Kara

Friday was Kara’s birthday.  She is now in her final year of being a single digit age.  She is such a good girl and is so helpful and kind.  I sometimes think she is older than just 9 years old.

This is our off year of big friend birthday parties.  Birthday’s are totally important and special around here and we always try to make the birthday person feel like its their day.  We did something new and exciting this year for Kara’s birthday. 

We had a little family get-away to a resort out at Lake Las Vegas.

I received a flier in the mail offering some summer packages.  I presented Kara with an option to have  2 or 3 friends go to the movies with her or have a family overnighter at a hotel.  She picked the second option.

We had such a great time!

This is the view from our hotel room.

Kara wore a birthday crown all day to mark her special day.

We started her birthday with breakfast at the hotel.  It was part of the package and it was a nice perk.  The service was a little lacking though.  One guy was kind of running the whole seating/ordering/serving portion of it and it was slow.  I think breakfast took over an hour and a half.  But we were on vacation and so we just went with it.

After breakfast, we headed out to rent a boat.

The kids were all very excited about this part of the day.  And actually I was too.  This was the part that had caught my eye in the brochure.  Our stay included, hotel, breakfast for up to 6 people, 18 foot electric boat rental and 2 paddle boat rentals for 2 hours.  Very exciting.

We got down to the marina and the guy running the rentals informed me that they weren’t allowing any rentals due to the wind. 

So there I stood, four kids in tow, beach bag packed, swimming suits on and a birthday girl longingly staring at me, feeling all of my plans unraveling around me.  (Paul was having a major work crisis at the moment and was on conference calls trying to sort it out in the hotel room)

I asked the guy what options we had.  I explained that we had already paid for the package and that we were far from home.  I mean we were all the way out in Henderson for crying out loud!  He was nice and felt bad but explained that the boats don’t go very fast and that the wind was reportedly going to pick up very soon.

So I asked again if we could just try it out.  And he very apologetically said no.

So then I said that it was Kara’s birthday and asked if we could just go around the little cove area right where the marina is.

And then he said yes.

Wahoo!!

It was really fun.  We drove the boat under a bridge and over near our hotel room.

This is a picture of the bridge we went under.

We called Paul and he came to the window and we were able to wave to him.  Thankfully, he was able to wrap things up for a bit and he ran down and joined us shortly after that.

There was no one else out and that is partly why the guy let us go out.  He was really great and told us where to go and let us stay out a bit longer. 

Because there was no one else out, we let all the kids take turns driving.  Needless to say, all of them, especially Cooper, loved it!

The girls jumped in after a while and we had fun pretending to leave them!  We had to keep things lively!

It was a totally different experience for us.  I really enjoyed being with just my little family.  Everyone was really well behaved and it was a memorable vacation.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in the pool and checking out the little lagoon at the resort.

We could see the waterfall from our room and Cooper was dying to check it out.  I think it was a little louder than he expected!

Kara is such a good sister to offer him some reassurance!

After we swam and swam and played and played (and got the worst sunburn I have had in years)  we headed home.

Evidence of a good time!

We continued the birthday celebration with presents and cake and ice cream.

 

We are so happy to have Kara as part of our family.  She has a great personality and she is so smart.  Kara is such a great big sister to Cooper and Cassidy.  She tirelessly plays with them and helps them so much. And she is a great sister to Allie too.  She helped Allie study for upcoming tests and she is one strict quizzer! When it comes to Kara, you don’t need to tell her to ‘raise the bar’ or to go the extra mile.  In most cases she’s done that and more.  She has high expectations for herself and is always striving to be good and choose the right.

Kara is the model student too.  When Tauna was here, she asked Kara is she ever gets in trouble at school for talking to much.  When she said no, I think Tauna was confused.  You see, Kara never stops talking.  She even talks in her sleep!  But like I mentioned before, she works hard and knows how to follow the rules.  So that means no talking at school when she shouldn’t be!  And that also means that she holds it in and we get more at home!  But we love Kara and there is always something to say when she is around!

Kara- thanks for a fabulous birthday weekend and choosing to spend it with your family.  We love you so much!  Happy Birthday.