In Sedona... with the JOHNSON'S

In December, 2009 we had the opportunity to spend a week in Sedona, Arizona for the Johnson Family Reunion. It was gorgeous! As you can see, the leaf colors were still changing.

With Grammy's timeshares each family was able to have their very own house unit. These units were huge and cozy. We had fireplaces, a balcony off the master suite, hot tubs, location near a creek, and close to the shopping outlets. It was so nice to be together and to watch the children play together. Some of the fun things we did during our stay:

Matthew & Cassidy all dressed up ready to go to Church

Cousins playing in the courtyard of the resort

Cute niece Carolyn found a treasure

Swimming Time

Uncle Bryan "to save the day"

Fun times playing Rock Band & the Wii

Playing Winter Olympics on the Wii

Play time

Adorable Daniel, Macey, & Cassidy pretending to be kittens in the shower

Matthew snuggling with Grammy

Movie Night

Cute niece Grace with baby brother William

Handsome nephew Michael

We exchanged stockings for the kids & for the adults had a white elephant exchange.



We had Macey's Christmas stocking, and filled her stocking with fun things...but she enjoyed her banana the most

Found snow outside of Sedona. Watch out for flying snowballs. We had a great snowball fight.

Train Ride

Going through the dark tunnel was fun for everyone.

Derek and his brothers: Bryan, Scott, & Kevin

Beautiful niece Brynna holding Cassidy

Santa & Mrs. Clause on the train with us. They read Christmas stories to the children.

Los Abrigados Resort-a tradition in Sedona to go see the decorative light displays.

One of my favorties: Peter Pan Display

Horse rides at a nearby Ranch. We also had the chance to feed the chickens.

Michael, Brynna, Amber, Daniel, Carolyn, & Cassidy

Karaoke Night. Uncle Kevin not holding back.

Karaoke is a Johnson family tradition

Once upon a time...

During a lovely afternoon...a discovery was made..."Cassie's Castle" (named by Cassidy of course)

Our adventures within these sacred walls include:

• A place of refuge from the angry dragons that were trying to take the princess away

• After defeating the dragons the Princess Cassidy had her hair done beautifully

• Then ate like Royalty, our lunch menu: Mac & Cheese, Hot dogs, & Pears -It was delish!
  

• Read Princess story books and created some of our very own

But most of all...shared the most magical moments between a mother and daughter, with NO interruptions!

Mission Call

Our oldest nephew (my sister Maria's son), has just received his mission call. Nic will be the 1st one to lead the way for his cousins. We're so excited for him and can't wait to hear about his missionary experiences.

He will be serving in this country... Armenia

We love you, Nic! We can't wait to see you before you leave.

Cassidy's Birthday Party

Cassidy was asking for a "Pajama Birthday Party" 6 months before her birthday. I thought what a perfect idea, since that is Cassidy's favorite thing to wear...her PJ's. She also asked for a Strawberry Shortcake cake.

So I found some fun ideas online for the party. I made pillowcase birthday invitations out of fabric and stuffed them with bubble wrap. They were fun and easy to make.


Knowing a slumber party was probably not appropriate for their age, we decided to have her party Saturday morning. We had all the children come dressed in their pajamas, it worked out great since they were in their pj's already. We provided a hot breakfast. We had waffles, scrambled eggs, bacon, fresh fruit, O.J., juice boxes, etc.


Derek had a great idea to set-up the basement with some bed mattresses and extra pillows and blankets. The kids LOVED jumping on the mattresses and snuggling up with their blankets/pillows.


Some of the activities at the party included: decorating pillowcases with fabric paint using their hand prints and sponge shapes, playing musical pillows, pin the pj's on Boo (Boo from Monster's Inc), story-time given by my wonderful husband, pillow fights, and of course cake and ice cream.

For the party bags to take home I filled them with a toothbrush, a story book, and goodies to go along with the theme. It was nice to have some extra pair of hands to help out at the party. Thank you Eve and Camille we couldn't have done it without you!

Yummy Chocolate Cake with fresh strawberries in the middle

A cheesy smile after blowing out the candles, she couldn't let go of her juice box and her precious DOLLY

Giving kisses to Daddy with a chocolate ice cream face!

My sweet 4 year old!

This is how we found Daddy after all our guests went home

Right after the earthquake in Haiti, we wanted to take the time to teach Cassidy about others around the world and their needs. Cassidy had many questions about it and asked us what an earthquake was. Derek used Cassidy's wooden blocks and started stacking them on top of each other like houses in Haiti on a chair. Then he rocked the chair as the wooden blocks fell. I think she had a better understanding on how devastating an earthquake can be. Right after that demonstration she ran to the bathroom and brought us something. Cassidy wanted to give all her Scooby-Doo bandaids to the kids in Haiti.

Since her birthday was coming up we thought why not do something different. Instead of birthday gifts from her friends we had the idea to instead ask her friends to bring a pair of pajamas that we were collecting to donate to a family shelter here in town. It was another great opportunity to teach our daughter it's more fun to give than to get. We have been blessed to provide our daughter with so many things and after we explained to Cassidy that some children have nothing, including a mommy and daddy, she wanted to give more. Our friends were very gracious in giving too and we were able to collect 20 sets of pajamas.

That following week Cassidy and I invited some friends and we took a trip to the shelter to drop off the pajamas. The staff at the shelter were very grateful! Children are an example to all of us.

Pajama Success!

February 6,2010

CASSIDY TURNED 4 YEARS OLD...

To carry on Cassidy's birthday tradition again this year, we went to King Sooper's to ride Sierra (the horse), picked out what Cassidy wanted to eat for lunch (Campbell's ABC soup), went shopping for Cassidy's new big girl bed (out of a toddler bed into a twin bed), went to Red Robin's for dinner, played at target with all the little green frogs, and went home to open birthday gifts. Thanks to everyone for Cassidy's new cute clothes, birthday money, books, and new toys.

Winter Olympics 2010

As a family, we spent most of our nights watching the Winter Olympics.

It was so exciting and it brought back memories. Four years ago, we remember watching the last winter Olympics in Minnesota with our brand new baby girl. We enjoyed it then too, but this time Cassidy enjoyed it with us and stayed up late to watch the exciting events. Our coffee table became our dinner table. There were moments of big cheer, times we shared tears with the athletes, felt heartache for those athletes who fell or got disqualified after training so hard for so long, and felt joy over their perseverance and the will not to give up.

We enjoyed watching Cassidy try to mimic the correct form of ski jumping and other events. Cassidy decided she wanted to be just like the ice skaters and dance just like them as long as she didn't have to dance on ice.

We enjoyed watching these games as a family for weeks. And now we are on Olympic withdrawals. Cassidy still begs me to watch the Olympics. Can the Summer games get here soon enough???? And maybe we should take a vacation to Canada, it's gorgeous!

THANKSGIVING...(I know a little late)

We were delighted to host a Thanksgiving Feast at our home for 15 additional family members. Unfortunately, not everyone could be with us. We sure missed you!!

We were able to show our family a good time by visiting The Olympic Training Center, Helen Hunt Falls, The North Pole, Garden of the Gods, the Zoo, getting up early to go on a walk at Sunrise, Playing Volleyball with friends vs. family, playing board games, eating dinner at Salt Grass, and of course eating lots of Turkey!

Grandma reading to Cassidy

Helen Hunt Falls (we all made it to the top)

My dad and I

Going to Church, BRRRR!!!

Zoo

Cool Lion Family

The Next Bobsled Stars
(My brother Derek, nephews Max, Phil, & Sam)

Looks like Phil got Gold, Sam Silver, and Max Bronze. If you look closely you can see Cassidy up above her cousins in the Green Olympic Ring

Trip to the North Pole

Santa's Workshop

Cassidy enjoyed the attention from her cousins especially from Austin & Max, and she was a little daredevil. She couldn't resist any of the rides.

Sunrise Stroll

Thanksgiving Feast

Garden of the Gods

Cassidy with cousin McKay

Dinner at Salt Grass Restuarant

Love notes we found from family after they left

We had a wonderful time with family! Thank you for coming to our home in Colorado and for visiting with us! Please come again soon! :) :)



Football at the Park. Mom was tough with the boys!

Valentine's Day

For Valentine's this year, Cassidy and I had a plan to "heart attack" Daddy's car at work. We were sneaky and Cassidy helped cover Derek's car with hearts just in time before his lunch break. And included Mounds candy bars. We parked out of sight and waited to catch the surprise in person. It couldn't have been more perfect. We had the chance to see all the action up close and loved seeing the smile on Daddy's face as soon as he realized what happened. I will never forget that fun experience and sharing the excitement with Cassidy. We kept laughing and Cassidy kept telling me to "Shhhh!" as if her daddy was going to hear our giggles. Of course then I immediately got a phone call from Derek and told him he can give us hugs in person since we were also in the parking lot. :)

When we got home we found that our front door was heart attacked while we were gone. It made us laugh! Thank you to whoever did that! We love you too! Also, Derek was surprised from the cute girls in his Sunday School class with some treats thanking him for being their teacher. It was so sweet of them. My friend and her kids offered to take care of Cassidy and feed her dinner so Derek and I could go out. We certainly felt the LOVE all weekend.

Derek bought me beautiful pink tulips (my favorite flowers) and took me to an Italian Restaurant. It was so tasty, especially since days prior I had food poisoning and didn't eat anything. Then on Sunday Cassidy received a gift from her parents-a crayon holder made out of fabric. She used it that day at church. It's sure cuter than a zip-loc bag. :)



We hope you had a wonderful Valentine's Day too!

A Sweet Surprise

Cassidy has been sick these last couple of days with a runny nose and a bad cough. But today she has been surprised with a special basket of goodies from some good friends of ours. Thank you Tribett Family! We love you! It meant so much to us! :)

My Birthday (Back in November :0) )

For my birthday my sweet honey bought me one of my favorite movies: Pride and Prejudice. He knows what I like. My parents were also arriving from Arizona on my birthday to visit for a couple of weeks. I heard the doorbell ring and to my surprise I had a Birthday song from my Abuelita and my parents with a Birthday balloon. It was sweet!

Then they let me pick where I wanted to go out to eat for dinner. For some reason, I was craving seafood and since they just built a new Red Lobster down the street I thought why not. Of course it has been like 5 years since the last time I ate at Red Lobster.



It was fun to have extra family to celebrate with. Unfortunately, our waitress wasn't very nice. And of course they had to run out of Mahi Mahi right before I ordered the dish. The sad thing is...that happened 5 years ago too. I still have not had my Mahi Mahi at Red Lobster! :(

But watching my daughter have a lobster experience was all worth it. You see Cassidy is always asking to visit the lobster tank at Walmart when we go. So Derek asked the hostess if Cassidy could see the lobsters. The hostess was so nice and actually took out a lobster from the tank and let Cassidy get close and personal with this new friend.



She enjoyed the Lobster experience until Grandma ordered a lobster dinner and the Lobster dish was right across from her. We had to explain to Cassidy why we eat some of the creatures we call "our friends." She seemed to be sad a little bit but got over it quick. Then before we left the restaurant she asked me, "Mom, do we eat giraffes?" I had to ease her mind and say "No!" I hope she doesn't think we're going to eat our dog next. Just kidding!



The best part of the evening was the COMPANY, good laughs, and my Chocolate Cookie dessert! Thanks family for making my birthday fun!