you...in a different situation: This Past Weekend...

Last weekend we had so much fun! It was super busy but we had a lot of quality time with family and friends. It started off with having our 8 year old nephew Reed over for a sleepover. We decided that instead of buying gifts for our nieces and nephews, once they got old enough we would take them out to someplace special of their choosing or have them overnight and let them pick the food and activities. Life just gets busier and busier and now that we have a child of our own we don't spend a lot of one on one time with our nieces/nephews so this makes for a great opportunity to do just that. It was really special just hanging out with him....he chose eating pizza & Sprite for supper, competing with Brad on the Wii, playing outside, watching the movie Planet 51, getting cookies n cream ice cream for snack, and sleeping in the living room on the floor with me. Happy 8th Birthday Reed-O...we loved having you all to ourselves!

In the morning when my brother came to pick up Reed, Carley couldn't resist the chance to play with her little Ella:)

Later that morning we headed out to Frederick Meijer Gardens in GR to check out the butterfly exhibit with the Lucas'. Although it was super warm and crowded, the kiddos had fun spotting all the butterflies.

Curt, Jamie, and Alden

Ella wanted to chase Alden instead of the butterflies:)

What a cute picture of all the kids:) We followed up our morning with lunch with the Lucas' at Malarky's on the East Beltline - very cool place to go - I highly recommend it!

That night my family gathered together for my Grandpa's 85th Birthday party. It was neat to be able to see everyone get to together to celebrate his life...he has a blended family due to his second marriage and they were all there as well...it was a huge group! At the end of the night we had a slideshow made up of all pictures of him and his family...I think it meant a lot to him to have us all there and to see all those pictures highlighting his life...it was a great way to end the night. (Good job Daysha!)

We rounded off the weekend with babysitting for my other nieces and nephews. Again, we just plain do not get to spend much alone time with them and to have them over was such fun!