Parties!

Nicoles BFF is moving to Washington DC and we are REALLY going to miss their family. We hosted a farewell for them and even though there were tons of people outside and lots of goodies outside as well, I came in and saw the two of them playing happily as can be, chatting and laughing.

The flash makes it look really dark but at least you get a pic of the fun. It was meltingly hot for the first hour and then was great until the party was over. We had a bring your own meat barbecue and over fifty people and their kids came to say goodbye to the Kinneys. It was quite a party!

Michael Huff enjoying a huge piece of cake. The kids Nicole's age had the time of their lives with the unlimited supply of goodies for three hours straight. Nicole didn't wake up until 9am the next morning (this is unheard of!) to sleep it all off.

On Sunday Jim and Jacob took a well-deserved nap. Sundays are pretty exhausting for us all.

Daniel turned 19 yesterday and we were honored to have him with us to celebrate his special day. We ate at a restaurant of his choice- he took us to a new place (yes, a new place!) and we all loved it! After dinner, we sang happy bday and gave him his Shark Attack cupcakes I made and played some fun games like "Don't Break the Ice" and "Cootie."

All day Nicole had been begging for one of these (and eating the scraps from when I was decorating them).

Michael chose a life preserver (with a doughnut on top it's practically two in one and he is all about MORE food). Nicole chose the shark because she knew there was a Twinkie in there somewhere and had seen how long they took to make :-)

Jim went for a school of fish and Daniel got a shark too!

Mom sent some presents so Daniel had something to open too! He got some Ukraine gear and books to read before his mission.

The Cootie game takes forever to play and Nicole was totally beating us before even she got tired of trying to roll a 6. We skyped with Marian and Mom and that saved us from having to finish :-)

Big news for the business- Medicare showed up yesterday (at least a month before we expected them) and luckily Jim and Daniel had just organized the lab that morning and everything went great! This is a huge blessing to have them come by so quickly because no other insurance company will consider having a contract with you until you have the Medicare number. We had told Daniel he could have his bday off from work, but he still went in. If he hadn't gone in, we would not have been ready. Can I ever say how awesome Daniel is and how grateful I am for his many sacrifices? Jim's first patient also comes on Thursday. We considered throwing confetti and getting his autograph and picture...but decided the idea was probably the effect of all of the cupcakes and candy we'd been eating :-)