Easter

Happy Easter!

It's hard to get the "perfect picture" where everyone looks at the camera and smiles all at once. We tried and eventually gave up, but everyone looked cute in their new holiday church clothes.

The kids had fun at the neighborhood Easter Egg hunt!

Here's a couple more attempts at the perfect picture. Emma has decided that this growl is her new smile.

Easter dinner was a smaller group this year, but we still managed to have enough food to feed an army. Yum! Jared's brother Mat and his wife Bri , baby Olivia , Jared's mom and dad and my parents. It was a wonderful day.

Hope you all had a nice Easter!

Friday Fun!

The kids had no school on Friday! Yahoo! We decided it would be fun to take a trip to the Pacific Science center with some friends. Here we are after unloading everyone from the car.

10 kids vs. 2 moms. We were slightly outnumbered but all the kids were very good. Tara and I got really good at doing head counts. I think I was still counting to 10 in my sleep that night.

Aren't they cute?

Emma and Natalie have been friends since birth.
They are only 4 weeks apart and live 3 doors down.

Emma loved the water exploration area. Thank goodness they had these plastic bibs to help keep her clothes dry.
Linsey spent a long time checking out the tide pools. They had areas where the kids could touch plants and shells and even pick up hermit crabs
Hunter found this toilet and became fascinated with watching what happens when you flush.
As you can see it is cut in half and when you push the lever you can see where the water travels. So interesting!
The butterfly garden was a hit. Large butterflies are flying all over and they land all around you, sometimes right on you. They especially seemed to like my jacket so I had several little hitchhikers.
Hunter found a small snail and he was really disapointed that we couldn't take him home.

It was really cute and tiny.

Carly was a little startled by this butterfly landing on her, but everyone around her thought it was real exciting. Check out Linsey and Alyssa's faces in the background.

Here the kids are at the dinosaur exibit.

You can see that Emma is a little worn out, it was a fun packed day and a great way to spend a day off of school.

February in Review

Well even with the extra day February seemed to go by so fast. As I told my buddy the other day. Everyone always told me that the years would start going by faster and faster, I just didn't expect it to feel like this.
So I'll give you the rundown on the whole month in one post.
I'm all about going on trips. I think it's fun to have a trip to look forward to. I'm also a very driven person. I really like to earn my fun. So when I'm home I feel the constant need to be working on something on "the list." When I'm on a trip I can truly relax because my list is back at home. Everything seems more fun when you do it while on a trip somewhere.
This month we traveled to Couer D' Alene to visit the cousins. I really like going there because our kids love it so much and, once they are all in bed, we have a really good time hanging out with Camille's brother Chris and his wife Tally. We've known them since we were dating (the second time) and they got married six weeks after us. In fact we are going to spend our ten year anniversaries together on a cruise to the Caribbean in April (see what I mean about trips). Plus, they always plan such fun activities. This trip we did something I've wanted to do for a long time. We pulled out the redneck and went to the Monster Truck show! It was pretty cool but one of the LOUDEST things I have ever been to.

Here is the fan favorite taking a jump.


Here is Hunter's reaction. He has earplugs in but it was still too loud for him.


The next day we drove up into the mountains and went sledding. We went to a place where you pay and they have a rope tow that pulls you up the hill. Linsey got sick the night before and Emma got too cold but Hunter was all over it. He'd go all by himself. Here he is cruising down the hill with his hat pulled down over his face. He didn't like the snow in his face so he jump in the tube and pull his hat down and just go till he stopped.


We also got invited by Matt and Bri to a hockey game. I must admit that I didn't have high hopes of being entertained but it was one of the funnest sporting events I've ever gone to. It's SOO much different watching it in person as opposed to TV. We really had a good time.

Aren't they cute cousins?


Here's Camille and Emma outside the arena. Aren't they both just so beautiful? By the way, Camille has lost 7 pounds since New Years. WAY TO GO CAMILLE!


The kids had more fun on the statues out front than they did watching the game.


Hunter is all about comfort... and treats.


One final February story.
I took Emma with me to the video store the other night to pick out a movie. She kept pointing out movies that had someone holding a gun on the cover and saying "look Dad, they shoot." You'd be surprised how many movies have a gun on the cover. I never really noticed until a 3 year old decided to point out every one around the New Release section. The next day Camille had promised Hunter and Emma that if they were good she would take them to the dollar store and let them pick out something to buy with the money they earned from doing jobs. This is usually a pretty predictable affair with Hunter choosing a ball or car and Emma choosing a horse or doll. This time however, Emma went straight for the coolest looking machine gun in the whole store and immediately wanted it. Camille tried and tried to convince her to get something else but she wouldn't budge. She wanted that gun. And she got it.
The dollar store is right next to Albertsons and Camille needed some bread so she took the kids in with her and Emma carried that gun, red bobbing curls and frilly pink dress, and shot at every person she could see.

Here is our mercenary posing with said weapon...she is still taking it everywhere.