Happy Birthday Caleb!

Caleb is three years old today. All he wants to do to celebrate is be with "Daddy and Brayden, nobody else." So tonight they are going to Max & Erma's for their $2.99 all you can eat ice cream. They keep refilling your bowl and you keep adding whatever toppings you want. Pretty fun for kids.

Fun facts about Caleb:
*loves eggs--would eat them for breakfast every day
*can't wait until he's four when he won't have to take naps
*if you ask him his name, he'll tell you he's two years old
*he's scrappy, you don't want to get in a fight with this kid, he's vicious
*he's a little engineer--always pulling things apart, like the front wheel on our jogging stroller, it's a good thing we haven't lost the any of the parts
*wants a Lightning McQueen story every night before bed
*if he sees a baby carseat he will buckle all the straps for you as soon as you're not looking
*is pretty shy--if he gets embarrassed or tired and someone he doesn't know that well tries to talk to him, he'll just grunt
*really likes micromachines (Mike has saved them from his childhood)
*hates it when his pants fall off--he really wants a belt

Cap City!!

I would vote this the best restaurant in Ohio and I WISH it was in Michigan, or better yet, Arizona where we will soon be residents. So their best dish, sounds disgusting, but is awesome--the meatloaf. Phil and Noelle have told us about it before, and I didn't believe them, but seeing is believing, or eating is believing. They start with texas toast, pile on the meatloaf (comprised of beef, pork, and veal), add mashed potatoes and chives, spicy fried onion strips, and a really tasty bbq sauce. Yum! And the portions are huge. This was one of the highlights of going to Ohio this last trip. Other highlights were, of course, seeing Phil and Noelle, going swimming in their pool (highlight mainly for the boys), the Columbus Zoo, seeing the Whiteheads, and going to the bunny fountains. Here's a picture of us at Cap City, and now all ya'll can see my plunge into the realm of short hair. I'm officially a mom--mom hair cut and all. But hey, it takes half the time to take care of. Yeah!!

Slumber party in the car

So I don't have a picture (Mike has the camera at school), but we had a slumber party in the car. We needed to go to JoAnne's and By the Pound and a neighbor wanted to get out, so we packed them in our van and got ready to go. Brayden reminded me on the way out that I had promised him he could take a blanket and a stuffed animal in the car, so we stopped back home and I ran up to grab them. I'm glad I was smart enough to realize everyone would want one, so I grabbed four blankets and stuffed animals and brought them to the car, and I was right, everyone wanted one. So we had a fun little "slumber party." It was even complete with hot chocolate (well, just for me, my neighbor had coffee and kids had water) as my neighbor wanted to stop by Starbucks. Fun to get out on a rainy day.

A litte aggressive?

So this morning we were taking Mike to school and coming up on a big intersection and this car on the street perpendicular to us tried to make a free right into the lane next to us (apparently didn't realize that there was a car right there) so to avoid hitting the car, she crossed that lane and then continued into our lane cutting us off as well (by the way, the light was totally green for us, this lady was not smart) so we had to slam on our brakes and Mike blared the horn for probably a full 15 seconds while we tried to avoid hitting this car. Luckily we did, and then of course Brayden asked us what was going on. So I said "Someone was being really stupid and almost got us into an accident." I probably should watch what I say for many reasons and because Caleb is a fighter not a flighter and he started chanting "Stupid car. Punch the stupid car. My punch the car. Punch the stupid car."

What I'm listening to right now

Mike is man-handling a dead chicken for our dinner tonight and trying to entertain the boys at the same time. So he's making the chicken dance and sing, and he's telling the boys how the chicken was beheaded to die and how he just broke the bones in the chicken neck trying to do I don't know what. It is guuuurrrooooossssssss!!!!!! If Mike ever dies, my boys will never be able to eat this meal again. Too bad because it's super tasty!! Oh, and it looks like Mike just found the chicken's kidneys and is now giving a tutorial on how they work. Yuck!

The Happy Couple

Neal and Michelle got married on December 6 in the Seattle temple. As you can see from the picture, they are happy!!!!! It only took four years. They apparently knew within a month in a half of dating that they wanted to get married and they had their four year plan to get everything to work the way they wanted (missions, etc.) I guess the sealer must have felt their anticipation because he talked for a tiny bit, looked at them and said, "Let's do what we came here to do. Let's get this couple married." So without a lot of ado, they became the newest Bastian couple.
They had great weather, the rain held off, and they had an excellent photographer and everything looked amazing, especially Michelle. I loved her hair. We had a good time seeing family, Caleb had lots of fun hiding under th dessert tables and Brayden liked wrestling Sydney, the dog. All pictures of Brayden and Caleb from the reception show them wrestling on the floor. I'm sure lots of people were wondering where their irresponsible parents were.
Now, most people don't make money at their receptions (aside from gifts), but we have an uncle, and calling him a prankster is an understatement, who paid Neal and Michelle $100 to smash the cake into each other's faces. Neal wanted to, Michelle said, "Don't you dare!" and then proceeded to smash cake into Neal's face. Great fun. I think Neal's highlight of the reception was getting to peal out in my Dad's Mercedes afterwards. The only bummer is that Neal brought home some nasty virus from the Phillippines (b/c he had got off his mission three weeks before the wedding) and gave it to Michelle. So she was pretty hosed by the time they got married. She was upbeat about it though, and said they had fun staying up all night coughing and getting caught up on their favorite TV shows. Now on to real life. Good luck Neal and Michelle!

Happy Holidays!!