Riding Bikes in the Rain!

Rain is a novelty here, especially in the Spring. We get some good monsoons in the summer but it's usually pretty hot and it is a lot of rain! Last Saturday we had a good old fashioned Spring rain storm. Hayden's first T-ball game was cancelled and so he asked me if they could ride bikes in the rain. I had one of those Mommy moments - you know the one where all you can think about is what a mess it will be? And you can see the mud splattered up the back of their shirts and into their hair from the back tire? Well, I pushed the thoughts aside and said sure, it will be fun! And so the kids had a fantastic time, 3 hours were spent riding through puddles and getting muddy up to their ears, it was definitely a fun way to spend a Saturday!

Bryn looks so sweet

Easter Activities!

This is a few days late, I know...

We had a great Easter this year. The kids started the festivities Friday morning with our annual Playgroup Easter Egg hunt. The big kids had the day off from school so it was fun to have them participate. Here's a picture of most of the kids together:

Brynley was hilarious looking for eggs. She would pick an egg up and shake it to See if it was worth keeping. If she didn't hear a lot in the egg, she would drop it and move on. She came upon one egg and after shaking it was very confused, she opened it to find only one M&M inside. Not wanting anyone else to be disappointed with the egg I'm sure, she took the M&M and ate it, then dropped the egg on the ground!
Brynley on her hunt

All three kids after the hunt. Why can't I get a picture with all of them looking at the camera???

Hayden looking for eggs

Kate and Zac having their eggs filled with Kix and Pirate's Booty!

Mom and Zac sitting on the blanket

Hayden and Bryn dying eggs with help from Aunt Shelly. They are both shirtless because I didn't want them to get dye on their shirts!

Brynley carefully pulling out her blue egg

Neither of the kids really cared what their eggs looked like, it too them about 10 minutes to dye all the eggs and they were off. Maybe sometime they'll care about them looking cool.

The following pictures are a bit out of order. (If I move them, you can't click on them later and that bugs me so they stay out of order.)

Sunday morning before church with Dad. Thankfully Andy didn't have meetings Easter morning (thank you to the powers that allowed that to happen!) I am usually on my own getting all of us ready and out the door by 8:15 but here is everyone at 7:55, thanks to a little help from Dad!

Brynley and Dad

Easter basket, all Hayden really wanted was Peeps, and he got them!

All of the kids got some fun pool toys in their baskets

Zac and Dad

Seriously, is this the best I could get??? No, but I thought it was cute.

Me and my girl!

After church we had a good time swimming and we had the best Easter dinner ever! It was a good Easter for sure!

Fast Sunday Tradition

We recently started a Fast Sunday tradition. For those of you who don't know what fast Sunday is, in our church we fast the first Sunday of each month for a specific purpose that we may be needing help with in our lives. Yesterday was not the first Sunday of the month but we have conference this Sunday so they did it a week early. Our tradition actually has nothing to do with fasting, but rather we chose to do this on Fast Sunday as an easy way to remember to do it.
Recently I went to a women's conference where a few of the speakers spoke about Personal Priesthood Interviews, or PPI's. This is a time when Dad (the Priesthood holder in the home) gets to have some one-on-one time with each of the kids and interview them.

Until recently I figured this will happen when the kids are older and actually have relevant things to talk about. I was surprised when a these women spoke about doing PPI's when their kids were quite young. The theory is, your kids will feel more comfortable talking to Dad about things if you start the habit young, and so that is what we have begun. While the kids are having their special time with Dad, the other kids get to help Mom make a special treat. This has proven to be an amazing experience for all of us...

Andy having his interview with Zac

Sibling love

Andy asked Hayden to talk to him first. Hayden's little mind however realized that if he went first he would miss most of the "cookie making" time, ie: cracking the eggs, pouring things in, using the mixer... And so he very kindly told Bryn she could go first, how nice...

Brynley got to do a little bit of the mixing and she did a great job forming the balls for the cookies. As we were mixing I asked her what she talked to Daddy about. Her response... "We talked about my "Spre School" (Pre-School) and my teacher." "You don't go to pre school yet." I said. "I will go in Tuesdays." (Not sure if she meant two days or Tuesday). She said Daddy also told her not to shut Hayden's door anymore. This is one of her ways she teases Hayden and it makes him nuts. She runs upstairs and closes his door before he can get to it, he gets so mad!

Zac was most interested in the fruit basket. He yanked it toward himself and promptly got every lemon, one at a time, and tried to get them on the cookie sheet.

More lemon sorting

Lemon sorting gone awry!

Cookies finished, a few glasses of milk, and what a way to end a good Sunday!

I was telling Andy's mom about doing this. She commented that she thought it was a great idea. Growing up, if Dad called the kids in for a PPI, they immediately thought they were in trouble!

First official swimming day

The pool was finally full by the time we got home from church on Sunday. The kids were so anxious to swim! Normally, swimming on Sunday will not be allowed unless it is a special occasion. Andy figured this is a special occasion - the first day the pool is full! The water was seriously freezing. The kids didn't care, I made Andy get in for a bit but he wimped out after a few minutes. Hayden and Brynley were happy to spend over an hour hanging out in their tubes, gotta love the simple life of a child.

Brynley - she stayed like this for the whole hour I think!

Both kids swimming

Zac taking a dip - he hated the cold water but eventually got used to it

Hayden grinned from ear to ear the whole time!

Thanks again Aunt Shelly and Uncle Joe- can't wait til you come and try it out!

Cinnamon Rolls!

Have you ever seen such a delightful picture?

Yum!
I don't bake, most people know that. My biggest claim to fame are my cake mix cookies with M&M's, you can't go wrong with those! When I decided I wanted to make cinnamon rolls, I was a little nervous but figured why not? So here they are. I made them a few weeks ago before we went to Utah for Spring Break. I thought I would be the best daughter in law and make a big batch to take to my in laws. Little did I know that Andy's mom had just started a strict diet and so they were not very well appreciated and half of them got thrown away because the kids and I are the only ones that ate them! They were pretty good, could have used a little more Cinnamon and sugar, maybe next time...

Enrichment Night!

Thursday night was our ward's Quarterly Enrichment Night. I was really looking forward to it, we had such a great theme and I knew the decor was going to turn out amazing! The night's title was, When Life Hands You Lemons... We decided to go with a black, white, and yellow theme. We served a baked potato bar, green salads, homemade lemonade (I robbed my dad's tree a few weeks ago and squeezed a couple of gallons worth of lemon juice), and lemon cheesecake bars. I gave a short talk on the history of Relief Society and how we can use the Relief Society to help us in turning our lemons into lemonade. We then had three great ladies speak from our ward. It's always nice to have everything done and to be able to breath a sigh of relief... And so until June, we can relax a little bit...

A few of the tables set up

The food table... you can't see it very well but we had B&W fabric drapes on the table where all of the serving bowls would be going.

One table close up

The beverage table

The dessert table

We were so thrilled to have all but one seat filled that night, which meant we had 55 ladies there, when does that ever happen? We may need to start setting up more tables!

Filling the Pool!

As most of you know, my awesome Aunt and Uncle built a 2nd home right next to us. We've been watching for the last month and half as the pool as been taking shape and today, we got to start filling it! I remember Kristin posting last summer about letting her kids play in the pool while it was fillin up, what a brilliant idea! Hayden had some friends over so we got swimsuits out for all of them and they had a blast playing in 12-18 inches of water. The water is cold though, and for some reason they kept wondering why we didn't have our suits on! They had a blast playing for at least an hour or two until they got too cold. Enjoy the fun pictures below!

Don't you love the water in this picture?

Zac is trying to crawl right into the water

Sweet Daddy