Brooklyn's Girls Choice Date - Tolo

Last night was Brooklyn's Tolo date. 

 

 She went with her friend Joey.

The three couples started the evening out at the Heidi's home for appetizers and couple pictures.

Group picture.

After appetizers the kids were given a briefcase with a clue to their first competition. They were given some Scrabble tiles. They had to make two words out of the tiles. It told them that they were going to "Value Village" to go "pop some tags". At Value Village each group was given $15.00 to go purchase an outrageous outfit for the two of them. After they were done shopping they were brought to our house for pictures, dinner and games. 

 

The first thing they did when they arrived at our house was to dress up in the clothes they purchased at Value Village.  We then posted each of their pictures to FaceBook with a note to please "Like" the most outrageous outfit. The couples scored a 1st, 2nd or 3rd place for this game/competition as determined by the most "Likes" at the end of the evening. The kids were texting and calling their friends telling them to go and vote for them - it was pretty funny. 

 Heidi and Jared

 

Autumn and Broderek

Brooklyn and Joey

What a fun group of kids!

Before dinner they were given a set of questions to answer about each other - it was called "How well do you know your date?" - a game where you try to guess the same answer as your date - like, "How many brothers and sisters does your date have?"  They then scored a 1st, 2nd 3rd place for the couple who answered the most questions the same.

Heidi's mom, Heather took this picture. I love how it captures the gold fish coming up for air. Such a cool picture.

Preparing to serve them dinner. They started off with layered raspberry jello.

 

Steve was the master at BBQing the steaks.

Delicious homemade breadsticks.

This is what the plate of food looked like that we served the kids. The kids said the food was great - we took a break after they were served and tried some ourselves!

After dinner the kids had 5-6 different competitions to compete as couples in. The first thing they did was shooting the BB gun in the garage.  Each person got 5 shots at their target and the couples added up their points. They had fun with this one. 

Another game they played was who could build the tallest tower using gummi bears, tooth picks and skewers. Here are Brooklyn and Joey working on their design.

They topped off the fun evening by going to Red Robin for dessert.

Brooklyn and Joey won the grand prize at the end of the evening. It was a popcorn cup filled with popcorn, candy, soda and a movie ticket. 

The kids had a lot of fun having their own Tolo date. They decided not to attend the school dance but instead to do their own thing. Great choice. Steve and I enjoy hearing the laughter and noise of teenagers having fun in our home. It's always such a happy sound.

Trip to Northern California

Brooklyn was out of school this past Monday and Tuesday for mid-winter break and so we flew down to Northern California. It was great - we got to stay and spend time with my parents as well as my two brothers and their families. It had been a long time since Steve and Brooklyn had been there so it was nice to have them come along too.

We flew in on Valentine's Day. My parents picked us up at the airport and then we went over to my younger brother, Alan's house. He and his his wife, Lisa had the entire family over for a Valentine's Day dinner. Check out the fancy table all set for dinner.

We were each given a menu.

 We had heart shaped hamburgers for dinner. They were yummy!

 Brooklyn loves spending time with her cousins.

We have a tradition in our family of putting our Valentine's on the doorstep, ringing the doorbell and running. Steve caught me just as I was about to drop my Valentine's off on the doorstep!

 

 It was so sunny and warm while we were there. We enjoyed picking oranges with Grandpa in his backyard. 

 

Check out all those oranges! We brought home a huge box of oranges with us and we have been enjoying them all week. It is like biting into sunshine each time you have one - so packed with flavor. 

Saturday night all the adults went to the temple to do sealings. My dad is a sealer in the Sacramento temple and it was fun to have him conduct our sealing session. Brooklyn had the opportunity to go do baptisms for the dead with her cousins Jacob and Matthew and the youth in their ward. She had a great time with them.

After the temple session we went out to dinner and then later that evening we went out for banana splits.

Sunday we went to church and Brooklyn had the opportunity to play a piano solo during sacrament meeting. Brooklyn has such an amazing talent - it was fun for her to have an opportunity to share it with her Grandparents, family and their friends.

 

Monday, Grandpa took us on a drive down memory lane over to Sacramento in the neighborhoods where I grew up. It was fun driving past our old house, church, schools and my dads dental building. Lots of fun memories in Sacramento. He also took us to Merlino's for orange freezes and hamburgers for lunch. It tasted so so good.

 

On our way to the airport Tuesday we stopped at In-N-Out for burgers and fries. We had such a relaxing time visiting my family. We really enjoyed getting together for family dinners and being with my awesome parents, brothers, their wives and kids. Thanks for all the fun family.

Tolo - Girl's Choice Dance - Brooklyn's invite and reply

Brooklyn and three of her friends asked some guys out to an upcoming girls' choice date/dance called Tolo. 

For the invite, we bought 2 helium balloons, one very, very large blue one and a regular size yellow one. She put a note cut into puzzle pieces in the yellow one. Then she wrote on the outside of the yellow balloon "Pop this balloon for a clue."  The note inside the balloon said,  "What are you looking in here for? Look underneath the rock." Then she tied 100 feet of ribbon onto the balloon and attached it to a heavy rock.  Underneath the rock was the formal invite. 

 

Steve helping Brooklyn tie the balloons to a big rock.

All ready to go drop it off on Joey's doorstep.

The balloons up in the air and Brooklyn about ready to ring the door bell and run!

 

Brooklyn didn't have to  wait to long for Joey's answer.  When we came back home an hour later we found the big blue balloon flying high above our house. 

...it was way above our house....

 Brooklyn pulled the big balloon down and found...

YES!!

Brooklyn is so excited that Joey's answer was yes! The date is on Friday, February 22nd.  Brooklyn and her girl friends have been busily planning their fun date. We look forward to posting pictures after their date.

Valentine Treats for Primary

Back in December I was called to be the Primary President in our ward at church. It has been so fun to be back in the primary. I really enjoy spending time each Sunday with all the amazing kids in our ward. I have 2 amazing counselors and a fun secretary.

The Sunday before Valentine's Day we made treats to give to all the kids and their teachers. 

One of my counselors came up with this cute idea for the kids treat. It's a clear cellophane bag filled with Valentine M&M's. My other counselor made the cute sticker tag on them.

I made huge monster cookies for all the teachers. They had oatmeal, coconut, macadamia nuts, chocolate chips and Valentine M&M's in them.

 

I found a cute idea on Pinterest (my favortie place to go to for craft ideas) of how to package them up. I used white CD sleeves to put the cookies in . Then I tied them up with bakers twine and made these cute tags with punches my kids gave me for Christmas. I made 36 goodies and we handed them out yesterday. The teachers seemed to like them and it was fun to surprise them with an early Valentine treat.