First Day of School-Treven

Treven started the 4th grade this year. Unbelievable how fast the time has flown! He loves anything that goes fast- cars, trucks, motorcycles, etc and anything that has to do with hunting or fishing. He started scouts last year and really enjoys that, although he wishes they did campouts at this age!

Treven loves to make all kinds of crazy faces. He has an issue (most likely inherited from his mom) with closing his eyes when the flash goes off! We try really hard to keep his eyes open, but it requires some cleverness!

Treven's 9th birthday

Treven had a monster truck themed birthday party for his 9th birthday. I looked everywhere for a cake that went with our theme, but none of the stores around here had anything close. So, plan B: Chelsey turned a plain old store-bought cake into this awesome cake! We just bought the trucks and jump and she put it all together. It turned out really cool; glad she is so good at decorating!

We held the party at the Rupert swimming pool. We planned a two hour party; 1 1/2 hours for swimming, 1/2 hour for pizza, cake, and gifts. I think the boys would have swam all day and all night if I had let them!

This was the gift table. I found wrapping paper at the dollar store and we wrapped all of his gifts in it. One kid even brought his gift wrapped in the racing flag paper!

Gary went to pick something for Treven on his own. He came back with this race track set. The cars were supposed to go around super fast...can't remember exactly how fast, but over 100 miles per hour. They couldn't wait to come home and set it up. It's always so heart warming to see a father and his son build something together!

Treven got to blow out his candles after we sang Happy Birthday. Sometimes I wonder what he wished for and other times, I'm glad that I don't know!

so many fun new toys! I tried to make the rule that he couldn't take anything out of the box until we got home, but you know how that usually goes!

Even Ellie got into the birthday spirit!

Braquel's Family Shower

When I started planning Braquel's bridal shower, I realized that I had such a big family, it wouldn't be possible to invite everyone to such a small space. (Don't get me wrong, a big family is a good thing until you are tight quarters!) Anyway, my mom was gracious enough to host a second shower for the family at her house. She did an amazing job and it looked beautiful. She set up a candy bar on her kitchen table with lots of pretty glass jars and colorful candies. The guests were given little baggies that they could fill with whichever candies they chose.

In the alcove above the kitchen table, mom decorated with "LOVE" and she had little tin buckets with Braquel and Keven's initials on them. She even made the cute banner with their engagement pictures.

A lady from one of the scrapbook stores in Twin loaned mom this chandelier. It was awesome to set little plates of cupcakes and goodies on for the shower. Braquel got spoiled again by all of my cousins and aunts and grandmas. We are so blessed to have so many members of our family that come out and support us!

Stapelman Family Reunion

It was our turn to plan the family reunion this year. We picked Indian Hot Springs as our spot and went with a Minute to Win it theme. We played about 10 games, some played as teams and some played by individuals on the team. Points were awarded for each game and we gave prizes to the winning teams. In this game, one player threw balls at the bucket on the other players head. No hands, of course, could be used by the player with the bucket!

This game was called Apple Stacker. Each team picked one player to try to stack five apples on top of each other without them falling over. We had two teams going at the same time and timed both teams. Fastest team got the higher amount of points. It was a little trickier than it looked!

We divided the family into teams; we tried to mix up families and equalize the amount of adults and kids on each team. Then, each team got to make a team flag and we had a parade just like at the Olympics.

The first game we played was a Cheeto toss. All of the teams played at the same time and picked two players to represent their teams. One player wore a shower cap covered in shaving cream. The other player threw Cheetos at their heads for one minute. Each team was awarded one point per stuck Cheeto!

This was a game that I thought would be a little easier! I took the front of a cereal box and cut it into twelve even pieces. We timed how long it took one player from each team to piece it back together. The only thing I would have done differently was to have each team go at the same time. Those that watched the first few teams had an advantage!

This game was one of the really fun ones. Each team picked a player that had to try to get a cookie from their forehead to their mouth using only their faces; no hands! It turned out to be quite difficult, but it was fun for those of us watching!

This game was really fun for the little ones on the team. They had 60 seconds (some a little longer depending on how little they were) to separate the different colors of Skittles into the corresponding cups. They even got to keep the Skittles when they were done!

Another game that proved to be more difficult than we thought! Each team picked one player to "fan" a plastic Easter egg across the room with a box lid. Much harder than it looks or sounds!

We also played Shave the balloon. All of the teams played this one at the same time and had shaving cream covered balloons that needed shaved as quickly as possible without popping the balloon. We also played a few other games, but I was too busy laughing to get pictures of every game! It was a lot of fun, but also a lot of work! Glad we won't be in charge for another few years!

Keven & Braquel's Engagement Photos

We are so lucky to have such a talented photographer in our family! My sister-in-law, Robin Gibbons, took these beautiful photos of Braquel and Keven! There are several more, but these are some of my favorites.

water fun

Chelsey always says she isn't getting in the water, but Ellie always talks her into splashing around!

Ellie is still a little scared to ride the tube, but Mathew and Mikayla convinced her to get on with them. Of course, once she realized that they had a good hold on her and she wasn't going to fall off, she loved it!

Treven's a maniac on the water. He doesn't like to ride the tube much, but he gets out there and wants to fish and fish and fish! Some of our family want to tube, some want to swim, some want to fish, and then there is me...I just want to sit and relax and watch the kids have a good time!

The captain of the boat! Still as good lookin' as the day I met him!

More splashing and playing around shots. We have an old foam football on the boat, so we would throw it and they would have a swimming race to see who could get it first. Only problem was when they threw it back to me on the boat; it was so full of water I would get soaked!

Braquel's Bridal Shower

We did Braquel's bridal shower in a cupcake theme. I rented the Senior Citizen center since I didn't want to deal with bugs, lack of a kitchen, and the heat at the local park. Everything was black, white, and hot pink and polka dots. The tables were set with black tablecloths, white square plates, polka dot napkins, and black silverware. We used doilies in the center and the wrapped cupcakes and black, white, and hot pink polka dot confetti in the middles. We also served Shirley Temples for the pink drink.

I covered an old hot cocoa container with polka dot paper and a doily for a date night canister. I bought large popsicle sticks and we had the guests write date night ideas on them. On one side, we used a pink pen and wrote ideas for dates that cost nothing. On the other side, we used a black pen and wrote ideas for dates that did cost money.

We individually wrapped cupcakes (notice the polka dot cupcake liners!)for all of the guests. They took some time, but they were really cute and we could send some home with the guests without them getting too messy.

These were the party favors that we set by each plate. You can't really see the tag but it says something about it being sweet of the guest to come share her day with her. We filled them with Hershey kisses and raspberry bliss chocolate. Again, the black white and pink! I also made about twenty tissue paper pom pom flower things to hang all over. I didn't get any pictures of them, but they turned out awesome. There were all different sizes and I even found black polka dot tissue paper for some. We hung two or three at various lengths above each table so it kind of looked liked chandeliers.

Braquel got very spoiled! It was great of so many family members and friends to come and support her.

My niece, Mackenzee came down with her mom for the shower. Her and Ellie were so cute; they walked around holding hands and just grinning at each other. They play together so cute!

Some other fun things we did at the shower that I didn't get pictures of was a 20 question game about Braquel. It was fun to see who knew her the best; however, I have to say that Keven was asked the same questions and he would have beat everyone at the shower! He answered 17 out of 20 correctly! We also did a game with candy bars. I would say something like "the Honeymoon night" and guests had to answer it with a candy bar name. The answer to that one is "Skor". It was really fun and then I gave a basket with each of the candy bars in it to the winner. We also did tee-shirts for the bride, mother of the bride, mother of the groom, and the bridesmaids that all had titles written in rhinestones on them. We also made tulle tu-tus for the flower girls to wear. We had lots of fun planning the shower and I thought it turned out really cute!