family...

"I still remember the days I prayed for the things I have now..."

My goodness, there is so much to be thankful for!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We are headed to Big Bear to be with our friends from college, to hunker down with good food, lots of laughter, amazing conversation, and to be surrounded by people that know us and love us... 

I just can't wait!

a little pick up game...

Ryder received a flag foot ball set for his birthday.  We have been pulling it out after Kit gets home from work...

These Rae's are fierce!

Oh my goodness, these three...

Celebrating Besties...

This last Saturday we celebrated Hank RAE Thrash's 6th birthday.  He and Ryder were born 10 days apart and when your dads are best friends, it's pretty certain that you are destined to be best buddies too!  He wanted a Golden State Basketball party.

They had all sorts of games for the kids to play:

 Jamie made basketball cupcakes:

And a piñata:

 Seriously, she is ridiculously creative!

These guys were room mates freshman year at Biola, and now we get to watch our kiddos grow up together!

We love you Hank!  You are so loved!

Has it really been 6 years!?!

Here they were the first day they met!

Oh my gosh, I want to cry when I realize how fast it all goes!

satisfying a HUGE craving...

This last Friday, Ryder had his 6 year old well check in Fullerton.  We decided to go as a family.  Afterward, we headed to an all time favorite spot of ours!  El Camino Real Mexican Food is located around the corner from our old house and neighborhood and we had not been there since we had moved!  Boy, was it good!

With each of my pregnancies, especially with Ryder's, I would CRAVE these tacos, and send Kit to get them at all hours of the day... It felt like such a taste of familiarity and home!❤︎

More park adventures!

Recently, Eden and I tackled three more parks off of our Tustin list.  They were all a win for us!

First:

 We had the place to ourselves...

 She did this climbing wall within seconds...

 She was so happy to climb on ALL of the equipment!

 Sriracha chips from Trader Joe's are her current jam...

 Next:

 This one had a pirate theme and very little shade, but we still managed to have so much fun with the playground.

 This swing was a favorite of the day!

 And lastly...

 This park is situated at the center of old town Tustin and had bocce courts too!

 Just a little crazy to be doing three parks in a few hours on a day that hit in the 90's, but she had wanted to do one more before we headed home for her nap.  So I think we were ok...❤︎

We are having such fun exploring our city and finding new favorites and connecting with each other along the way... 

Man do I love this little girl and the time that we get to spend together!❤︎

afternoon relaxing...

After school this week, we headed to our back yard with cold juice and shade and played...

 He is building things so well and so fast!

 It ended up  being a play dough and lego kind of afternoon and we loved every second of it!

Man, do I love these kiddos!

I might be THAT mom...

... because we just got his baseball pictures and I want to wear the pin! All. The. Time!

I can't stand how sweet this little home run hitter is!

We love Leo!

A few months ago we found out that our street sweeper goes to our church.  He is the kindest man named Leo.  He is one of our greeters and he always makes people feel so welcome!  So the kids and I decided that we would always have coffee ready for him on his route.  So since then, every Monday morning, at 7:15 am, you will find us curbside, ready to give our new friend coffee.  

It is the highlight of our day and the kiddos LOVE to be part of it.

It's usually an argument on who gets to hold the coffee until he gets to us...

celebrating Ryder's Golden 6th Birthday

Over the weekend we celebrated Ryder's birthday.  He chose the guest list, food, and location. We had SO. MUCH. FUN! I think I'm going to have him plan stuff more often...

We went with a sports theme:

 I had bubbles and crayons so that the little kids could do things if they didn't want to go on the playground. For the tables I used chalk board contact paper and pretended to draw plays for  the different sports:

 The playground was amazing and was the perfect backdrop for the party...

 He was SO excited about his gold 6 balloon!

 The menu was Dorritos, grapes, and Costco pizza.  Everyone ate and talked and the kids played...

Kit created a HUGE relay race for the kids that the parents helped manage.

 Because of Ryder's love of sports, the relay pulled in different aspects from football, soccer, baseball, and finishing it off with a slam dunk for basketball.  The kiddos had to do the relay while holding water balloons and not let them fall or pop until they were done.  Then each kiddo got a metal for finishing...

When you marry someone who was once a rec guy at a camp for kids and then became a children's paster, you realize that ANYTHING is possible and if you put that person in charge of games, it is going to be AWESOME!

The kiddos did the relay multiple times until we were out of balloons.

We had 200 water balloons, so the kids got to run the course MULTIPLE times.

Then we had cake:

 Ryder was so tired from the relay, but he was able to rally for chocolate cake...❤︎

We ended by opening our presents at our house with the grandparents and our cousins.

The girls got to try out some of the gifts...

The force is strong with these two...

There is no way to express how ELATED he was with each gift...

Not only does he love Star Wars and legos, but that also means that he will get so much time with his dad to put the big projects together!

We think our grandparents are so special!

 It was such a fun party!  

We had our family, who was there the day this kiddo came into the world.  We had new friends from school and our life group and old friends from church and from our accountability group from college.  It was such a sweet day to watch it all come together to celebrate the life of our Ryder.