Emily turns 7

IMG_5618_b, originally uploaded by MCuthbert.

Emily chose to celebrate her birthday at Parties on the Move this year. She and her guests had a wild time bouncing on the inflatables. Afterward, her friend Abby got to stick around for a sleepover.

Here's the collection of photos from Emily's party.

Misty's 2nd Rumpshaker 5K

Giant inflatable colon, originally uploaded by MCuthbert.

A year after achieving her goal of running a 5K race, Misty completed the Rumpshaker for the second time this morning. She's come a long way in the past year, and I'm so proud of her!

Here are more pictures from the race.

Meeting Sam from 'iCarly'

Super happy girls, originally uploaded by MCuthbert.

In what turned out to be a unique birthday treat for Emily, I learned that Jennette McCurdy (who plays Sam on the Nick show "iCarly") was performing a free mini concert in Birmingham today and would be signing autographs for fans afterward.

After work, we loaded up the girls and headed to The Shops at Grand River where we waited in a super-long line to by a copy of Jennette McCurdy's CD. At first we tried to keep our intentions a surprise, but with so many excited little girls there, it was impossible.

It was so crowded that we had to watch the performance from behind the stage, and we had to hold the girls up for them to see. They didn't care though -- they had a fun time.

After about half a dozen songs, we waited in an even longer line for autographs. However, we were really lucky in where we'd ended up standing, because the line stretched on a looong way behind us. Jennette's "handlers" made it very clear that, in order to get as many people through the line as possiblem, she wasn't able to pose for pictures or personalize photos.

When Emily got to the table, though, our little girl worked her charm. "Hi, my name's Emily, and it's my birthday," she said as Jennette scribbled her autograph on an 8x10.

"It's your birthday?!," Jennette replied. "Well, hang on a second." She then proceeded to draw Emily a cake with seven candles and wrote "Happy B-day!" on the photo.

The girls were all smiles after that. They were so proud of their signed pictures. We capped off the evening with dinner at Red Robin and listened to the 2-song CD over and over again on the way home.

Here are more pictures from the event.

Disney character extravaganza

The video that Misty and I made for the girls after we took our 5-year-anniversary trip to Disney World without them just crossed the 100,000 view threshold on YouTube!

If you've never seen it, here it is.



It continues to get a few new comments every week. I'm glad so many people have enjoyed it.

Fun-filled spring break

Morris Avenue alleyway, originally uploaded by MCuthbert.

Our family didn't take a vacation for spring break this year, but I did schedule some time off work to pack in plenty of fun activities with the girls.

We went to Railroad Park, McWane Science Center, the Peanut Depot, SoHo Square, Walk Park, and Star Lake. Then we finished up with a weekend vising my parents in Atlanta.

Here are photos from our spring break adventures.

Conversations with a 4-year-old thinker

I just had this exchange with Kendall...

Me: Girls, I'm going to get us some Chinese food for supper.
Kendall: I know.
Me: How did you know? I just told you.
Kendall: Well, I thinked it.
Me: You thinked it?
Kendall: I thinked it in my mind, because I'm a thinker.

Kendall turns 4

Happy birthday to Kendall, originally uploaded by MCuthbert.

Kendall had wanted to have her birthday party at the park again this year, but poor weather conditions forced us to move the event to our house instead. Here are pictures from her party and a few more from her actual birthday, when she and I went to the zoo.

Rage Against the Marching Band

Wow. I think playing in the school band just became cool.