Easter

Nothing says Easter than a giant Easter bunny made out of chalk!

 We started all the Easter festivities with an egg hunt at one of the schools that some ladies in our ward put together.  They started off with having the kids decorate cupcakes.  Starting the morning off right with sugar!

Everyone brought 12 eggs per child to hide which makes it nice for the slower kids to get equal amounts as the older kids.  Olivia was the one in tears at the mention of "go!" because Kaitlyn and Abby took off leaving Olivia behind.  It was quickly fixed by eating some candy.

Alec is ready to go!

Sunday morning, the backyard was too wet so we did our egg hunt inside before church.  This year we assigned each kid a color to find.  It was fun to hide Abby and Kaitlyn's eggs in difficult spots and no one was fighting over what egg to grab.  Everyone got 12 eggs that helped in knowing if they got all of their eggs or not.  I liked this way of doing eggs and it might be a new thing in our house.  Other traditions are new Sunday clothes and PJs for the summer.

Alec would find an egg then throw it in his basket and raise his arms up in a cheer so proud of himself.

 For dresses this year I pulled up a few websites and let the girls look through everything and let me know what they wanted.  Luckily they all liked dresses from the same store and I got free shipping!  That's how I like to shop!

The girls all looked beautiful before church in their new dresses and Alec looked like a little man.

 

 After a great Sunday at church we had Grandma and Grandpa come over for dinner and our other tradition - the Easter Egg roll off.  Abby was the winner this year with her Humpty Dumpy egg.  She says she won because she kissed her egg before each roll.

One year older and wiser too...

I celebrated my birthday during spring break but it didn't start off well.  I woke up around 5 am to a pounding in my head.  I took some medicine and went back to bed.  By the time the kids got up around 7:00 my headache had become a migraine.  I changed Alec's diaper, then asked Abby to get everyone breakfast and I crawled back into bed while the kids watched tv for an hour.  It is so nice to have an older child who can help out.  

An extra hour of sleep helped the headache and I got up and got ready for the day.  We were planing on going to the zoo today and there were people meeting at my house.  I had to suck it up and get on with my day.  I came out of my room to find that Abby had decorated the house early in the morning to surprise me.  She had made some homemade signs and had her stuffed animals lined up around the living room for decoration.  I drank a can of coke, took some more medicine and we were off for the day.  Surprisingly enough, by the time we made it to the zoo my headache was gone.  We enjoyed our time at the zoo and headed home by early afternoon.

I hired a sitter to come in the afternoon to entertain the kids while I took a long nap.  It was glorious!  When I woke up, Abby set up a massage table and she and Olivia gave me a massage - it was close enough.  It was a sweet thought and I really enjoyed it.  I really wanted a real massage so my parents came over later in the evening to watch the kids while I finally cashed in a gift card to a spa from a year and a half ago.  While I was gone, Abby and my mom made me a birthday cake- it was really Abby.  Abby even got online to look up how to make a homemade frosting and made it all by herself.  She really wanted it to be special.  Her frosting was really runny so we just poured it over our cake and enjoyed the sugar rush.  What had started off to be an awful morning turned into be a great birthday thanks to the efforts of Abby.

Spring Break- March

I was hoping for a few family events for Spring Break but there was a mix up in communication between Todd and I and he was traveling for spring break and my birthday.  Big bummer.  We did enjoy our time off of school and I actually thought that if spring break was an indication how summer would go, we'll be okay as long as I plan some activities here and there.

The week before spring break I had the girls make a list of the things that they'd like to do or eat.  Once I had their lists I made a big poster with everything written down and we made our schedule off of that. I told them we wouldn't be able to do everything but we were going to do a lot of it.

Some our events were building a fort in our living room and having a "camp out",

visiting the library and stocking up on books and movies, soccer practice, meeting up with friends at parks, ordering out,  making our favorite breakfasts I never have time to make during school days, yard work, shoe shopping, swimming at the gym, hanging out at grandma's house,

 visiting a smaller zoo I had heard about so we could avoid the crowds at the Ft. Worth zoo,

making a lemonade stand.  I felt so bad for the girls, they tried so hard to get people but no one would stop.  They came in so sad that they didn't even get one customer.  Mom didn't count.  Any time they saw someone driving by all three girls would shout "Lemonade! Lemonade!"  We'll have to try again on a hotter day.

Since Todd was gone for the week we saved eating out at IHOP and bowling for Saturday morning.  And then hang out with some cousins that were passing through.

 
Alec loved bowling so much he ended up bowling for mom and dad.  And we did end bowling early because of fussy kids.  One in particular was unhappy she didn't get any splits or strikes when everyone else did.  We'll have to save bowling for some one on one dates in the future.  It might be a little more enjoyable that way.

 And a couple weeks after spring break, we borrowed a tent and the girls and Todd camped out in the backyard to let them really see if they liked sleeping on the ground.  In the morning Kaitlyn complained how her back and neck hurt.  I had the windows open during the night and before they went to bed I could hear Todd telling the girls stories and making them laugh.  It was so cute to hear.

March school happenings

I was a lucky parent chosen to go on Kaitlyn's field trip.  We went to an our door learning preserve where the kids could learn about all different types of animals and insects.  Kaitlyn's favorite part was the spider web.  Each child had a chance to be a spider and put on black goggles so they couldn't see and then feel for the vibrations (kids pulling on the string) of their prey.

 We also had an open house to see how much the kids have learned so far this year.  Can't believe the school year is almost over.  Olivia was very excited to see everything the big girls do. Just another school year before she's an kindergartener!

Invention Convention was for 3rd grade this year.  The kids were given the choice to do a science project or invent something.  Abby opted for an invention and I made Todd help her narrow down what she was going to do.  The guidelines were to think of a problem that they had and come up with a solution.  Abby's problem was that even with a metronome, she still gets off beat when playing the piano and plays too fast.  Her solution was to have a timer attached the metronome that would time how long you play.  We would first figure out how long the song should take with the given beat.  Then, as you finish your song you'd see if you were within the correct time.  She did a great job and earned an A!

March Concerts

Back in December we gave the girls tickets to shows as Christmas gifts.  Olivia's finally came around for payment.  Olivia and I went to see "The Laurie Berkner Band".  If you have never heard of them, you should check them out, they have great music geared for preschoolers and early elementary aged kids.  Our concert was an outdoor one and it had rained buckets early in the morning. We had seats and not lawn seating which was a bonus.  Because of the rain, I think many ticket holders didn't show up and we had lots of empty seats so we had a great view of the stage.  That didn't really matter since there was a huge space in front of the stage that the kids could come up and dance around in.  It was a giant kid mosh pit!  The rain held off for the concert and Olivia was exhausted by the end with all the running and dancing.

Abby and Kaitlyn and I went and saw Mary Poppins.  It was a fun date night with my girls.