It's Great To Be Eight!!

 Daddy helping Logan get dressed for his baptism interview with the bishop.

 I made Logan a special birthday lunch and dyed his milk his favorite color.  After school I asked him what he thought of the milk.  He gave me two thumbs up and a big smile.  Then I asked him what he thought of how I decorated the inside of his lunchbox and he responded, "it was weird".  I know not to do THAT again :P

 We took Logan, Levi and a few of Logan's friends to Kangaroo Zoo to celebrate his birthday.  They had a blast!!

 After playing at Kangaroo Zoo we went back to our house for cake and presents.

 Wish big, son!

 Now that he's eight, Logan gets to attend Cub Scouts!  This was the first time he got to wear the uniform for his first meeting.  Afterward, he said he loved it!

 JT and Logan in their baptism jumpsuits.  We decided to take pictures at home beforehand.

 Logan was really excited.  He said, "mommy, get a picture of me pretending I'm being baptized".

 He has his very own Book of Mormon with his name engraved on the cover.  He said, "mommy, get a picture of me showing the inside, too".  Very creative, Logan! :P

 My sweet boy and me!

 A lady in the stake made this towel for Logan.

 Daddy and his boys on our way to the church.  Me and my boys.

Our family after the baptism and below is Grandma and Grandpa with Logan.

The baptism was beautiful!  Thank you to everyone who attended!!

She's crafty!

Over the last few months, we've had special baptismal themed Family Home Evening lessons in preparation for Logan's upcoming baptism. We try to make each one different with varying visual activities to heighten understanding. Tonight, I had the idea to take pictures of my two sons and print them out. I then printed out two sets of baptismal clothing and had them each tape their white clothing onto their pictures. They enjoyed seeing what they would look like on their baptism day. Although Levi still has several years before he is of age for baptism, he really liked dressing himself (his pic) in the special clothing. The lesson was informative and we reviewed the steps to baptism likening each one to a ladder. Each step of baptism is a rung that makes up the ladder which leads to the Celestial Kingdom. For refreshments I made "Immersion Cookies". They are sugar cookies made to appear as people by using a gingerbread cookie cutter. :) To eat them, you dunk them in milk (immerse them) and then eat them up. The boys had a lot of fun with those, too! It was Logan's turn to choose the family activity and we worked off the cookies by playing a game of dodge ball. It was a good night!

The "Immersion Cookie" recipe is from this website:http://www.ldsfamilyfun.com/fhe/recipes/recipepages/recipes-imcookie.htm

The recipe:

Ingredients: 2 Cups flour, 1/4 tspn. baking powder, 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1 cup butter (softened), 1/2 Cup powdered sugar, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract, a glass of milk for each person.

How-to:

Preheat oven to 350 F. Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into a bowl and set aside. In a mixing bowl cream the butter until light and fluffy. Add the powdered sugar and continue to beat. Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl once or twice while you are mixing. Beat in the vanilla extract. Slowly add the flour mixture. Mix on low until everything comes together into a thick dough. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface. Press the dough out into a flat patty an inch thick. Wrap in plastic and chill completely in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes. After the dough is chilled, roll the dough out to 1/2-inch thick. Cut the dough with cookie cutters or knife. Place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 7 - 10 minutes, or until the bottoms of cookies are barely golden. Cool on wire rack.

This is the ladder, my boys added each rung as we discussed each step.

Up close.
Several months ago I found this on pinterest. I still need to change the large R to an M for McKenna family. Until then, no one has noticed it. I printed this and put it behind a glass frame. I put each of our names on a paper and we rotate the names accordingly each week. It's a great inexpensive solution to display FHE assignments.
We have used a few different methods to choose the person who says the nightly family prayer. This one seems to be the best. I made this with each of our names listed. I printed it and had it laminated. I did the same for the arrow and each night the person who says the prayer gets to move the arrow to the next name in below theirs. The arrow is attached with gummy tape.
We've used this cleaning method for about three months now. I've tried SEVERAL different ideas but we've all decided this one is the funnest and the one that motivates everyone. I saw this idea on pinterest and put my own spin on it. It's called The House Game. I have individual squares that list the names of a room in the house and above each room name is a number. For example: 1 = Family room and Entry, 2 = Kitchen...etc. I made corresponding cards that each have a number on them. We turn them face down. (If you have dice you could use those and whatever number is rolled would be the room you would clean.) We set the timer for a different amount of time each day we do this. One day we will set it at 45 minutes, another would be 20 minutes, according to the time we have. We then try to see how many rooms we can clean before the timer beeps. We can't move on to another room until the one room is clean. We then run back to the board (which is framed in a glass covered frame) and one child marks off the room we just completed as the other turns over our next card. It's really a lot of fun and my hubby even enjoys it. :)

Here are the pictures I used of my boys for FHE that was mentioned above.

I had to blow up my youngest son's picture so the image would be large enough for the clothes. It worked out great.
Happy crafting!

Weekend Get-a-way

When I returned home, Logan had lost his top left tooth. So cute!

I was happy to return to my guys (this was taken a few days before I left).
Most of the pictures I took were for my boys and JT to see me in "real-time". This one was taken on the way.
This one, too. Pretty winter sunset.
We went sight-seeing the next day.

And did some exploring by foot and tram.

That night, we went to the Tesla concert. Our cousin's band was the opening band ~ Built By Stereo.

Before the show started, sitting in our seats.
Sheree and I goofed off while we were waiting for the place to fill up. It was a lot of fun!
More fun!
We were on the upper level (we ended up switching to the opposite side of this). The place became packed soon after I took this.
I thought the chandelier was picture worthy. Pretty!
There's Tony!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sheree and I went to talk to Tony in between the shows. It was really great to see him!
We had such an amazing trip! Can't wait for the next one, but it's definitely good to be home again. :)