broaden his work experience so he is applying for other jobs as they come up.

My sister, Tamra, came to visit me a month ago and we had such a fun time (still waiting for her to send me pics!). It was her Christmas present from her husband, Eric. We went to all of the local church history sights and even the Truman Library, which ironically is not just a library! It was really interesting. Most of all it was just nice to be together.

Today we had stake conference and were told that the ground breaking ceremony for the KC temple will be on May 8th. Very exciting!! It will be so nice to have a temple so close!