Max's Birthday

For Max's birthday this year instead of throwing a party I decided to take that money and take him and his best friend out for a night of fun instead!  We went to Fat Catz, which is an arcade/bowling alley/goofy golf/theater place.  Tons of fun for a 4 year old!  We started out by eating some really good pizza, then we went bowling, then we played in the arcade!  We ended the night by getting some dessert at the Sweet Tooth Fairy.
 

On Max's actual birthday we just had a small family party.  We got him a Captain America costume, Iron Man hands (with motion activated sound effects--he's been playing with them non-stop), a fun How to Speak Droid book, and a read aloud chapter book Super Diaper Baby.  We've already read this and it is perfect for a 4 year old's sense of humor.  Max laughed so hard!

This may just be my favorite picture of Max ever!

Also we're not sure why he put on a baby shirt for his party!  Funny kid.

Happy Birthday Max!!!! 

Bottema Family Reunion

Even though the drive was SO long, I'm so very happy we decided to come to this reunion. I love my Bottema family and we had so much fun! There was so much family history, pictures, things my Grandma had made, and pictures of everybody on display, but this was the only picture I took.

Karen tracked down a cotton candy machine!  My Grandpa used to have a cotton candy machine, and he would hand out cotton candy on Halloween.  These pictures speak for themselves- the kids went nuts over the cotton candy!

We had a cake decorating contest that day and a family talent show.  These are the only pictures I took, but I think I need to mention Carson's Jesus cake and Cody's angry bird pig cake for memory's sake.  Khristen and Sherri sang their opera song that Khristen would sing for all her pageants (with a tamborine solo by Bryce), Cody and his brothers put on a poem/skit about the infamous prank we played on Uncle Paul at another reunion, and Karen's family performed a pretty epic lip sync to Neil Diamond's "Comin' to America"

There was also a slide show of my Grandpa's pictures from Korea. And we got to ride in the Green Hornet!  I don't personally have any childhood memories of this vehicle, I guess it was my Great Grandpa's and it was really cool!

The next day was the 4th and we started it out by going to the Tooele parade!  My kids buckets were overflowing with candy.

We went back to the church for a whole bunch of pretty epic games!

Water war- regular war except the winning card gets to through a cup of water on the loser!  Lose five hands and you get a pitcher of water dumped on you!

This quickly turned into a water fight :)

Cheetoh head-- put shaving cream on a shower cap and throw cheetohs!

Whisper challenge: One person has headphones on with really loud music and has to guess what the other person is trying to tell them ("salted peanuts" bahahahaha!)

Say anything:  Each person takes a turn literally saying anything and the first person to repeat or slip up gets a piece of tape stuck on their face by their opponent!

Human Hungry Hungry Hippos: laundry baskets, something to roll on, and ballons.  Hilarious!

We also had a white elephant auction.  Everyone was given $20 fake money to bid with and we all bid on items we had brought!  It was so much fun!

All five of us girl cousins were born within 2 years of each other.  We have always been really close and are the reason it's so important to me that my kids are close with their cousins!

Okay so I don't have the original picture we are trying to recreate here but just imagine a bunch of 80's hair children in matching 4th of July outfits that are hand painted with puffy paint ;)

Just kidding, I found it!

After the reunion we went to Donald's shop to shoot bottle rockets, tractor rides, ice cream and fireworks!  He also had a caboose that the kids thought was so awesome!

Road Trip- Viva Las Vegas

Last week I had a Bottema family reunion in Tooele Utah.  For those that don't know where that is, let me do the math for you- it's about a 13 hour drive from where we live.  Since we have 3 small children there was no way we were going to drive all that way in one day, so we made a pit stop in Vegas!  We got there Tuesday night and drove the strip and the kids were amazed by it all.  They even got to see the Mirage volcano explode!  The next day we went back and did some fun tourist stuff.

First stop- M&M's World!  We bought bulk M&M's and saw a 3D movie.

Then it was off to the Coca-Cola store!  We took a picture with the polar bear, played with the merchandise, and got to sample sodas from all around the world.  That was a lot of fun.  There were some good ones, some interesting ones, and one terrible one from Bahrain!  

We also got pictures with creepy characters that begged for money!  Haha, it's all part of the experience right?

We also went in the Hershey's candy store where we saw 3 giant statue of libertys made out of Jelly Belly's, Twizzlers, and of course Hershey's chocolate!  We ate lunch at Shake Shack, which I think other than this Vegas location is only a New York chain.  Oh my goodness---it was amazing!!!  It's a must do if you're planning a trip to Vegas soon.

  That afternoon we went to the aquarium at Mandalay Bay.  It was so crowded and hot and humid in there, but we had a blast anyway. 

We also went swimming in our hotel pool that night, and ate dinner at Hash House.  I had heard about this place while browsing good places to eat on Pinterest, and I was so excited to find one right by our hotel!  The food was amazing and came in the most gigantic portions I've ever seen at a restaurant.  Seriously, you should split your dinner with someone- it was ridiculous.  But awesome :)  This day was also my birthday and I'd have to say it was an awesome one!