Keira's 4th Birthday Bounce Fest!

With the baby's birth slated for mid-May, we figured we'd never be able to pull off a birthday party around the time of Keira's real birthday (June 15th), so we opted for an early birthday celebration. So, on May 4th, we had a very fun (yet very low-maintenance) party at our neighborhood park complete with a castle bounce house (per Keira's request), food, and friends!

The birthday girl getting things started!

Pre-party: testing out the slide

 Bouncing with Daddy makes it so much more fun!

Even Ella got in on the Daddy action--yeah!

Tetherball fun!

She's looking so grown up these days!

The bouncing madness!

The lunch spread--yum!

They stopped playing for a few minutes to re-fuel

4-years-old!

Passing out the party favor bags.

She helped assemble all the bags and had fun passing them out to each friend!

How old are you?

Superhero Oliver!

Awwwwww!

Besties!

Pretty girl!

The whole gang!

Keira had so much fun celebrating with all her friends!

We love our (soon-to-be-)4-year-old!

(And, wow!, that is one tired mama!)

Keira took this picture.  :)

She specifically requested a castle bounce house.

The after-party!

Catching some air!

Spider Girl!

The grand finale with Daddy!

After cleaning up and heading home, it was time to open presents!

Wow, look at all those gifts!

Princess Cinderella!

Yes, she posed like this on her own

Swimming Princess Cinderella!

After all the presents are opened, it's time for the wrapping paper game!

Hmm...this may be more fun than the actual presents!

Can you find Keira?

We had a great time celebrating Keira's 4th birthday and the bounce house was a big hit!

Thanks to everyone who came out to celebrate with us!!

Traveling Near and Far

At the end of March (Easter weekend to be exact!), we drove up north to be with my family for my cousin's wedding. Keira stayed at my cousin Devon's house while Noah and I attended the wedding. It was super HOT outside, but the wedding was beautiful.

What a good lookin' family!

Congratulations Ashley and Ross!

All the cousins!

Keira had a great time playing with Cousin Marissa (almost 10-yrs-old) while we were at the wedding!

They played Easter egg hunt, gave each other tattoos, played on the swings, and more! We stayed overnight at their house and the next morning, Keira even got a basket from the Easter Bunny (unfortunately, no pictures)!

On our way home, we picked up Grammy to ride along with us since she was planning to stay at our house for the week--yippee!!

After the drive back home, Keira and Grammy got busy coloring Easter eggs!

Before heading off to bed, Keira got to follow some clues to find her special Easter basket from Mommy & Daddy!

Score!

Lots of fun goodies were inside!

Also that night, we said goodbye to Daddy because he left for a week-long trip to Ethiopia!!!! WOW! He was asked to go with Pastor Joe and Champ Rhodes to photograph all the work being done through Africa Water & Life. It was a privilege to be asked to go and Noah had a great time. To find out more about his experience, click here:

http://blog.africawaterandlife.com/post/50679002978/a-first-hand-perspective-from-west-arsi

Here are some of the amazing pictures Noah took while in Ethiopia:

A playground at one of the restaurants they ate at

Pastor Joe speaking at a Church Planters' Conference

Some of the church planters

These ladies are preparing lunch

Some sites around town

Sharing details about the Self-Help Groups

The team got to visit with a few Self-Help Groups and find out how they are doing to support each other and get small loans to start businesses

There were lots of meetings in dimly lit rooms

At Selam Awassa, a type of business/trade school.

These guys are students that Africa Water & Life provided scholarships to so that they could attend the metal-working school.

Delicious guac & salsa with a type of chip prepared by students at the cooking school.

The cooking school

Interesting wildlife and exotic landscape...

These are called "ingera", which is essentially a fermented pancake. They are typically served as a side at all meals.

A home out in a rural village

Watering station

These kids were fascinated by the meeting that was going on between the New Hope Team and members of a rural Self-Help Group

See all the kids in the background?!

Praying together at the Church Planters' Conference at the end of the trip

Gathering water

Keira and I had a great week with Grammy while Noah was in Ethiopia! We got to Skype with Noah a few times while he was gone and, thankfully, the baby did not decide to come that week!