Happy Birthday to Jane! Her birthday was on September 2 so I am little bit slow in blogging this, but we did just have her friends party last Friday so now I can put up the pictures from both events. It is so hard for me to believe that our youngest daughter is now 10 and in the double digits! Boy does that ever make me feel old! But I am also so grateful that I have a 10 year old and that I am not going to be an empty nester any time too soon! Jane is a gift to our family and makes us all laugh! I have been feeling a little sad lately realizing that my family is growing up and leaving the nest and that most likely all 7 of us will never live under the same roof again for any length of time. But then I guess that is what we strive to do as parents...teach our children to be able to live on their own and to be independent. It is wonderful to see how all of our children are making great choices and doing so well...I couldn't be any happier about what they are doing...I am grateful for that.

Anyway, Jane was able to celebrate her birthday on three different days...how does she rate? We had birthday cake and icecream and opened a few presents the night before her birthday because we knew her birthday night would be crazy with meetings at the church! But on her birthday she had her traditional Swedish pancakes in bed, lunch out with mom and then we all went out to dinner and opened up her final gifts. I think she felt sufficiently honored! Finally last Friday night we had 9 giggly girls over for a swim/ game night with pizza, fruit, cookie cake, icecream and candy...lots and lots of candy. It made me so happy to see these girls having some good, 0ld-fashioned fun together without any media of any kind. I think we need more of that in our society. We definitely rely too much on media to make us happy, but it's the games together that can bring closeness and create real memories! All in all we had a great party without too much mess! Happy birthday to our little sweetie!

BREAKFAST IN BED...AHHH THAT'S THE LIFE!

BECS AND JANE...WE MISS ANNE!

FAMILY DINNER...WITHOUT OUR COLLEGE STUDENTS...WAAAA!


JANE GOT A NICE SURPRISE IN THE MAIL FROM BRAD AND MICHELLE...YOU CAN TELL BY HER FACE THAT IT MADE HER VERY HAPPY! HER FIRST FLOWER DELIVERY!


THE BIG JUMP!

PARTY FOOD AROUND THE TABLE!


COOL SHADES WITH CLAIRE!


CAN YOU TELL JANE'S HAVING FUN?


THE HAPPY COOKIE CAKE...by the time we got to this point in the party everyone had had too much sugar and were not very excited about adding more...but at least it looked cute!