Weekend birthday bash

August 6th marked my 20th birthday! To celebrate this milestone, I decided to not only celebrate my birthday on the day of my birth, but to go all out and celebrate all weekend long. And it ended up being the best birthday ever! 

Friday started the weekend off perfectly. I got to play hockey in the morning! No other way to celebrate if you ask me. Later that day I got to help Rami out at her church doing the games for VBS. My mom, Rianne, Anna and Emma came, too! We had a bonfire and hayrides after that. Great night!


On my birthday I got to go see the Bristol Renaissance Faire! So much fun. I'm hooked! I went with Rami and her brothers, Jason and Quin. We got to see some pretty epic shows there. Plus I got roasted nuts, which are possibly the most delicious thing on the whole dang planet. The fire whip guy, Adam Winrich, was probably my favorite show. Check him out! http://www.winrichwhips.com/ We also saw a bagpipe group called Tartanic. Loved them! Barely Balanced was right up there with Adam Winrich. They were very funny and did some crazy stuff. I now have 2 more trip to the Ren fair planned in the next two weeks. Don't judge.

Adam Winrich

The day after my birthday, we made a trip over to state fair. I was joined by Rianne, Rami, Aaron, Stephen, and my friend David from our TKD dojo. Crazy fun group! And you have to love Wisconsin. Where else do you find deep fried snickers, oroes, pb&j, beer (don't get your undies in a bundle, I didn't have any!) and BUTTER?! I think with the Ren fair and state fair, it's quite possible that I gained 10 pounds! So much tasty food.

Powered?

 

deep fried pb&j! thank you Jason for opening my eyes to this deliciousness on a stick

 

 And there ya have it, my weekend birthday bash! Tune in next time for my next great adventure!

Good times in the hood...or house

Yesterday we celebrated Anna and Emma's 9th birthday! I still cannot believe that they are this old already. It seems just like yesterday that we brought them home to be with us. God has been so good!

 We spent the afternoon making Christmas cookies. Well, there goes my diet...but it sure is worth it. I am really grateful that we got to share this tradition with Duchene. He seemed to be having a good time. This was also the first year that my dad got to be home while we were making the cookies. It made it that much more special.

Later that night, it was time to go out for their birthday dinner. We have a tradition where the birthday girl (or girls) get to choose the place for dinner, keeping it a secret from the rest of the kids. Then everyone has to close their eyes on the way to dinner. The car ride is full of guesses and sometimes complaining that it's pointless to close eyes because we all know where we are know...but that rarely happens. ;) We got to Stonefire Pizza only to find that it was closed for the night. Fortunately, Anna and Emma had a backup. On to Dave & Busters we went.

When we got home, we did the ol' cake and ice cream, then presents. I know that they're growing up because my parents got them Nintendo DS's. Scary! Usually the birthday kid gets to choose a movie to watch, but seeing as how it was already midnight when we were done, we decided to wait on that. I'm pretty sure they want to watch the first Narnia. They're hooked after seeing Dawn Treader.

Happy birthday Anna and Emma!

 
Showing hope -
 ~Katie~

Fútbol and Coke

Fútbol and Coke is the best way to describe today. I spent a couple hours watching fútbol with Duchene, while he drank about five cans of Coke today. He sure loves his sugar and caffeine! While watching a couple games, Bill and I discovered that his favorite player is Ronaldinho. Duchene told us that he used to play a lot of soccer, er, I mean fútbol, back in Haiti, but he had to stop when he got the tumor in his jaw. The sad thing is that he most likely will not be able to play any more because his jaw is so fragile. At least for quite a while anyways. 

After a couple hours of the tele, I decided I needed a little bit of our fresh 1° weather and set up our Christmas lights with my mom. Yeah it's the 14th, but better late than never! We now have the best light display in our court, if I do say so myself. Once that task was completed, I took Anna and Emma to the store to get my mom a birthday card and some purty flowers...happy birthday mom! Then we got to eat at my mom's favorite restaurant: The Cheesecake Factory. YUM. All in all, it was a pretty fantastical day!


Showing hope - 
 ~Katie~