a baptism and a baby blessing

Last week we made the trek up to Oregon to see our nephew, Nathan get baptized and our newest nephew, Kurt have his baby blessing. My sister Tess and her husband Ryan also came out from Idaho to be there too. We had a ball. Here's my sister Krystal and her husband Dave with their kids Derek, Nathan, Lauren, Kurt, and Nicole.
Next, is Krystal with little Kurt. His blessing was right after Nate's baptism. He was so cuddly and fun to hold. I just couldn't get enough of him.

It was so much fun to see my 3 sisters. I miss them so much a lot of days. The 4 of us went out for dinner together after everyone was bedded down that night. I just love them. Another highlight for me was going shopping at RWB with Krystal - the famous thrift store there in Clackamas. I got some great stuff and great deals - my favorite was the clip on ties for the boys - 50 cents per tie! It was also wonderful to see my parents. I hadn't seen any of my family since last July when we had our reunion - right before we moved into our house. It's just not enough to only see them once a year!

The next picture is of all our kids with their Pederson cousins right before Nate got baptized.

The bottome picture is newly baptized Nate. It was so much fun to see our family. Tonight at dinner the kids were planning out our culdesac. They wanted all their grandparents, cousins, and aunts and uncles right on our street - and no further. :)

birthdays and cousins

As a bonus to our trip we got to be at cousin Isaac's 2nd birthday in San Ramon and then the next day we got to be there for cousin Derek's 6th birthday in Molalla, Oregon. Isaac's was cars and Derek's was Lego. Way to go Alicia and Krystal on the cakes! They looked so great! And they were quite delicious too.

Jandi and Tess mini marathon!

My 2 little sisters (who are all grown up now) have been training for a mini-marathon for awhile now. So this weekend that we were there in Oregon, Tess and Ryan also came out from Idaho. The morning of the marathon it actually snowed! Here's Meri out at Krystal and Dave's in the snow! So, even though it snowed for some of the run, Jandi and Tess pressed on. Here they are coming to the finish line and we were waiting for them. Kenny and Ryan had the Rocky music blaring and the kids fell in behind them and ran with them as they finished. It was awessome!

California Poppy fields

Well, we finally made it out to see the poppies. They are just beautiful this year. When we occasionally make the drive down to Lancaster you can see off in the distance just this huge mass of orange. It's so pretty! The day we went it was super hot and there was some talk from other sight-seers of rattle snakes so Meri was not feeling so hot about sticking around - hence the sad face in the picture. The bright sun made it hard to get good pictures with out lots of squinting, but it sure was beautiful to see!

feet bath

Jessi's favorite activity lately is doing feet baths. She just loves it! I often find her in the bathroom running a bath in the sink for her feet. Her Aunt Tess loved doing this as a kid too! It's funny how we inherit various things from our family!

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!