Carrie Underwood Concert

Last Thursday the big girls and I, along with Tammy and Jenaya, went to the Carrie Underwood concert.  It was awesome!

Grandpa Russ treated my fall birthday girls to the tickets.  Mike treated us to a fabulous stay at the River Rock and Terri, Linda and Mike provided childcare for the three C's.

The girls were well prepared with cute fan shirts and a memorized playlist of all the songs she was going to be singing.

Getting ready at the River Rock.

Notice the coordination...They all have gold shoes:)

Front and back of the fan shirts.

Tam and Jenaya.

{Great company}

I'm not looking so much bigger than them these days..

Heading out to the concert!!!

Of course we took the sky train (it's attached to the River Rock)

{What better way to get some great people watching in?!?}

Fact: People in the "big city" are more interesting.

Kinda excited...

 More golden coordination.

We had dinner at Whole Foods.

It was Tam and Jenaya's first time in a Whole Foods.

Whole Foods is our favourite so we made sure to show them around.

Nothing compares to Whole Foods.

It's awesome.

(are you convinced yet?)

I think they were convinced.

Cheers!

Full and on our way...

LAST TIME we were at this place, (for Taylor Swift) our tickets were rejected at the door.

 (unknowingly purchased from a scammer)

Lame.

Horrible.

We were able to buy tickets at the box office and still get in but it was traumatic.

So much so that we all felt a little nervous when we got back to the arena this time around.

With good tickets.

Here they are!

Their shirts glow in the dark.  Wish I could have captured that but my "real camera" wasn't allowed in and iPhone, while wonderful, is NOT a Nikon D90.

Chaperones.

{we enjoyed ourselves just as much as the kids}

They stood most of the night.

At one point, part of her stage (with her on it) floated over the crowd.

Very cool.

These pictures do not do her outfits justice.

This dress was full of frills in ocean colors and adorned with lots of sequins.

This dress was rows of all white gathered tulle ruffles on the outside and black on the inside.

It had one strap of black jewels.

Black lace heeled booties.

Seriously.

So fun.

Carrie is on the right.

In the blue lame pants.

A traditional pic on the stairs on the way home.

Another awesome concert.

Another fabulous memory.

The girls had a great time and so did the Mommies:)

We are so very blessed to have these kinds of opportunities.

I love seeing life through my kids' eyes.

I still remember my first concert (Tiffany).

And my second one (Amy Grant; Heart In Motion)

I was so excited.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I can not believe that I have kids old enough to be having all these same experiences!

Maybe Not So Cultured...Yet

This weekend we drove JD to the airport in Bellingham, WA.

{JD is Mike's buddy from Ohio.  He came to visit for three weeks.}

While we were close, we took the opportunity to stay at our favourite hotel in Vancouver.

The River Rock!

Enjoying the sunset after a swim.

{okay honestly tho, they were freezing and totally not into it, I forced this picture!}

The next morning we took to the streets of Vancouver, headed for the Art Museum.

I was so excited to see the Matisse exhibit.

My family is a bit unconventional.

Ya they don't really play by the rules.

Love visiting the "big city"!

Apparently it was a bit loud for Bria!

We say "came-bee"

This street is "cam-bee".

So right off the bat, the kids notice a gigantic copy of Blue Nude.

Ya. 

I guess I didn't really think this one through.

Pretty much they were traumatized by their first sight at the museum.

Then there were the three C's.

{Caleb-Caity-Cambria}

"Quiet", "calm" and "don't touch" are not words in their vocabularies.

And we were at the art museum.

Mike spent most of the visit out front with the small fries.

But I loved the exhibit.

I was an art history minor in College and I still really enjoy it.

I can't quite put together a fancy enough sentence to express my thoughts here.

Simply?

I miss being able to look at, ponder, study and appreciate art.

I guess I thought taking the kids to see some of my favourite artist's work would inspire all of us.

The big girls did stand and ponder this one for a while.

Mikayla really liked this one.

Right about here is when a guy in a suit jacket with an earpiece came up and told me to stop taking pictures.

Awesome.

It wasn't the loud 3 year old or the boy-who-has-to-touch-everything that got us busted at the museum.

It was miss art history minor herself.

Culture fail.

For the most part anyways.

I felt a glimmer of interest from a few of the girls and I am hopeful that we still have a future in art appreciation:)

Brian & Meghan's Vancouver Wedding

  This past weekend our family celebrated.

Our hearts expanded.

We shed a ton of happy, bursting with gladness tears.

I gained a beautiful, tender-hearted, loving new sister!

Here is their special day in a few of my favourite photos...

This was the gorgeous scene of their vows.

On the deck of the Vancouver Rowing Club.

Amazing.

Here are the bridesmaids.

(L-R) Meg's sister Kate, Shell, Tam, Ter and myself.

The bridal party!

Mike was the best man.

Caity was a flower girl.

Caleb was an "usher".

Wedding kids with the bride and groom!

Our complete family!  

Now all 5 siblings are married.

Adorable flats for the reception.

The girls had matching dresses.

They looked beautiful!

Little Cambi was a crazy cranky baby girl toward the end of the evening but she looks pretty happy here!

The view from the deck was incredible.

I couldn't stop looking at it.

This is the best family picture I was able to get...

The oldest four are cooperating...that counts for something:)

Here's a whole bunch of the kids.

They had a great night.

Meg and Bri were so gracious to invite all these munchkins.

There were fun activities for them on the kids tables, too.

So honoured to be included!

Adorable cupcakes (and guests).

I was thanked and complimented many times for making the cupcakes.

I did not make them.

I enjoyed decorating the table they sat on but that was the extent of my role.

Girl table!!

Guy table!!

The boys were right next to the coffee.

And the gigantic bowl of sugar cubes.

You can imagine how that turned out.

(let's just say, someone on the deck below ended up with a cupcake on their head...)

Lots of heartfelt speeches.

The quality of character of these two was apparent.

They have so many people who love, respect and admire them.

Their first dance was awesome!

Just a magical night!

(and I had no idea but Brian can dance:)

The kids danced the night away.

It was really fun to watch them!

Madison was dancing like crazy.

People kept telling me "that girl can dance!"

The city view at night was breathtaking!

                                                 

Just celebrated 13 years of marriage!

Caity played and danced her little heart out.

She eventually reached up to her Aunty Tammy, snuggled up in her arms and conked out.

What a sweetie!

This was the little "bed" we made for our two sweeties.

The music was pounding but they slept right through.

Soon Caleb gave in as well. 

I found him laying on two chairs under a table.

Brian and Meghan's wedding was beautiful, special, meaningful and magical.

I wish you all could have been there!

The getaway car!