Rain rain go away...

Yesterday I took the kids out to the South Towne Mall and met Emmy & Lainey there. We rode the carousel, train, mechanical car, played around in the kids play area, and went up and down and up and down the escalator. It was really fun to get the kids out of the house and visit with auntie Em. With all this rain we've been having, it turned out to be a perfect little activity.

Oh no! Mom caught us having fun together!

Even I got to ride the train...

Today was Maddy's field day at school. Except, due to this never ending rain, it turned into a gym day. Since I am a room parent I got to chaperon the kids around from station to station. It was fun but incredibly exhausting! Trying to get 24 first graders to listen and follow what I say is damn near impossible. There was kicking, screaming, shoving, crying, and pouting..... and the kids were even worse. No, it was actually pretty fun being able to play around with Maddy and her classmates. They had an obstacle course, tug-of war, three legged races, potato sack races, and a full body workout station. By the end of it the kids were exhausted but giggling with joy. They all then got their yearbooks and took turns signing each others. The kids kept asking me to sign it as well which I thought was pretty cute. Maddy has made some pretty great friends and I look forward to seeing them all again next year when my baby starts SECOND GRADE!!

Three best friends

Maddy and Caitlyn signing each others year books.

Olivia, Ella, Avery, and Maddy hanging out.

Laney, Maddy, and Olivia

Playing tug-of war. The girls kept kicking the boys butts!

Maddy and Olivia doing the three legged race.

They had to count how many jumping jacks they could do in 30 seconds.

Potato sack race!

A day at the park.

Yesterday Chris and I took the kids to the annual Living Traditions Festival downtown which we look forward to every year. It's a cultural fair with dancing, singing, arts, and (more importantly) cuisine! They set up 20 or so food tents with all different kinds of meals. Bosnian, Vietnamese, Tibetan, Laotion, and Salvadoran to name a few. Em, Mike, and Lainey met us there and we all set up a little picnic area near the kids crafts area. It was pretty warm outside with a constant cool breeze. Chris and Mike periodically ventured over to the tents to bring back a new plate of something to try. We had a ton of different things to eat. Pakistani chicken curry, Tibetan momos and spicy potatoes, watermelon, Swiss chocolate hazelnut cake, and Bosnian palacink (crepes filled with nutella and strawberries) and Cevapcici which was by far the best thing we tried all day. After stuffing our faces we all just layed around and relaxed. Maddy made a few crafts, Liam and daddy strolled around the grounds and I soaked up some sunshine. It was really fun to spend time with the Em, Mike, and Lainey as well. We love them so much as do both of our kids. Another great weekend.

Rolling on the blanket.

Chris, Emily and Lainey May

This watermelon turned out to be a HUGE hit with the kids!

Liam kept lurching forward to get more.

He looked so cute sticking his tongue out before he took a bite.

They were full of smiles...and watermelon

Liam couldn't eat it fast enough!

Schoooooooool's. Out. For. Summa!

Maddy had her end of the year music program at school the other night which was really cute! The theme was 'Rhythms around the World' so each grade sang songs about different countries. Maddy's class sang 'Fanga Alafia' and 'Kalinka' both of which were adorable! Maddy looked beautiful in her summer dress and sang her heart out to both songs. She was very enthusiastic during the hand motions and made sure to smile and wave to Chris and I. She has some very cute classmates that were playing with her after the program so we snapped a few pics of them. Poor Liam was at home with Yaya, sick with an ear infection. He ended up sleeping for 16 hours straight that night.

Singing her heart out with her classmates.

This was the finale where the entire school piled in to sing  'I'll Make the Difference'

Maddy and her BFFs Caitlyn and Olivia

We couldn't miss an opportunity to take a picture with us all cleaned up!

Mother's Day

Over Mother's Day weekend Chris and I decided to take the kids up to my parents vacation home in Eden, Utah. It's just about 2 hours north of our house, up in the mountains in a quiet small town. We thought it would be fun to get away and have some relaxing time. We went up Friday afternoon after Chris got off work and came back Sunday evening. The weather was fantastic so we spent a lot of our time lounging on the deck soaking up the sun. Christopher's parents, sister, brother-in-law, and niece came up Saturday morning to spend the day and night with us which was a ton of fun! We went shopping, ate at the local mexican restaurant, and then drove over to the lake in the evening. Nobody else was there and it was too cold to swim but we sure had fun playing on the beach. Chris, his dad, and Mike skipped rocks on the water, Liam rolled around getting sand in every crevice in his body, Maddy collected tiny shells and drew pictures in the sand with some driftwood, and Cris, Emily, Lainey, and I soaked up the fresh mountain air. The next morning, which was Mother's day, the boys cooked us moms some breakfast. It was really good. Very nice to relax for a little bit that morning. After breakfast Chris' family left so we just spent the rest of the day watching movies and napping. It was a wonderful way to celebrate the birth of my children.

This was Liam's favorite activity of the weekend. He swept that porch over and over.

Liam and cousin Lainey getting acquainted.

Kissing cousins!

Maddy teaching Lainey all about the ipad.

Auntie Em, Lainey, and Maddy at the mexican restaurant Carlos and Harley's.

Liam thought uncle Mike was hilarious eating his big burrito.

Beach time!

Liam loved the sand so much, he ate it!

The stick was her crayon and the sand became the canvas.

Oh no! Maddy grew duck feet!!

Liam wanted to bury grammy in the sand.

Bliss.

The family hanging out by the lake.

The Aquarium

Christopher doesn't work on Wednesdays so we decided to make it 'Family Outing Day'. Our first excursion as a family was to the aquarium that is just down the street from our house. We packed snacks, the stroller, and a pad of coloring paper & crayons. It is always fun taking Madeleine to the aquarium. She loves sea creatures and even more, she LOVES water. We gave her the pad of paper & crayons and let her create pictures of all the fish. She is such an artist! Very vivid colorful interpretations. This was Liam's first time and boy was he excited! He just kept saying 'WOW, WOW' over and over again. He kept smacking his lips together which meant he either wanted to eat the fish or drink the tank water. Either way, it was pretty funny. We spent a lot of time with the jellyfish and the stingrays, and strolled through the rest.  Surprisingly the place was fairly quiet which it never is, so we pretty much had the run of the place. It turned out to be a wonderful day spent together! These pictures aren't very good quality, I guess I need to find a better app for my iphone...

Beautiful Madeleine smiling with the jellyfish

Looking at more jellyfish

Maddy drawing pictures of the jellyfish

Checking out the starfish in the octopus tank.

The creepy eyed family lurking over the stingrays...

Pretty fishies.

Maddy and Liam playing in the caves.

Sweet Angelfish.

Liam exploring around.

He found Nemo!

Swimming in a canoe.

Sea turtles in the shark tank!

Hanging with the penguins.

Here comes Peter Cottontail. Hopping down the bunny trail. Hippity, hoppity Happy Easter Day!

Easter weekend was so much fun this year! Friday Maddy's school threw an Easter egg hunt on their lawn for all of the kids. Maddy collected a ton of eggs and even got a giant stuffed bunny.

She was so happy and excited!

Sugar filled eggs...

Saturday all four of us went over to my parents house to dye eggs. Usually just Maddy, Yaya, and I end up dying all of the eggs but this year Liam joined in on the fun. We gave him the yellow dye to avoid any rainbow colored skin on Easter and he LOVED it! Of course right away he wanted to eat the eggs and drink the cup of yellow colored vinegar, so we gave him a couple of the cracked eggs to eat instead and he went crazy. Egg yolk was everywhere in a matter of seconds, it even ended up in Yaya's hair. Maddy very lovingly dyed her carton of 18 hard boiled eggs, after each one she dabbed off all of the excess drippings and delicately placed each egg back in the box. When we got home we put the kids to sleep and Chris and I jumped right into the Easter Bunny duties. Actually, Maddy lost a tooth 2 days before and decided to wait a day to put her tooth under her pillow so that the bunny and the Tooth Fairy could have a chance to meet. So Christopher took on the Tooth Fairy duties: replacing the cute little baby tooth with a one dollar gold coin and hand written note from Tula the Tooth Fairy. I made up the Easter baskets which were over flowing with all sorts of goodies. Christopher grabbed a couple of carrots from the fridge and half nibbled on a few of them then left the remains on a plate to be placed next to the baskets. Maddy always likes to make sure we leave snacks for our visitors! We decided not to leave out the eggs the night before because they would've gone bad and also the cats most certainly would have chased them around the house and push them over the stairwell. So instead we had to set our alarm for 6 a.m. to get up and hide the eggs before the kids woke up. But it was all worth it to see their faces in the morning.

Getting ready to dye eggs!

Playing with Umpa King and place mats...

Little bean eating and dying his eggs.

Third tooth in a month and even more are loose!

Easter morning turned out well, Maddy and Liam were very excited to hunt around the house and were pleased with what they got. We played around for a little bit with the new toys and then put the kids in their adorable outfits! They looked so flipping cute! We headed out to my grandmothers house for the traditional brunch they throw for all of our family. We ate and ate until we couldn't eat anymore and then went on our second egg hunt. Chris and I took the kids out in the front yard to snap some pictures of them in their new outfits. Oi! Little Li did not want to sit still for more than 2 seconds so we snapped fast! Our next stop was Grammy and Umpa Bogus' house for egg hunt number 3. This is the most extravagant hunt and Maddy looks forward to it every year. This year Grammy took pictures for clues of certain objects throughout the entire house and Maddy had to seek them out to find the next clue which also had a gift next to it. It was pretty fun for her and she ended up with a ginormous basket full of stuff. Li was quite pleased with his basket as well. Aunt Emily, Uncle Mike, and cousin Lainey came over and we all got to sit around and play. After a few hours of that and a few more plates of food, we headed out to my parents house for more basket of goodies. These kids were all sorts of loved! We played around there for a while...and ate food yet again. By the time nighttime came around we were crawling out the door with our pants unbuttoned and our kids hanging on us like monkeys. We had an absolute blast! We are so blessed to have such amazing families who love us and our children so much.

Easter baskets!!

Maddy searching for eggs

Liam found an egg and was so excited

~Easter outfits~

Walking around great-grandma's yard.

My little bunnies.

Does she know how to pose for a picture or what?

Love those smiles!

Bogus family Easter eggs!

Christopher and our niece Lainey May

Uncle Mike holding Lainey while Liam gives her a hug.

She loves Lainey too!

Umpa Bogus and Liam relaxing on the couch.

Mr. stylish boy in his sweet little outfit!