and so it begins...

We are excited to finally begin working on the backyard! First, we are digging out a space to put sand for the playground area. Of course, with digging also comes a big pile of dirt which the kids go nuts for. I for one, am not so nuts about the mess the dirt makes, but I can see how much the kids enjoy it, so I say go for it! Then we went to Home Depot to get some stones to build a wall along the back of the sand area.
Below is a picture of the boys with a magnet creation they built together this morning. We just love magnets at our house as it entertains the kids for hours and it gets their brains going. But often they argue over who gets certain amounts of magnets and so on, so when the boys came to tell me they had built something together (with no arguing) I was quite pleased. Hooray for those precious moments! (I usually don't put them in matching shirts anymore, but today I did because we were hoping to drive out to the poppy fields so I could take pictures of them, but darn it, it was just too windy and cold.) Anyway, just wanted to share this happy moment of my 3 sons.

Jelly Belly factory

Here's a few shots of the kids at the Jelly Belly factory with their cousins Chance, Mady, and Andy. We all thought it was so interesting to see them make the candy and just how much of it we saw was amazing! And of course, we loved the free samples at the end of the tour.

One little bonus to having 2 girls is that I love dressing them in matching dresses for holidays. I'm just really enjoying this stage because I know it won't last for long!

Here we are a Dad's (Grandpa's to the kids) work. They love visiting here and watching him work.
The Power Wheel is always a big hit when we go to Amanda and Matthew's house. Here's Orion with cousin Isaac riding around. He loved riding around with Isaac. I think he enjoyed knowing that Brayton and Ethan are too big for it now - Orion was livin' it up!
And of course, the kids loved getting in the pool even though it was freezing! They spent most of the time in Grandpa's hot tub, but they did get in and swim in the pool too for a bit teeth chattering and all, they were still just loving it.

Easter morning

Easter morning was filled with fun. When we woke up at Dad's house we went over to Amanda and Matthew's 1st thing. The kids hunted for candy with their cousins and had the great surprise of a little bunny - a new pet for their cousins. The bunny got lots of love and attention from all the kids. Then we had brunch there as well and then headed off to church. How wonderful it is to remember the Savior and what he has done for us.

Easter

For Easter this year we went up to San Ramon to see our family. We got to swim, dye eggs with Auntie Alicia, hunt for candy, get dressed up for church, and play and have tons of fun with our Larson cousins Chance, Mady, Andy, and Isaac. The kids also got to see Grandpa Teare at work - the day we were there he did some dental work on a puppy and some other stuff that involved stitches - eeek! But the kids are very interested in his work and love going there. We got to see several animals recovering from surgeries or waiting for their turn. The kids just love the animals. They especially loved seeing their cousins new baby bunny and playing with him on Easter morning. We also went to see Horton Hears a Who with all the cousins and Grandpa, Aunt Alicia, Aunt Amanda, and Uncle Matthew. And a big highlight was going to the Jelly Belly factory. Had a ball there even if we had to wait 1 1/2 hour to get in . We were sad to come home, but have all these fun memories to think about now. My favorite thing is seeing my kids build friendships and relationships with their cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles. I will hopefully put more Easter pictures on soon - having a bit of trouble withe camera. Happy Easter.

leprechauns in the house!

The kids were very excited this year to have 3 leprechauns -Lucky, Lucy, and Leppy-come to stay with us for a few days. We got tiny notes from them, let them sleep in the dollhouse, fixed a few meals for them, and left them some coins since they were here looking for gold. On St. Patricks day the leprechauns left a treasure hunt and we discovered the treasure in the dryer! (Luckily no cats were there) :) Then we all munched Lucky Charms and put on our green shirts for a day of not being pinched!

bedroom makeover

Well, Shawn and I have made over our bedroom! In the past we have always gotten caught up in making the kids rooms fun and neglected ours. We recently inherited a full size bed for the girls (since before that they were still in toddler beds). So we gave our comforter to them since the color matched their room perfectly. So we had various blankets on our bed for awhile-the boys old star wars comforters! Anyway, it has been so exciting for us to make our room look how we want. And thanks to our tax return, we were able to make it happen.

Years ago when we were first married I searched and searched for a print of the 1st flight of the Wright Brothers - a favorite of Shawn's. I was never able to find it back then. But now thanks to ebay I was able to find it and had it framed for Shawn for Christmas - that is what's hanging over our bed. When the kids come in our room they keep saying "it looks like a master bedroom!" I must say, it is very relaxing to come into - as long as we can keep it free from clutter which is not an easy task.

Next project, the backyard.

The Bulls

Brayton and Ethan have been playing on the Bulls basketball team for the last few months. Their last game was today, the tournament is next weekend. It has been a lot of fun for them to play on the same team together. They are such good friends it just warms my heart. And I just love watching them play together and grow in their skills and confidence.
Here they are with their coach and team.
Here they are in action together - our camera does not take very good action shots, but I was glad to get one of the two of them together. Below is a shot of them on the bench cheering on their teammates. Even though they only won 2 out of 9 games all the boys played with a lot of heart every game. They always gave it every thing they had. It was a lot of fun to watch.

7 lives left

Our kitten, Padme looks so sweet and innocent here in this picture sleeping all cozy between Meri and Jess. But she is down 2 of her nine lives. Last week she took a ride in the dryer. For about 5 minutes or so she went round and round with the clothes before I realized there was a clunking sound. Needless to say, when I opened the dryer for the 2nd time wondering the cause of all the racket was( I didn't see her the first time I checked) I was shocked to see her crazed eyes and panting like crazy. I broke down crying for fear that she was taking her last breaths. I rushed to her the vet and he said he couldn't see any broken bones or concussion. When we came home she drank some water and hid under the bed for a long nap. Her fur was all fluffed out like a stuffed animal that has been dried one too many times, but the next day she was back to normal.

Then tonight she fell into a full bathtub of water and Shawn had to pull her out because she couldn't get back out on her own.

This is one curious cat! Meri adores her so we are glad she is ours.

girls and kitties

Meri's kitten, Padme, has found a cozy napping spot - the doll crib. It is really cute and the girls get such a kick out of finding her in the little crib sleeping.

March 6th our other 2 kitties, Luke and Leia turned 5 years old. Meri was very set on having a birthday party for them and making a cake so we went ahead with the festivities. Luke and Leia really didn't want to be in this picture so Mom and Dad had to hold on to them and Brayton took the picture so Shawn's head didn't quite make it into the picture, but anyhow, here's our kitty party. Since the party, Meri says she is going to write Santa a letter asking him when all the other pets birthdays are so we can celebrate each one!

Below are a couple pictures of the girls and I making peanut butter cookies together the other day. They love to bake and so do I. They especially love doing the criss crosses and licking the beater. The morning time is a fun time for us since it's just the girls and I. I'm really going to be sad when Meri starts 1st grade in the fall. Life so interesting how you just want to hang onto the moments and yet you want to see what is yet to come, and it always does come.

a bit about Orion

Orion started these agates and petrified wood in his rock tumbler on his birthday. A month later this is how they turned out. He was thrilled and all of us were excited to see how they turned out. Very smooth and shiny.
Orion has also become the "Cat's Cradle" King. Last Thanksgiving Aunt Shannon sat down with him and worked on learning all the fun string stuff you can do. - cat's cradle, cup and saucer, witch's broom, etc. He just loves it. Thank you Shannon for indulging him. He has really caught onto it and can do all the tricks in his little book now. The hardest one in my opinion is "Jacob's Ladder". Below is a picture of him with a finished Jacob's Ladder. He can work it in a matter of seconds.

You may also notice his giant bruise from one of his many rough housing antics.

You may also notice that he has all 4 of his front teeth missing. The first one fell out last October. The next one fell out after a sledding accident in February- it was hanging by a thread and he was bawling and screaming all afternoon afterward (the tooth still hanging on)- wouldn't let anyone near him and he wouldn't eat anything for fear of food touching his tooth. Finally at dinner time, a very hungry Orion still screaming was tackled to the floor by his mother (of course very gently:)) I held his arms and legs down and it wasn't hard to get to his tooth for all the screaming he was doing. I touched the tooth and it fell right out! Okay, so tooth number 3: again with the rough housing - Meri's knee knocked it out (it was already kind of loose). The last tooth was knocked out last week in Walmart. Upon walking into Walmart (all 7 of us- if that's not enought of a spectacle) Orion ran up to Shawn and must have hit Shawn's elbow because I turned around to Orion screaming and blood coming out of his mouth. So amidst all the Walmart customers staring I walked him to the bathroom to get him cleaned up. Oh, the joys! So now he is the great toothless wonder.

You may also notice - again with no shirt.

Orion is our very emotional, very full of life child. Actually they all are, but as the middle child in our family he makes it very sure and certain that he is not overlooked. He's always throwing us curve balls. We love our Ri Guy!

One more award

Meri earned a "Leading Reader" award a couple weeks ago. She was really surprised since they don't usually hand out reading awards to Kindergartners. For what ever reason, she has really caught on to reading and loves it. And what could be considered even more of an achievement, was the fact that she didn't run for the hills when Tommy Tiger shook her hand and gave her the award -in the past she has gone into super duper freak-out mode when she sees giant costumes wandering around. Below is a cute picture I took of her last Sunday wearing her "new" dress. We get lots of hand me downs from some of our new friends and the girls think it's like Christmas when we get a bag of clothes from them. So Meri was really happy with this new dress. And we use the flower from Auntie Shannon lots of times to top off outfits!