Melissa's 8th birthday party

Everyone swimming while the weather was good (during a tornado watch!)

Melissa opening her gifts.


We have giant birthday parties for our kids when they turn 4, 8, 12 and 16. This was Meliss's big 8! My brother was taking a lot of pictures, and I was very busy, so I didn't take a lot of photos,I am posting what I was given by Karena Mcgraw( who was also very busy helping me, or should I say I was helping her!) We knew that the day was supposed to have "passing showers in the afternoon" so on the way back from the church following Melissa's baptism, I was praying for the sky to clear up since we had about 60 people coming, all ready to spend the afternoon swimming! We turned on the radio to hear the weather report, "The whole area is under a TORNADO WATCH"! did I hear that correctly??!?! Yes I did, I began brainstorming for what we were going to do with 60 people in our house, and had decided to pray again for good weather!! So we got back to the house in the pouring rain, and started welcoming guests...Dale went to get pizza, and the rain stopped and a teeny bit of sun peeked out!! I rushed everyone to the pool to take advantage, they swam for about 45 minutes, we came in and ate, then outside again while the weather was cooperating, Since the party ended at 2, I planned to call everyone in from the pool at 1:30 for cake and ice cream and gifts, at 1:26 we heard thunder, cleared the pool and the bad weather returned!! Call it divine intervention, or luck, things went very well for Melissa's big day despite the tornado watch!

So after the big event, my house was destroyed! I was way to tired to care, so I decided I would clean it monday...well...on Sunday I came home from church to find my house SPOTLESS! Karena decided that I had had a busy enough weekend and decided to clean my house for me before she left! I wish I had the before and after photos to show how bad it was! Not to mention, she had ALREADY cleaned it friday night! I can't SAY enough "thank you"s to You, Karena!