Grandma Vella's 80th Birthday Party

Over the river and through the woods to grandmother's house we go!

Today is Grandma Vella's 80th Birthday.  We have been planning a very special day for her and was excited for the day to finally be here.

First off, we decided to switch Austin to a forward facing seat.  He has been protesting for a while and thought, "why not?"  He loved it.  You could see in his face how excited he was to be facing forward like his big brother and sister.  He even got a milkshake on the way.  Lucky!

The church that my grandmother goes to, was gracious enough to let us have the party in their building.  Good thing too because our alternative plan was to have the party in my grandmother's backyard and it ended up being 100 degrees outside.  Yikes!  So grateful for fans and air conditioning.  :o)

We prepared a luncheon the included a green salad, fruit salad, bread, and a pasta bar that included four different kinds of sauce.  So yummy, if I do say so myself.  We also had a dessert bar provided by my ever so talented sister, Jen.  Everything looked and tasted great!

We invited many of my grandmother's close friends but also had lots of family come.  It was so nice to see everyone.  We hadn't seen some of our family in many years.

After the luncheon was over and all cleaned up we headed over to my grandmother's house for the "after party".  Grandma had purchased an inflatable pool for the kids to play in and the rest of us spent the time catching up with each other.  Payton and Lincoln were so excited to see their cousins Caeden and Maddix, who were able to come back from Colorado for the celebration.  Dave took advantage of all my grandmother's fruit trees and picked grapes and peaches.  Yummers!

Since we had so many of our family together, we took advantage and snapped a few group photos.  So awesome!

My mom's brother, Ron, was able to come out.  Which was so awesome!  I know my mom and grandma were especially excited to see him.

 

 

We also took advantage of the pretty scenery and tried to get a few cute family shots.  Believe it or not this was the only picture without someone making a silly face.  Haha!  Gotta love those kiddos!