Madson Memories

My birthday started out way early....and continued on!  I got a couple of really cute gifts from the kids on Sunday when they were here for Greg's birthday party.  Tuesday night, 3 of my sweet friends stopped by with nice gifts.  Wednesday morning Greg and the two boys sang Happy Birthday to me and gave me fun presents.  When I got to school the whole front walkway was decorated announcing my birthday.  Then, I was later surprised to find out all the entrances to the building had cute messages.  One student brought me balloons, another a plant, another a necklace she made me.  At around 11:30, Greg showed up at my classroom with cupcakes for my class.  He had the kids all sing to me.  At the end of the day, my room moms showed up with cupcakes for the class and a snickers cake.  Greg and Tyson had to take off for SLC for ball games, so Kaden and I went to dinner and a movie.  Each of my cute grandkids called and wished me a happy day.  Thursday another cute student came to school with an enormous balloon and ice cream.  I have still been getting wishes from kids at school since the entire school knew it was my birthday.  Kids make birthdays so fun!

Kenzie wasn't sure she liked all the commotion!





 Greg had fun reading all the messages.

 Kris and Dave gave Greg a bunch of fun toys for when he wasn't feeling his "age" and also a gift certificate for when he was.
 Jayson and Kassi had looked up a bunch of things that happened in the year 1962 and then gave him gifts that coincided with those events.  It was really creative.


My fun gift was a book that all the kids contributed to.  Each of the kids and grandkids wrote letters to Greg.  I added a bunch of photos over the years.  As you can tell, Kami liked looking at the photos with Grandpa.


 After dinner we had an open house for friends and family to stop by.  I should have been better about taking more photos.  We had about 100 people stop by during the party.  It was so much fun!

We got up early Saturday morning after getting home after midnight on Friday to go to Tooele to watch Madison's first soccer game.  It was a crack-up!  Kris and Dave had to teach a class that morning and so they weren't able to go.  So, Greg took pictures with his own camera as well as with Kristen's.  I took video with their video camera also.  Dave's mom, Bev, and his sister, Heather, also came, so Madison had a huge cheering section.

Tyson started out telling Maddie to kick the ball hard!  Her comment back was, "I could maybe break my toe!"  So then he told her to run towards the ball and get closer.  She turned to him kind of disgusted and told him, "Did you see that girl earlier who got hit the face with the ball!"  Hard to argue with that logic!

She did a great job though...especially for her first game!

I love this photo and the next one.  While I was videoing I missed a lot of the action obviously.  Looking at Madison and the way she is mad at this boy totally cracked me up.  You don't push around my grand-daughter and not get an evil eye!

Kenzie did warm up later in the game, but she wasn't sure she wanted to interact with a lot of people at the first!

Friday the 13th is supposed to be an unlucky day....but Kaden sure didn't think so.  He came home from school all excited.  He had gotten really good grades on a math test he had taken and on a book report/project he had turned in.  Then we headed to Pocatello for his clogging competition and they took first place!  He has decided this is a lucky day for him after all!

My mom and dad and Ryan all came and watched Kaden clog.  After the first dance, we went and told him he needs to smile!  As Ryan and I got up to talk to him, I heard his dance instructor, Kristie Roche also telling him he should smile.  She told him that he is the one kid that doesn't need to look at his feet....so he should be able to smile!

He was telling her he wouldn't smile....so I tried bribing him.  I told him I would give him $5 if he would smile during the next number.  He still said no.  Then Kristie offered to buy the team donuts at their next practice.  He still said no.  Then I upped the offer to $10.  He still said no.  So then Ryan told him he would pull up his shirt, show his belly, and yell Kaden's name.  Kaden then agreed to smile.  I think he decided he better go for the $10 and donuts before his brother embarrassed him half to death!

Kaden's loyal fans!

Before the Easter weekend happened......on Wednesday after school, I went to pick up Kaden from clogging.  On the way home, Kris called us and asked us what we were up to.  I told her that Dad and Tyson were headed to Salt Lake to watch Tyson's team play baseball (Tyson is still in his leg brace due to Blount's Disease, so he can't play) and I was going to take Kaden to piano lessons and then to mutual.  She talked us into playing hookey and heading to Salt Lake to meet her at the new City Creek Mall that just opened and go shopping with her and these two cuties.  We had a lot of fun.  We all loved the Disney store (maybe not Kaden as much as the rest of us).  I had taken a couple of cute pictures of the girls and Kaden in the Disney store and by the fountains, but somehow deleted them, so luckily Kris had taken this photo right before we got there.  It is sure fun to be around the grandkids!  Thanks Kaden for being such a good sport!

Thursday the little boys and I headed to Pocatello. My mom had another vein surgery that morning. We hung out at her house most of the day. She is a very tough lady! I can't believe all the pain she handles. We brought Carter and Kami home with us that night. Ryan and Kristen thought Kami would be asleep before we got home...but nope! She was wide awake and ready to wrestle with grandpa! The next morning we got up and got the house cleaned, laundry done, and the Easter eggs dyed. I took some pictures but accidentally erased them off my camera! We went to lunch with Grandpa at McDonalds. We then got some grocery shopping done. By the time all the rest of the family came we had the turkey cooked and food ready to go. Carter had requested that they roast hot dogs and marshmallows for dinner Friday night. After dinner, Greg went out and hid the eggs for the big people Easter egg hunt. He has a really good flash on his camera, so you can't tell that it was pitch black outside. I had bought those glo-stick bracelets,s so the eggs were all illuminated. Greg was sitting on the dark porch and I didn't think he had enough light to take a picture...so I posed....I shouldn't have! Ryan and Kristen were the big winners. Kristen found the $10 egg, and one of Ryan's eggs had $5 in it. Tyson also found one of the $5 eggs. Saturday morning we headed to the Tremonton egg hunt. Greg is the Kiwanis president this year so he was in charge of it. The kids all got a good share of candy. Tyson thought it was dumb that he was too old this year to participate. Kaden helped Greg give out candy in exchange for eggs. After the hunt, we came home for the little kids to have their egg hunt at our house. I was glad the weather cooperated. It snowed a bit on Friday, so I was nervous, but it was a beautiful spring day. One of the biggest hits was the bubbles. We all laughed a lot watching the kids! The girls were all trying to catch the bubbles, while Carter was using his light saber to stab the bubbles. He is such a boy! The four-wheelers are always a hit at our house. I wish I had the pictures I had taken. Kassi and Jayson made really cute deviled eggs that looked like chicks hatching, and their veggie tray they brought looked like a bunny. Kris made some really good white chocolate covered cereal, cheesecakes, and peanut butter cups. I made turkey salad croissants. We all ate too much and had fun. I love when the whole family gets together!! Dixie and Baxter both got to come this weekend. I don't think they loved our garage, but they were good sports. They both loved playing fetch with the plastic Easter eggs.