Festival of trees

I had the opportunity to help decorate a tree for the Festival of Trees this year.

The tree I helped with was dedicated to Jared Vance, my friend's son, who lost his battle with cancer at the young age of 7.

It was a lego/super hero themed tree. I was thrilled to be a small part of this.

A major award

 I have some October posts that are in the works, but this one is short and so very sweet.

Do you see that darling necklace Karaia is wearing? Well, I'll tell you what, Karaia designed and crafted that all by her cute little self.

She did it for the Reflections contest. The contest has the theme of "Together We Can" this year.

Karaia is very aware of recycling and encourages everyone in the family to remember how important it is.

The fantastic news is that she received an AWARD OF MERIT for her entry and will be going to the next level!!!

Way to go, Karaia!

As if the recognition wasn't enough she also got a free Clark Planetarium movie ticket and will soon be receiving a ribbon and a certificate at the Root Beer float party in December.

I was very impressed with her creativity and her determination to make you visual image come to life. I can't wait to see what else she creates.

Beckham is 6!

Beckham turned 6 on Sept. 23 just a few days after we returned from Europe.  We had planned, ok semi-planned, to have his friend birthday party the weekend after his birthday. His actual birthday involved me randomly breaking out into the Happy Birthday song with pretty awesome, so non-embarrassing, dance moves, a few presents, and a dinner at McDonald's.

When Beckham came upstairs the morning of his birthday he stopped at the top stairs and said, "Is that special birthday breakfast I smell?"

"Um....no. I'm sorry, Bud, was there supposed to be?"

"Yes!"

I hadn't planned on a special birthday breakfast, why I don't know, but we didn't have much in the house. Thankfully scrambled eggs and toast felt special enough since we are SO not a hot breakfast kind of a family i.e. I don't do mornings and so my children get cold cereal.

*note to self: the children have started a special breakfast tradition on their birthdays. Don't let them down.*

He had requested legos and star wars legos for his birthday. He is one lucky kid because he got everything on his list!

Beckham has been BEGGING to try taekwondo. We finally found a class that would work and it just happened to start the week of his birthday. So he had his second taekwondo class on his actual birthday.

Oh he also had piano lessons which he said was completely unfair to make him go to on his special day. I told him sometimes you have to do things you would rather not do on your birthday because, unfortunately, they have yet to make it a national holiday. (wouldn't it be funny if one day Beckham did something amazing and they DID make it a national holiday and then they found my blog and quoted me?)

His friend birthday party was one week after we returned. He really, really wanted a Star Wars theme party. I was suffering for a pretty good case of jet lag. I had NO idea jet lag could last for a week. I almost took a pregnancy test because I was that tired! No worries, it was just jet lag.

But because of that, I had no energy to get things done for the party. Thankfully, my mom is awesome! I would think of the ideas and she would execute them. Or if I had no energy for ideas she would save the day with a great one. THANK YOU MOM!!!! It wouldn't have been nearly as cool with out all your hard work.

Party Favors: Light Saber Pretzels. Pretzels dipped in colored chocolate.

A big helper :)

Puzzles found at the dollar store and the finished chocolate light sabers.

Jedi Robes waiting for the young padawans to pass their Jedi tests.

Each guest received this invitation. Actually this is the invitation I got the idea from. This is not the invitation I sent out, nor does it have any of our real information, but you get the idea.  I found this at Tip Junkie.

full size, well kid size, light sabers to complete their Jedi training. Mom made every one of these! Thank you again!

Princess Leia greeted each guest and gave them their missions

waiting for their turn on the obstacle course

obstacle course

making their own games while waiting for everyone to go through the obstacle course

Light Saber training. Train until you can hit the balloon 20 times before it touches the ground. It improves your light saber reflexes which is a very important Jedi skill.

Training is serious business

With the training complete, the newly robed Jedis are off to destroy the Death Star

waiting for the battle to begin...plus a peak at my newly painted black garage door.

We split the group up into two teams. Each team had a different color of chalk and drew Death stars on their half of the drive way. Then each team was armed with water balloons. Who ever had the most Death Stars remaining won.

drawing the Death Stars to destroy

This is one of Beckham's most favorite friends

Getting armed!

Do you see the death star on the ground in front of them?

the battle has begun!!!

Isaac, Halle, Megan, Lily, Juliann, Beckham, Bradley, Avery, James, Tennyson, Noah, Jacob, Mathew

Using the Force, the young Jedis had to defeat Darth Vader

The "it" person had a blind fold on while their team mates told them which way to swing to hit the Darth Vader faced balloon from the tree.

opening presents

Watching Star Wars outside  drinking Dark Drink (red cool aid) and Yoda Punch (green cool aid) until the parents came

Thank you to everyone who came or helped with the party!!! Beckham had a wonderful time and it was all because of YOU!!!

Beckham is a very inquisitive child. He often engages in conversation with adults because I think he relates to the topics they like to talk about.

All the adults, and all the children, in our ward know who Beckham is. He is always very quick with a compliment and tries to let you know he cares about you. Even if he has only met you one time, you can be sure at your next meeting he will ask about the status of the last thing the two of you talked about or give you condolences for any hardships he has heard of.

He catches onto things very quickly, has an amazing memory like his dad, and just recently tested reading at a 5th grade level.

He LOVES building legos and is very good a following the instructions all by himself.

Beckham adores playing the piano and reading. He will do either of those two things with any spare time he has. It's a sore spot around the house sometimes because Karaia feels like she doesn't ever get to play the piano just for fun because Beckham is always on it.

He can be so good with his younger brothers, IF he decides they aren't too boring. If he does, well then he just pushes their buttons until some drama comes into play and things are no longer boring.

Tennyson cannot get enough of Beckham. He wants to be just like him and talks about him a lot when he is at school.

Beckham really looks up to Karaia and is always wondering what she is doing. They play very well together and have even started playing with each other at recess. Beckham is always very excited to tell me when he found Karaia at recess.

Beckham needs to know how everything works and loves to be right by Kevin side whenever there is a project.

He wears his feelings on his sleeve. You never have to guess how Beckham is feeling about something or someone.

Beckham has the cutest dimple! It melts my heart every time I see it. 

Beckham brings so much joy and laughter in our lives. He has great comedic timing and he is so loving.

We love our Beckham brother!!! We are so glad he is part of our family.