It's All About The Bunny Ears

As you know, I am way behind on blogging! So I am going to be posting some things that happened to us awhile ago.
Here goes...

 The Easter Bunny came to our house and brought some goodies for the girls.

Another sign that our girls are growing up...Not very many toys any more. Just movies and lots of candy.

As usual...The three youngest girls were up at the crack of dawn to check out the loot. They had to wake up big sis, Haley because they felt she was missing out. 

 He brought Pop Rocks! That's right, at 7:30am the girls were beginning their sugar high and you better believe they kept it going all.day.long.

 I put cheddar bunnies and jelly beans in bowls on the table for snacks while waiting for brunch. Payton bit the jelly beans and stuck them to the cheddar bunnies to make motorcycle riding bunnies! haha! Love it!

 I put out a basket of bunny ears and surprisingly the adults were the first to grab them and put them on. Baby sis, Xuan, wore them all day!

      My big sis, Robin, sported them for most the day too!

We didn't get around to painting eggs until Easter morning.

For $5 at Target, I bought an egg spinner that gives the eggs a tie dye look. The kids really enjoyed spinning it! 

It was a little messy, but lots of fun! 

Mushu and Chloe= Not love forever. She barely tolerates him! haha!
(p.s. Proof that Haley even wore the ears!)

Robin made the cutest "birds nests" out of fried chow mien noodles and Peanut Butter, then gave the kids jelly beans and other treats to use as "eggs" in the nest. 

Goo-Goo Xuan decided she needed to get her nails done, and she invited the girls! She got Mani's and Pedi's for all four of them!

(Haley's nails)

This was such a special and exciting treat because Haley was the only one who had ever gone so the three youngest were over the moon with happiness!

(Kaylin's)

(Emma's)

(Payton's)

 When it was all said and done, Linh  and Xuan did some serious online dress shopping. They both have weddings in the near future, and we are super excited!

Vacay to Birch Bay

This year was the our first annual vacation with the Goo-Goo's and Uncle's. Dao has three sisters, two are married, and one is engaged. They don't have any kids, so when we get together our girls are spoiled with attention! At a family gathering we were all talking about camping, and we decided we should plan a trip together. We scheduled it for Dao's birthday weekend in early October, so we vetoed camping and decided to rent a house/cabin. Xuan found a cute little place right across from the beach and we had a blast!

Uncle Dan declared it a TV free weekend, but we still used our ipods and cell phones a little.

Uncle Dan says Payton is a natural horn player!

We got up early to take advantage of low tide, but only found one teeny, tiny, crab. The dogs loved playing on the beach, too! We had game nights (and days), enjoyed the beach, took a walk to the local candy shop, flied kites, did a couple of low tide walks, watched the sunset, and roasted marshmallows around the campfire. 

The sunset was beautiful. Kaylin and Daddy wanted to get a little closer to the water to enjoy it.

It was not quite breezy enough to fly kites, but they sure did try to get them up in the air.

We each took turns making meals and cleaning up, so it was stress free.

We had so much fun that we wanted to stay another night!

Thank you so much Goo-Goo Linh and Uncle Brian, Goo-Goo B and Uncle Rob, and Goo-Goo Xuan and Uncle Dan. These are memories that the girls will have for a lifetime!
We love spending time with you!

School Jog-A-Thon

We did it! Our school reached it's goal of making over $40,000!!!!!

It was a long day for us volunteers, but so worth it! The kids all worked so hard and took this fundraiser very seriously, determined to meet the goal.

Thank you so much to all who pledged and supported our girls and their school!

(Sorry, but no pic of Isa and Luc. They were to fast for me!)

Back to School 2010 Edition

 Okay, so it has been a looooooooong time since I blogged! I have been having a hard time uploading pics to blogger. Every time I attempt, it closes down my Internet Explorer! Ugh! So every few days, I sit down and try again, only to have it happen again!
Anyway, I was able to upload some today, and I'm hoping to be able to get some posts in soon.

This year was a huge milestone for the C6 family! All of our girls are in school. As in the same school, every day! This is super exciting for them, but sad for the Mommy. I can't help but miss my buddies. Especially my baby, Pay, our youngest. We home schooled her last year, so she was with me most of the time. She was so ready for Kindergarten, though.

 The week before school, her classroom had a "get to know each other" gathering. The kids all played, explored the classroom, and met many of their new friends. Pay is so happy to have her best bud Dev in class with her! She also knew many of the other kiddos because they have siblings her sisters ages. Needless to say, she was very comfortable with her new class.

 Here they are on the big day.

 Pay and Dev are locker buddies!

She sure does love Madi (Dev's little sis)!

 At her table with some friends. =)

Em with her class.  She got a haircut the day before, and ended up not liking it because she felt it was to short. Poor thing was devastated! She was able to pull herself (and her hair) together and continue on with her first day of 2nd grade.

 Kaylin was happy to find out that she and one of her besties (since pre-school) were back in class together! She is in 4th grade, and at our multi-age classrooms they will be together for next three years! We are all so happy that she was assigned to Haley's old class, and so there is much familiarity with the classroom and teachers. Although, one of the teachers is new as a full time teacher, she was a sub for them many times in the past, so she knows the kids well.

Haley is in 7th grade this year! That means that we have a middle schooler?!?!  (For those of you who don't know, Dao and I met in the 7th grade and started dating in 8th! We love to tease her and her friends that they might meet their future husbands this year. Actually, I love to tease about that. Dao doesn't think it's very funny. In fact, he gets a little upset when I do it. haha!)

Haley is doing great in Middle School so far, adjusting to her new schedule. She decided to be a TA for her elective and is working in her old class where Kaylin is now. She is also taking Language, Algebra, Applied Science, Social Studies, PE, and is once again in the Jazz Band playing Piano.

Jetty Island

I can't believe we had never been to Jetty Island! For years people have told me how great it is to take the free ferry and spend the day on a sand bar, picnicking and playing in the sand. It sounded great, but we never took the time to check it out, until Haley wanted to go for her birthday. Unfortunately, her friends were all either busy or on vacation and couldn't join her for an August party, so we decided to go as a family and bring along Amara and Caleb from the M4.

We got there around 4pm and found that the little snack shack had Italian Soda's! We quickly got one for each of the kiddo's (and the worst ever iced latte for me!) and then hopped on the ferry. The kids played for hours, wading in the water, building sand castles, and then the tide started to quickly come in. Everyone got dressed, and then the older kids took a short "nature walk" to the end of the bar to watch the wind surfer people. The temp was almost 95 degrees that day, but we had a nice breeze, and the ocean water to keep us cool. It felt like it was in the 70's not 90's.

My favorite part of the afternoon was watching the sunset while on the ferry. It was beautiful!

We will definitely be going back to Jetty Island again, and if you have never been, don't wait.... GO!

A Little Water Park Fun!

The weather forecast said sunny and 80, so when my friend Kim asked if we wanted to go to a water park, we were totally excited! We had never even heard of the Henry Moses Aquatic Center in Renton before, and it sounded like the perfect place for my girls to go for a sunny and hot day!

The day started out cloudy and cold. To tell you the truth, we were contemplating not going, but the clouds were supposed to clear so that the sun could shine, so we went.

There are lots of shallow areas for the littler ones to play. The big kids spent a lot of time at the two water slides. You can take an intertube on one of the slides, too!

This was a pretty fast "lazy river"! Haley and her buddy Amara took a break in the middle to watch their siblings float by.

 Caleb (little bro to Amara) from the M4 turned and let me take a quick pic of him enjoying the tubes.

Kaylin hardly left the slides, she was having such a blast! But she enjoyed the tubes, too!

 The clouds did clear out and it ended up being a beautiful day! The kiddos all had a blast and are begging to go back again! Thanks so much Kim for inviting us! I still can't believe we had never heard of it!

Donuts and Meerkats

Have you ever tried a maple bar donut with bacon?

Well if you haven't, you are totally missing out! I had to get some for our California guests to try.

My absolute fave is the bavarian cream, though. Head on down to Frost Donuts in the Mill Creek Town Center, and get yourself some! The salted caramel is delish, too.

              Srsly, you will not be dissapointed with Frost Donuts! 

After our donuts, we headed to the zoo!

The gang!

 There is a new entrance at the zoo right by the penguins. The north entrance and west entrance combined and are no more.

 The girls and I were super excited to finally see the Meerkats! I was a little surprised at how small the exhibit was, but they sure are adorable. Have you ever seen Meerkat Manor? It's a great show!

We always enjoy the Komodo Dragons, too!

The girls have to climb this statue every time we pass it!

It's been awhile since we have seen this guy. He was walking around looking for food. Apparently, the lady that feeds him works in this office.

We all gathered around to see him.

 He didn't like that, so he blew up his tale! The lady came out yelling at us all to get back because he might charge us! It was crazy the way she was yelling at this bird, like he was a 2 yr old  kid.

After the zoo we hit up Red Mill Burgers! (Don't worry, we didn't use our cell phones and get yelled at like someone I know!).