Happy Birthday Tess!

Daddy loves our two day old baby Tess! Dec. 16, 1993

She is dressed the first thing I ever bought her.

The day I found out I was pregant I went to D.I. (all I could afford) and bought this tiny pink dress. 

What a little doll!

Tess is such a unique person. No princess costumes here! 

She's a robber!

Easter Sunday age 8.

Totally confident and happy and as darling as can be. 

I made a replica of her lacrosse stick for the #1.

Russ suggested I make a road with a stop sign for the #6. I added a the truck for fun.

The whole family got up early in the morning so we could bring her breakfast in bed (chocolate protein shake that she forgot to drink before she left!) and watch her open her presents before school.

She got some cute stuff! New purse to hold her drivers license, key chain, Gas $$, shirt (pictured below) necklace and matching earings and flower for her hair. It was a girly birthday!

All of the boys in her seminary class knelt down and sang Happy Birthday to her! 

She was LOVING it!

Her best friend Hailey had another present for her...

A "Crocodile Gecko"that Tess named "Ferb"

More reptiles for the Crawford family!!!

That night we took the family and Hailey (who seems like family) to Macaroni Grill for a delish dinner.

Tess wearing her new jewelry and shirt.

Happy Birthday!

Hopefully all her wishes already came true, but just in case!

Update... She got her driver's licence today!!!!! 
Watch out world!

Tess's Sweet Sixteen!

For Tess's party we decided to make candy since she was SWEET sixteen!

We made suckers with various colors of chocolate and taffy which is cooling right here on the counter. 
Fun and Yummy! Good combination :)

... I dropped a five pound jar of sugar on the tile. I was hoping Tess would catch it as it fell between us but she jumped back to save her feet from impending doom!

That's me in the purple flip flops and Tess is barefoot. You can see a patch of white sugar on her thigh. Sorry Tess!

This event put the candy making on hold as we cleaned up. I wasn't the only one to cause a catastrophy, Tess put chocolate in the microwave to melt and left the METAL paint brushes in the bowl. We were sitting there and then Sadie said "Wow- A flame, in your microwave!"

AHHHHHH!!!

You can't really see it but there were big black burnt sections of chocolate and the bristles on the paint brushes are fried

We started by making chocolate suckers. We had all different colors of melted chocolate to brush onto the molds. Miranda models her yummy Santa.

Mckaylee just finishing eating her chocolate covered pretzel that she made.

Great job guys. They called the green Santa, "The Grinch."

Spencer and Janessa had fun making treats. They used some of our streamers as a headband.

Pouring the hot candy onto the pan. We couldn't find the candy thermometer Russ had JUST bought so it didn't exactly turn out. Perhaps we cooked it too long or maybe didn't pull it just right but it turned out hard and not taffy-ish.

 Still yummy!

As if candy making wasn't enough, we decorated APRONS too!

I bought 18 white aprons from Sam's Club and then Tess picked out this cute black and white fabric which I sewed into pockets on the front of each. Then we bought tulle, ribbon, flowers, gems and more for the girls to add and make them ADORABLE!

Sadie was the first one done and really got into the BLING!

What about the boys? We found these awesome iron-on gold TIGERS!

(Tess's school's mascot is a tiger)

They loved them!!

Here they all are!

Hailey, Tess, McKaylee, Cassie, Jenna, Sadie, Miranda, Jenessa, Maddy, Branson, Spencer and Doug in the back.

Tess received lots of great gifts, including this abstract portrait made out of food from Hailey and McKaylee!

Getting ready for ice cream cake from Cold Stone

(don't worry, I made her one of my famous homemade cakes tonight- her reall b-day)

Cake all aflame with sixteen candles!

We had to do the hand-slapping happy birthday song from girls camp! After cake we played the "What would happen if..." question game and laughed our HEADS off!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TATE!

Happy Birthday Chloe!

Our new 12 year old has been waiting a whole year for this day! 

You made it CHLOE!!!

Our third child was the easiest one yet. Born three weeks early and happy ALL the time!

Chloe has always been talkative and outgoing. Never a dull moment.

The first of our kids to have Daddy's big brown eyes.

Chloe, an Arizona baby, can still enjoy the rain like her mom.

Chloe is an early riser. This morning she was up way before 6:00 am. At 6:07 Olivia came to wake me up and tell me that Chloe was ready to open her presents and have breakfast in bed! It was a Saturday. I did get up soon and made her a smoothie and poppy-seed muffins. YUM!

She asked for a camera of her own and now she's got it. She put it to good use right away!

Her cute carrying case. It matches!

Chloe wanted a gymnastic's b-day cake and party at her gym (USA Fitness) so I looked at a picture online of a girl doing the splits in a handstand on a beam and drew this design, and switched the beam to her gym logo.

One of my favorite cakes EVER!

Our gymnast with her cake. The gymnast on the cake is her. Can't you tell?

Chloe, a Young Woman!

The night before her b-day the Beehive class from our ward came and kidnapped Chloe and took her to McDonalds for ice cream. Chloe was dead asleep when they got to our house and she did not go willingly. She kept telling them to get off her and leave her alone till I told her who it was and why they were attacking her. Then they had fun!! After they dropped Chloe back home and she fell asleep, the Beehives came back and "Heart attacked" the front of the house and garage door with tons of big purple hearts with messages written on them and left this sign for people to HONK for Chloe's b-day. 
We heard lots of horns all day long!

At the gym, Coach Suzanne helped the party girls (and Rustin) get warmed up!
 Tess was at home working on an American Sign Language project with her friend.

Doing the splits! Olivia, Madison, Megan, Ashli, Alexis, Bailey, Natalie, Emily, Rachel, Chloe, Olivia G., Penelope, Landrie, and Shaylee. 
3 sisters and one set of twins and one set of Olivia's.

Rustin had fun trying out every aspect of the gym, especially doing the "log roll" with this octogon mat.

The two Olivia's racing up the ropes.

There was lots of trampolining, swinging, flipping, flying and racing! 

Olivia trying out the BOY'S equipment for a change. Not so bad!

Bailey just hanging around.

After a super fun Pit Race, (Chloe beat me in the end- a great come from behind victory!) and Capture the Flag (our team kinda cheated by hiding the flag too well) we went up to the party/dance room for cake and presents!

Chloe in her birthday chair getting ready to make a wish.

Too bad it took her about 10 blows to get all her candles out!

Twin gift cards from the Olin twins. Thanks girls!

Chloe always wanted to give everyone a big hug after she opened their present but we were running out of time so she just got one BIG group hug at the end!!!