Sweet 16

Oh my goodness how time flies... how could I possibly have a 16 year old!? My daughter is the very best and I'm so grateful she is in my life. She is strong and independent, caring, nice and no-nonsense! I love her so much and she makes me a better person. I'm glad I am her mom but I also know I am her friend - Happy Birthday Sweetheart!

Happy Birthday Lucas! Amos Girls Visit

I can't believe my little Lucas is 6 year old! He still has the coolest birthday around - 4/4/04. His birthday this year was on Easter so we had his party a few weeks ago with his friends. He didn't quite understand that his party was in March. Even on Easter morning he asked if his friends were coming over.

I told him they were all on vacation and that the Easter Bunny came instead! We've had a busy week with school ending for the holiday and our friends Jessica, Julia & Christy coming to visit us. Here a the fun things we did this week.Celebrated Lucas' Birthday
He got lots of new Toy Story Legos

Our friends the Davis' came over for Easter Dinner to also help us celebrate Lucas' birthday!

We took the girls to Stonehenge & Salisbury

We went to see the Queen Musical - We Will Rock You after spending the afternoon of the Bank Holiday at the giant Westfield Mall in London - it was really big!

We went into London another day and spent the day around Borough Market, St. Paul's Cathedral, Tate Modern Museum & up to Camden Markets and ate Fish & Chips!

Christy & I even made it to the London Temple for a session. We packed in a ton of things in one week! Now it is off to pack for Spain!

Move over Von Trapps

The Von Cranes are in town!

Last Thursday night was the school Spring Concert - it was a huge extravaganza of music! Our Winter concert was canceled due to the snowy weather we had this winter so they packed in a ton of performances in this one show....

The quality of music by all the kids was fantastic! They worked really hard and you could really see the difference even from last year.

I have some of it on video but I never seem to have luck posting videos on my blog. Both Tyler (vocal) and Chandler (Clarinet) had solos this year so it was extra special for the Von Cranes....it's nice being in a small school the kids have a few more opportunities they might not have in the big schools back home. It's all good for now :)

nIan playing the trumpet (you know brass is always in the back!)

Chandler's trio (violin, flute & clarinet spotlight solo)

The spectators

Tyler's Bday

Well how horrible am I? I never posted a proper post to my sweet big girl.

Tyler was born in the wee hours of January 22, 1996.......

She was our first baby and we were sooo excited. She made us wait 11 days for her arrival and even then she made us wait all day for her to come out - something like 14 hours!

But now I wouldn't even know what to do without her - she is smart, funny, responsible, such a good girl. She's my best friend - I can always count on her. My how she is growing - 13 - it all goes so fast from here.

She had a party on Thursday - her real birthday - we didn't have school on Friday so it was perfect - 9 girls came over for a sleepover - we had a mini party - individualized - homemade individual pizzas, giant individual birthday cupcakes, triple chocolate brownies brought to school, crepes for breakfast - I was so tired of cooking!!! But they had fun - she missed her hometown friends terribly but she has made really nice new friends from here, the US, Canada, and all over. What a great experience! Happy Birthday Baby!

My Girl & Our Human Footprint

Today was a busy, but nice day - We had speech and ran to costco to get hotdogs for our potluck - Ian had a ball game and we had a successful potluck this time! When we came home Tyler had stayed home after dance to do her homework - she's had some monster projects due lately.



She had the whole downstairs clean for me!!!! It was so so so nice to come home to a nice clean house - when the kids came home from school we had all crazy stuff you know - homework all over, mail, backpacks, papers, my hotdogs cooking, and my neighbor walked in....so embarrassing! But she tidied everything up - the dishes were done, well actually I think I did the dishes before I left, but she had taken out the trash, vacuumed, and just had everything put away so nicely!!! And she wrote me a card saying how much she loved me... you just couldn't ask for a better daughter - I love her so much! She knows I've been really tired and overwhelmed with laundry and all the projects I mentioned the other day. I am so lucky!

I'm watching the National Geographic documentary - Human Footprint it is amazing! And kind of disgusting how much we consume and use! You need to watch it if you can - it is on again Sunday night......it is so an eyeopener!