Happy Birthday Randy!

Well it happened.  Randy is his last year of his 30's  We celebrated in style by going to Culver's (of course).  

 This guy does so much for our family.  He works loooong hours and puts up with lots of crap to provide for our family.  I hope he knows how much we love him. Thanks toots for all you do.  Hope your birthday was awesome!!!

Welcome to Minnesota

We left on Labor day from Martin's Cove in hopes of seeing Mt. Rushmore and Matney one last time.  But our start was too late and we had 13 hours to go so we drove all day and got into our hotel in Maple Grove about 1 AM.  Because of Randy's surgery and other events we were unable to secure a home before leaving Indy, so we stayed in an extended stay type of a hotel in hopes of finding a place soon. Randy had to be up early and at his new job that next morning and so we sent him off with his very own first day picture, lol.

 Over the next 3 weeks, we searched everywhere for a rental.  We thought we wanted to stay somewhat near Randy's office so he wouldn't have to commute that far, but we also knew with this new position there would be a lot of travel, so being near the airport was also an option.  When we couldn't find a place up on the Northside, so we expanded our search to all over the Minneapolis area and found a home in Lakeville in a little bit of disarray from previous tenants that the landlord said he'd work on while we were living here.  It was big enough and for a great price, considering the area, and since we had been struggling to find a place we jumped at the chance and moved in as soon as possible.  We had been living in a 2 bedroom hotel for too long and we were "all done" living that way.  Plus the kids had been out of school long enough and they were getting a little stir crazy.  We tried to get out of the hotel as much as possible, but with Randy working and being new to the area it  was hard to explore with 6 kids. We did go to the Mall of America which had been a dream of mine since I was teenager.  Now we live 20 minutes away!!!  This place everything imaginable, even roller coasters and other rides.  The kids really like the Peeps store and of course the Lego store.

 Being out of our ordinary routine was hard for Kaders.  Living in a hotel, not having his normal bedtime routine made it hard for naps as well as bedtime.  But he would eventually crash somewhere.

 We also heard about the Como Zoo which is a free zoo in Minneapolis.  It was small but had some really cool animals.

So far we really like it here.  There is a lot to explore and so many lakes.  I feel like I'm living Up North all of the time.  Now if we could just afford to buy a lake house, I would be in heaven!!!

New Year, more fun! Randy and Micah's birthdays!

I can't believe I finally finished 2014!!!  Here we come 2015!  We rung the New Year in Andy and his family, even BJ's brother was in on the mix.  They stayed long enough for us to celebrate Randy's 38th birthday and then had to head back home.

 It was must have been Friday, looks like it was pizza night, lol.  Randy loves this pineapple cake my mom makes, so it has been HIS birthday cake for a few years now.

 11 Days later, Micah turned 10!  This boy is such a kind hearted soul.  He always wants to make sure everyone feels important.  He gives the best hugs and wants you to know he loves you.

 He also opted for an ice cream cake.

 Then he got to open some presents.  This was his favorite.  After playing with army guys so much when AJ is around, it was time to get him his own.  He had a few but this topped the cake.  He was so excited.

Love you lil Man!

WE'RE DONE!!!!! Well almost

It's hard to believe that we were here just 3 years ago.  It's been a looooong hard road, but we've made it, kinda.  Technically Randy has one more 3 credit class to finish until he's officially done, which will be completed by the beginning of June, but since we really don't think we will be here in August when the summer session ends, we decided to have him walk in the Spring Graduation.  We have struggled since the day we got married as to which was the right direction to go for Randy's schooling but once we figured which path to take, Heavenly Father sure took over the reigns.  We have gone from clueless on how we were going to go back to school to getting relocated to Utah, losing a job, miraculously getting Utah residency, going  to and finishing a Bachelors from UVU, thinking we were going to move to Cedar City to finish school and having that fall through, to being led to the EMPA program at BYU and not having to pay for his graduate degree all in 5 years time (which to some might sound like a lot, but when you have 4+ children things sometimes take a little longer, lol).  I can't count how many times I have felt my Heavenly Father push us in a different direction than what we was going during this time.  I am sooo grateful that He did though otherwise we may have ended up with a completely different outcome.

WARNING: PICTURE OVERLOAD!!!!

Now for the fun you've all been waiting for. . . the pictures, ta da!  Randy picked up his clothes early and we decided instead of waiting till graduation day to take pics when there would be tons of other grads doing the same thing, we'd go to the signs at BYU the day before and take advantage of less crowds.  I have so many shots and really wasn't in the mood to do a lot of editing so I just put up a few random ones. 

It was a little breezy, can you tell?

I love this shot.  We were walking back to the car and I couldn't resist shooting this.

Micah sporting his dad's cool hat.

Randy walking in, he's 9th from the end with his arm up pointing.

 A little closer shot, looking right at us.

His mom's camera got even closer, I love that he looks like he's marching.

This was right before his row got up to go to the stage.  That's one of his EMPA buddies that decided to graduate early as well.

Really blurry I know, but here he is going up on stage.

On the other side with the 2 other EMPA guys.

We were naughty and left after he walked.  Apparently in the business school, over half of the grads were getting their graduate degrees.  I really couldn't sit any longer for them to go through the Bachelor's as well especially since Randy was literally right at the end of the graduates.  Blame it on #5.

Here are the families that were able to come and celebrate with us.  Julie and her kids.

Alina and Ki Ki-these 2 are troopers.  They had already sat through another graduation early that morning.  Alina's mom graduated with her Master's in Education.  Thanx again Alina for coming.

Of course us-minus Morgan who decided she should make this day extra special by barfing, the poor thing watched movies on my bed all day.

Randy's parents and sisters.

Even though she looked like trash we didn't want to leave her out.  We had to get at least one shot of her with her handsome daddy.

At home for a couple more shots.

I'm going to regret this later, but I couldn't resist.

After it was all over and we checked up on Morgie, we went out for Linner at one of our favorite places, Rib City.  It was probably our last time eating there and man it will be missed.

Grandma tried really hard to get these kids to sit still long enough to get a cute shot, this was the best that we could do, the little stinkers.

Next on the agenda, getting a job.  Right now Randy's got a really great opportunity in San Antonio and we will find out by the end of this week if he got the job.  We are hoping things work out for us down there, but I've learned over this past years that it's really not in my hands.  So if we are suppose to be there I know that Heavenly Father will have a huge part in it.  However, prayers couldn't hurt, lol.  Here's to the next chapter in our lives.  Congrats Toots!!! We Made it!!!

Busy January

To start of the month, Randy turned 35 (don't tell him I told you).  He hinted to me that he thought it would be fun to have a party, a surprise party to be exact.  I'm not a huge party thrower, that is why my kids only get a party every other year, but Randy has been working really hard to get us out of the circumstances we are in (through school) and so I figured I needed to be nice this year and do something for just him.  My friend Matney offered her house, I got the invites out, and ordered a cake (cuz I can only do so much when I feel like crap most of the day).  Our neighborhood friends, his parents and sister showed up and gave a him a good surprise. (Or so we tried, he figured it out earlier but was a good sport about it).  I, being the lame wife that I am, didn't get any pics except the cake and a video of us singing to him (which I will spare you the excitement).  It was fun and I think he liked it.  Thanx to all who helped out and showed up.

 Last Friday was Micah's 7th birthday.  He had a birthday presentation in class and I brought the class donuts to celebrate.

 His teacher wrote a story about Micah and he read it to the class and showed off some silly pics of himself.

 Gma, Gpa and Kristi came down for dinner and we went to Applebees, cuz that's where the "loud guy" is.  Unfortunately he wasn't there that night, but he still got sung to.

 We came home and ate a Lego cake (I know, not one of my best, but hey at least it was done which is all I can ask for at this moment).

 Oh and at Applebees, there was a balloon lady that made some awesome balloon figures for the kids.  The 1st on the left is a double helix (ya know DNA Strand) she even put two bouncy balls in it for fun. The next is a yellow monkey on a tree, then there are 2 dogs a poodle and a wiener dog and the far right is an octopus, amazing  I know.  This lady was awesome.  Very clever and the kids loved her.

 We didn't have time for our bday pancakes on Friday so we made them Saturday AM.  I just wanted to extend his bday a little, lol. Later that day we finally went to Trafalga to get our pictures taken for our Pass of all Passes.  We played a little black light mini golf, went in an XD Theater ride then Gma and Gpa took the older 3 up to the North Trafalga to play some more while Malia and I went home to rest (since I still don't feel great and Malia was a little under the weather).  The kids had a ball.

 Also this month, Malia's preschool class(es) went to the Dinosaur and Bean museum on campus. I went and helped chaperon (since I usually feel ok till 1).  Malia was crazy the whole time, can ya tell?

 She couldn't sit still long enough to look at anything.  Good thing I only had her and one other little girl.  The other little girl was very well behaved and stayed by my side (unlike my daughter).  It was fun to see everything for eleventy billionth time.  The Bean Museum is always a fun place to go. This is a pic of her teacher showing the kids the butterfly made out of hundreds of little butterflies.  Pretty cool eh?

I can't believe we are already in the 2nd half of January, time sure gets faster with age, lol.

Ice Fishing

Randy's boss invited a couple of his coworkers to go ice fishing last weekend.  Randy opted to bring Micah along so they could have some bonding time.  They went out to Scofield and fished for a few hours.  Micah caught 2 fish by himself and helped reel in 5.  He thought that was soo cool.  Randy didn't take the camera (the one downfall to having a big camera), but one of the other guys brought his so he took a couple of shots of my boys.  Here's Micah and his 1st fish.

Randy helped dig the whole for fishin'. 

They had fun, got a little wet but it was nice for them to spend some time together.  Randy said the snow was coming down pretty good the whole time they were there.  Luckily we were just getting rain here (at least till that night).

Happy Birthday Toots!!!! Micah Lost his 1st Tooth!!!!

1st off, Randy turned 34.  Seriously can time just stop now.  Before we know it we'll be hitting 40, AHHH!  I'm not ready for that.  Anyway, we kind of had a long birthday weekend.  We celebrated New Years day with some cousins.  Had a potluck and a white elephant exchange.  It was fun visiting with them.  Randy's mom brought down a birthday cake to share with everyone.  So we sang to him on the day before his bday.  Then on his actual bday on Sunday, my brother, Billy, blessed their new little baby girl (btw congrats to them, I still haven't taken a picture of her yet).  So we went up to their ward and then had dinner with them and didn't celebrate that day.  But on Monday we decided to have a few of Randy's friends over for dinner and cake. 

Hope you had a fun day/weekend Toots.  

Micah lost his 1st tooth on Wednesday.  I had been doing P90X with my friend Jess when he bit into an apple and Randy said it started.  He noticed on Monday that another tooth growing behind his 2 bottom teeth (which made me nervous) and neither of his teeth were loose at all.  I figured well we have a dentist appt next month, I'll let him deal with it.  That was until he bit into the apple.  From Monday until Wednesday, there wasn't even a hint of it being loose.  I came home and he was holding a cold rag in his mouth.  I asked him to just let me see it and would not cooperate.  So I pinned him down and barely touched the tooth and it fell right out, literally. 

That little white thing behind the hole in his mouth is the new tooth coming in. . . craaazy.

Our little man is sure growing up.  On another side note, we had another Micahism. McKenzie taught him the "turning the apple stem through the alphabet" game.  So now every time he eats an apple (which is daily) he turns the stem and lands on a different letter. So far he is going to marry Isabel, Maya, Hadley and someone named Nikki or Nicole.  He giggles every time we think of a corresponding name to his letter.  Oh boy.