best birthday ever!!

so i woke up around 6:15 am on the morning of my 31st birthday. jared was snoring next to me and i was sure he was super late for work. when i rolled over and told him he was late, he informed me that he took the day off just for me! what a great present. i was so excited. he got up and took the kids to school for me while i got ready for my big day, and what a day it was.

i asked for a craft room for my birthday. jared and i found a kicking deal on new cabinets at lowe's last week. i ordered some more cabinets from the lowes in logan because they were cheap, cheap, cheap!! so after we dropped off the preschool carpool, we headed up there to pick them up. they were the only lowes in utah with the large cupboard that i wanted for my new room. they finally found the cupboard and matched the tiny price tag we brought with us but at that time we were running quite late to pick up the preschoolers and were running out of gas fast!

we made it to the high school just in the nick of time, filled the van with gas, and dropped the children who did not belong to us off at their home. jared, addy, lily, and i took off then for our favorite new lunch option, chick-fil-a. we spent quality time visiting, eating, and letting the girls play in the playland.

when we got home, i got all packed and left for a girls weekend with my mom and sisters. we spent the weekend in slc shopping, trespassing, trying to sleep, and laughing and visiting with one another. when we arrived in slc we went to gardner village (a favorite). we shopped around and all found some treasures before going into the city to eat. we met up with lexi and ate at the ole spaghetti factory.

these are pictures of us at dinner.

we were playing lexi's favorite game "the ugliest face game."

promise we are all much cuter in real life.

lexi says i look like a small asian man at disneyland.

kalie and shay both told me i look like sherlock holmes and mary poppins in my new hat.

aren't sisters so kind and honest?

mom, kalie, lexi, and i were going to try to see a movie after dinner but we could not find the theater. we were driving around looking for something to do when i mentioned there was an area where people who were vertically challenged live together and it was supposed to be interesting. we had no idea what we were looking for so kalie pulled over and let lexi ask some crazy young people, who i am pretty sure were on some kind of crazy drug. they started telling us where to go and about some very large samoan dude and pickle throwing people and what-not.

lexi would not let us leave without seeing this place. so after some deliberation, kalie drove into the community (against my mother's wishes). we followed another car (probably full of crazy wacked-out drugged college kids) in there. kalie was about to turn around when the devil beside me (i.e. lexi) peer-pressured her to drive further. kalie kept going and as we passed one house a very large dude came out to see what was going on. we drove down a very creepy road that seemed to be straight out of a horror film set in a forest. when we saw the car in front of us start to turn around we figured it was the end and we better turn and get out of there as fast as possible.

as we were driving out we saw the very large samoan dude standing by the road. we were trying not to pee our pants because we were quite frightened. kalie was saying, "i am just going to drive past him as fast as i can." that was before she saw the very large log blocking the road. she stopped when she got near him and rolled her window down about half an inch. the giant samoan towered above the little car and asked, "what does 'no trespassing' mean to you and why are you here?" kalie squeaked out something about being lost and not knowing where we were going. he looked strangely at kalie, my mom, and me (luckily he couldn't see lexi who was strategically placed in the backseat), kicked the very large log placed in the road to the side, and basically told us to get lost. we sure did leave faster than we came.

when we got back to the hotel, shay and tessa were in shock with what we had just done. they could not believe we were out causing mischief. shay even called her husband and explained to him what we had just done. (apparently he has done this before and things did not go so well for him.) needless to say it had been an event filled day and we were tired. we went straight to bed. we shopped, played, and laughed the rest of the weekend. it was a grand time and we all spent really quality time with one another. i have the best family ever!!