Painting of the Month

My kids have really gotten into painting lately. Rick and I got a whole bunch of 10X10 inch  canvases and gave each of the kids two canvases for Christmas along with some poster paints. A little while ago Josh and Jenna got them out and started painting their canvases. Soon Jaiden and Janelle joined them. Josh hung several of them on his wall along with a sign that says, "Painting of the month." He told his siblings that he was going to host a "painting of the month" contest once a month where he would be the judge. The winner would get to hang their canvas under the "painting of the month" sign in his room and get to choose a treat from his candy bowl. 

Well, the kids have all been taking this contest pretty seriously! Their paintings are actually quite good! Jenna's painting of "A Day in Paris" won the January contest and she already has three different Valentine's Day pictures to enter into the February contest. A couple of weeks ago Josh bugged me to take him to the dollar store to buy some more canvases. Now Jenna's friends have joined in the fun and have been painting their own pictures to enter into the contest! It is pretty funny! Jenna is already working on a St. Patrick's Day painting for the month of March! Who knew that the simple gift of canvases and paints would entertain our kids for hours on end! (Here is a photo of the first batch of paintings. They have done a lot more since then!) 

Janelle Jr. Prom

Janelle -- Junior Prom! I went to Junior Prom with Porter Radley. We started Saturday morning by going to Zion National Park and going hiking with our group. It was a bit chilly, but a lot of fun! We had a picnic there and played some games and had a good time. After the day date we went back and I got ready for the dance. Then we had pictures at Snow Canyon Outlook, which was super pretty. Pictures were super fun, probably one of my favorite parts of the day. After pictures we hung out at Clay's house for a bit while waiting for dinner, and then we had dinner at Justin's house. It was all Italian themed and was decorated super cute. After dinner we had dessert and played games at Carson's house. It was a lot of fun! We played pool, ping pong, and Jackbox. The dance was held on the top floor of the children's museum. It would be a great place to have a dance, except there weren't any doors or windows that led outside like other dances normally have, which made it extremely hot and humid. The dance was great though! I had a great time hanging out with Porter and some of my other friends there. We went ham on the last song, which was "Best Song Ever." It was a great time. After the dance we went back to Carson's house and played a bit more Jackbox before Porter took me home. It was super fun and I'm glad I got to go!

Happy Birthday, Ellen!