The Big 10

I'm not talking big 10 football, I'm talking Karissa's 10th birthday. If you can believe it, she is 10. That means we have lived in Canton, MI. over 10 years! Crazy, huh?  Karissa is the lucky one to be able to celebrate her birthday with family members randomly on her birthday. This year, it was Grandpa Jim and Grandma Pat again. They came out the day after Christmas and helped us work on the basement project, that we started last year and took about a 8 month break from for other seasonal projects outside. We also finished up our Christmas celebrations by making our gingerbread houses. 

Getting really involved in that candy.

Who says they have to be done before Christmas?

Karissa's birthday is the day before New Year's Eve, so it fell on a Friday this year. For a change I decided to have her party on her actual birthday. Of course it turned out it was the day our Stake celebrated New Year's at Zap Zone, so it was a day full of fun. We went to Zap Zone that morning and had a Panera Bread/ Burger King take home lunch for Karissa's special family meal. Yes, odd mix. I had some gift cards from my students for Panera and of course Karissa wanted a hamburger, so we did it all! She opened her presents from the family after lunch, then we got ready for the party. She wanted to go to the local radio station that is at our highschool for a tour. We borrowed our friend's 15 seat van so we could all ride together. We got an excellent tour of the station and learned a lot from it. My mom recorded Karissa talking on the station and posted it on facebook. We had a hard time getting it to my computer, so if you haven't seen it, look for on FB, it's pretty cute. 

Zap Zone Glo Golf

Present time!

Austin and Grandpa had some quiet time to rock out on their harmonicas.

Erik even gave him some piano tips, though he isn't taking lessons yet.

Making Karissa's Beanie Baby cake

She created it on her own.

Party van! Sarah, Victoria, Ella, Edlewiess, Kasrisa, Olivia

88.1 The Park

Talking on the radio!!

 When we returned, we ate pizza and other party food, played the Beanie Baby based games Karissa planned on her own, ate cake, opened presents, and then watched The Princess Bride. Her friends left later then they normally do, as she wanted, and then I convinced my kids, minus Erik, to stay up for New Year's on Friday rather than Saturday so we could wake up for church on time. They didn't make it to midnight, thank goodness! I'm sure part of it was the fact that all the adults had gone to bed, they didn't know what to do!

Beanie Baby bowling

Pin the eyes on the Beanie Baby

Her besties :)

Karissa still loves to read. She reads about 5 different books at a time, sometimes more. I don't know how she keeps track of it all! She's still doing really well in TAG, even though she says she hates math and that she's not good at it. She's really improving in her piano skills and is preparing for Federation in February. She loves to play Animal Jam on the computer and "meet" her friend Ella there. She will text Ella on Ella's mom's phone from my phone and they will figure out how to meet in the cyber world on Animal Jam. She still loves crafts and loves to watch Studio C and sing. She keeps practicing her cheers and cartwheels for next August when cheer starts up again. She really enjoyed being a cheerleader. In the meantime, she just got a part in the community play Fairy Tale Courtroom  as a flying monkey. Tryouts were the other day, so we'll see how that goes these next two months. 

She is still super small and loves to cuddle. It's hard to think that she might actually be close to my height one day (all 5'3"of me).

She let Grandma and Grandpa have her room and we all had a great time with them.  Happy Birthday Karissa!

Next blog: update on the basement!