Kiersten Of The Double Digits

Kiersten has turned 10! She is pleased to finally be a "tween". Her birthday always falls during spring break. It's nice to have the whole day with her. This year she wanted a donut for breakfast, so I was off to the store bright and early for some fun sprinkle donuts. 

I tried to make her birthday gift display look like bamboo. She loves bamboo because it reminds her of pandas. 

I made Kara blow up 10 balloons, and she helped Ben make a number 10 out of crepe paper. 

It wasn't my best door decorating, but she was still excited to wake up to it. 

When I was at the store for donuts, I saw this balloon on clearance for $3. I was checking it out to see if something was wrong with it, and the floral employee said it was just discounted because it had already been inflated for over a week. I thought it'll at least last one day, so I bought it. I'll have you know that balloon is still floating around the house nearly 2 months later!

After breakfast, she got to open her gifts before Daddy left for work. 

Kara was extra excited to have spent more than usual to give her some very nice gifts. 

Jingles had a great time with all of the wrappings. 

She is the proud and happy owner of her very own cell phone! Only, we didn't set it up with phone service, so for now she uses it to listen to music, take pictures, and play games. When we decide she's ready for a phone, it should be easy enough to activate it. 

Since she requested a special panda cake for her party, she just asked for a cheesecake on her birthday. That was easy enough. 

Happy Birthday to a sweet and fun little 10 year old!

Basketball and Engelbreit

The girls wrapped up their winter basketball season in early March. Kiersten is playing in the spring league, and has had a few  games so far. The teams got switched around a little, but she is loving her teammates and coach so far. 

Kara wanted a break from basketball, so she isn't doing the Spring league. She really bonded with her school district team and is hoping everyone will be back together next year. 

Great season Flaming Hot Cheetos! For the last game, their coach gave them all cheetos socks. Sometimes I'm surprised to learn certain things even exist. 

Biggest girls basketball fans in Ballwin. Sort of, ha!

And the 2 most busy athletes in the Miller house. 

Kiersten asked me if she looked like an anime character. She was really proud of this outfit, though I'm not sure anyone at school thought of anime when they saw her. She's so funny. 

For her famous Missourian project at school, Kiersten learned all about Mary Engelbreit. We learned a lot of fun things. The costume was blessedly easy to come up with, much easier than Kara's Mark Twain. 

She had a great pose, and her speech was very entertaining. She really tried to put some personality into it. 

All of the kids did a great job. It's so fun to hear all of their presentations. There is never enough time to visit them all. 

Finally, here are some pictures of Jingles, because something is clearly wrong with me. I can't stop taking pictures of her during the day to show the kids. I feel like she is the best during the day while they're all gone at school. She looks for me every day around 12:30 to cuddle. 

My 4 Loves

The girls loved their dresses that Daddy bought them for the sweetheart daddy-daughter dance this year. I really thought I would get Evie to ditch the cat ears, but she was really determined to wear them. At least she went with some fancy ones. 

There was no dinner this year, but  Ben was never impressed with the food anyway. 

In place of the dinner. they had an ice cream bar instead. From what I hear, it was a huge hit!

I also heard the music was fun and the dancing was epic. I just love these fancy 4!

On Valentine's day the girls had school, so I had plenty of time to decorate the table and set out their gifts. 

Everyone was very pleased with their fun little gifts. 

We got our heart pizzas from Boardwalk again this year. They were delicious as always. 

When Ben called to place the order, he was offered a dessert calzone as well. It was heart shaped as well, and so cute, right? It was full of Nutella, so the girls liked that. 

Part of my gift from Ben was a fancy custom cupcake. It was so pretty, and a good excuse to indulge. 

It was also delicious. 

Of course I decided to take everyone's picture while they were eating dessert, sheesh.