2016- Week 8

This week was the daddy-daughter dance for our church. The theme was a 50's sockhop. My girls needed new poodle skirts anyway for the Woodcrest sockhop that is next week, so I made them a week earlier so that they could dress up for the dance. They both looked so darling and they were so excited to go to the church for an evening with their dad and with their friends. When they got home, Zaya said that she had spent a lot of time with her friends, but Hurley mentioned that she spent almost the whole time with Rob. This is huge, because she is usually so social. I'm so glad that she was having fun with Rob and enjoyed an evening having some quality time with him. While the girls were gone, I stayed home with Brooklen and Kaiton. I had asked Brooklen if he wanted to watch a sports movie with me, but instead he wanted to chose the activities for the night. First, we played video games. He wanted to play all of his sports Wii games and I'll tell you, it was pretty miserable (the games, not the quality time). I am terrible at video games and he isn't very good at giving direction. For an hour, he completely creamed me in every game that we played. Finally, he got bored (I'm no real competition) and so we went upstairs. Kaiton was asleep by this time and Brooklen wanted to play Monopoly Empire. That version is so much better than regular monopoly and we had a great time. When we were done, we made banana spits and watched a little bit of the Amazing Race. At the end of the night, we downloaded some iPad/iPhone games and played with each other. When Rob and the girls got home, Brooklen broke in to tears. I think he was really enjoying the quality time. I'm already planning my next date with him (a Saginaw Spirit game).

On Saturday morning, the girls, Kaiton, and I went to the Civic Arena for Try Hockey For Free. Brooklen and Rob went to Traverse City for a hockey tournament. We had to do a lot of waiting, which was a bummer, but the girls loved being on the ice. Zaya skated with her friend, Lucy Bond. They were in the intermediate level because they are both good skaters, but every time they stopped skating for a minute or two, they would get moved down to the beginning level because the instructors assumed that they were not very good because of their size. Boy were they wrong, those girls are both great little four year-old skaters. Hurley was in the advanced level. She was the only girl and by far the youngest one, but she is also a great skater. Initially, she tried getting out there on hockey skates, but they are very different and she was struggling. She came off the ice in tears. I think she was embarrassed! I quickly put on her figure skates and decided that we need to get her hockey skates ASAP! The girls both enjoyed the event and they both want to do skill development now. The pictures below were taken by a reporter and they were in the newspaper!

 After ice skating, we went home and played outside for a while. It was 50 degrees and sunny yesterday. It was absolutely gorgeous. The Nymans were outside playing, so our kids joined them. At 3:00, we went to the Keplers house for Lexi Van Wagoner's baby shower. I had to bring 4 dozen cookies, so I cooked those up right before. At 5:30pm, we went over to Tiffany and Eric Jaimie's house to celebrate Sophie's 4th birthday. The girls had fun playing over there and they enjoyed the dinner and dessert that Tiffany prepared. Rob and Brooklen didn't come home until about 10:30pm. Brooklen had played four games throughout the day and he was really tired. I think that he had a good time. The hockey season is coming to a close and I am grateful for how much confidence it has given Brooklen. I think it has helped him feel really good about himself. Today, Rob had to go to Mt. Pleasant for Ward Conference. I had to teach a lesson in YWs and Hurley gave a talk in Primary. After church, we stayed for a Laurel class meeting and then when we got home, we all spent some time outside in the warmer weather. I didn't have much food in the house, so I made some homemade pizzas for dinner. After dinner, we played Monopoly Empire as a family before bed.