Quick captions for a quick trip

Kids are funny and memories are fun.  Here are some from our most recent trip to South Jordan and quick captions to go with them.

  Kelton ate a green Lucky Charms marshmallow and ended up with a green tongue that lasted a couple of hours.  

Cambrie had Papa help her create a magnifying glass out of cardboard and plastic wrap.

  The girls had Easter egg crafts waiting for them on their bed and were thrilled to put them together.  

Dantley is a great play friend for Kelton when we visit.  

Dantley even volunteers to feed the little guy.  I couldn't hold back my smile when I saw the mess on his face.  It is a good thing he had a bib.  

This picture explains why we have McKenzie is gymnastics.  Sure, why not climb on top of the banister?

  If it is possible, Kelton is more wiggly than McKenzie.  He thought that climbing in his bumbo was so silly.  

There was lots of Lego building time for the girls.  I really like this house they made.  

We got to meet our new little cousin, Kieran.  Even though Kelton is older and a little fatter, Kieran is nearly as long!  He is going to be one tall kid.  

When Cambrie packed her suitcase for this trip, she purposely planned for her church outfit to match Leesa's.  That's pretty spot on if you ask me.  

The kids also had their first Easter egg hunt of the season.  Their eggs were just hidden in the family room but it took them awhile to find them all, especially when we were sitting on some of them.  

Kelton had just woken up from his nap and wasn't feeling very festive, but he still liked the rattling sounds from inside the eggs.  

Jeremy and I even got our Easter goodies early.  

I love this picture of Bruce with his grandkids.  What a perfect way to end the day.

Naborhood Bakery

While we were out in Utah, Leesa found a super fun activity for the girls up at Gardner Village.  After a tour of their bakery, each girl could make and decorate their own sugar cookies.  From what I heard it was a dream come true for the girls.  When we make sugar cookies at our house I let the girls use the cookie cutters, but I control the dough.  There the girls could roll, cut, re roll, and re cut their dough as many times as they liked.  Then when it was time to frost them they had full control over how much frosting to put on each cookie as well as how much candy to decorate them.  Yes, they were in cookie heaven.  When the girls brought home their creations I could tell they had a really good time.  McKenzie was quick to share her cookies with me to help me feel better.  My girls really are made of  sugar and spice :)

"Mom.  Their mixer was sooooo big!"

"It's a butterfly!"

She must have been really excited.   Her hand is moving so fast it's a blur.

It looks like she has just enough flour on that rolling pin.

For Cambrie, precision us everything.

I'm glad I wasn't on dish duty.

I'm surprised the frosting is on the cookies instead of on that tongue.

"Sugar!"

They each graduated with a diploma and got to take each of those cookies home.  Lucky girls.

Park Day

Colorado spring is a tease.  One day it's snowing, and the next day we are in our shorts at the park. Cute little Kelton loves exploring, but isn't a fan of the dried grass on his hands and knees so he stays mainly contained on whatever blanket I set him on.  However, that doesn't mean he has a lack of things to stuff in his mouth.  He was so darn cute stuffing handfuls of dried grass in his mouth that I tried capturing his perfect expressions instead of pulling it from his mouth.  Geez I love this kid.

St. Patrick's Day

The leprechauns didn't cause much mischief this year, we had Kelton to do that.  They simply left green footprints on our mirrors.  Kelton on the other hand discovered the kitchen drawers.   Yikes, I have been dreading this day.  

The girls had fun in the kitchen too making leprechaun cupcakes.  Sometimes just a little mischief is just right.

8th Anniversary

Eight years ago I married my best friend.  Since then we have had some crazy ups and downs in our lives, but I am still totally in love with my choice and my man.  This year I would describe our anniversary simply happy.  We didn't go on a weekend get-away, but instead Jeremy took time off work to just be home with me.  He helped me wash the car, took care of the kids, went on a run with me while pushing the jogging stroller, went on a bike ride with me while pulling the bike trailer, let me take some time to go get my hair cut, got up in the middle of the night with Kelton and McKenzie, and didn't even complain or laugh when I asked him to play "wedding dress up" with me.  It was a really relaxed, fun, and happy weekend.  For fun I pulled out my wedding dress to relive the memories and to see if I still fit in it.  The answer was yes, I still fit in my dress!  My girls saw me putting it on and thought that it looked beautiful, and tried playing dress-up with me by putting on some of my other clothes.  Goofy girls!  

There are times I want to get married again not so I can re-choose a spouse, but so I can try on beautiful dresses and feel like a princess.  Putting my dress on again helped satisfy that.  I asked Jeremy to put on a suit and tie and asked Cambrie to take a picture of us as a comparison photo.  I guess I shouldn't expect too much from a six-year-old :)  

We stayed home that night because of snow and cold, and I made a yummy wild rice and mushroom soup with lava cakes for dessert.  Wow.  McKenzie can testify that they were delicious.  

But last night we went out on our official anniversary date to Elways.  We had a gift card that made the trip possible and boy were we grateful for that since we were able to go all out on dinner.  Our waiter surprised me with a custom-made limeade slush of some kind and I found myself wishing I had asked for more!  But we also had crab, beet salad, potato soup, steak, and a complimentary anniversary dessert brownie.  Yum. Yum. Yum.  Everything was delicious but if you ask Jeremy he will say that his favorite part of the meal was his steak.  The outside was seared to a blackened perfection and it was soooo moist and tender that I found myself thinking it actually deserved its price tag.  I wish that we could enjoy that menu more often because it was truly scrumptious.  But the best part of the whole night was simply being with Jeremy.  Man, I love him so much.

2 Wheels and 2 Pedals

Miss McKenzie has been on a Strider bike for about a year.  She is so comfortable on it that it's ridiculous and can fly at crazy speeds down the hill from school.  Now that we are occasionally getting warm days with no snow, I decided to pull out the bike with pedals to see if she was ready for the switch.  So I plopped Kelton down on a blanket on the grass and hoped he wouldn't find too many interesting things to eat while I helped McKenzie.  It took a couple of times up and down the sidewalk for her to learn that she needed to keep her pedals moving around and not to move them backwards.  But after only about ten minutes of practice she totally got it.  I couldn't believe (well, actually I can) how quickly she picked it up.  It was time to go pick up Cambrie from school and I knew I was taking a risk have a student driver on the sidewalk with all the students, but we risked it and it was awesome.  That girl rode her bike all the way to school and back with no problems.  Now she asked every day if she can ride her purple bike.  She still hasn't crashed.  She is now comfortable with the brakes (sigh of relief).  And now she can keep up with Cambrie as they ride around the peanut.  The experience of teaching your kid how to ride a bike is so sweet.  They are so proud of themselves and I can never take enough pictures to capture the moment.

Saturday chores

Today we initiated Saturday morning chores.  The conversation with Cambrie went something like this:

Cambrie: Are we doing anything today?

Me: Yes, I have a plan.

Cambrie:  Yea!  A plan!  What is it?

Me: I'll tell you after breakfast.

Cambrie: I can't wait!

After breakfast

Cambrie: Now can you tell me the plan?

Me: Yes.  We are going to do Saturday morning chores!

Cambrie: What?!  That is NOT a fun plan!

Me: I know, but it's time to get started.  You and your sister are going to clean your bathroom.

Cambrie: Booorrriinggg!

While cleaning the bathroom

Cambrie: Mom, this is so much fun!

McKenzie: Ya.  Why don't I get to clean the toilet?

Me: Because your sister is bigger.

Cambrie: Okay mom, the toilet is done.  Why does McKenzie get more jobs than I do?  

Me: Her jobs are shorter, but I can give you more if you want.

Cambrie: Ya!  Can I clean the toilet downstairs too?

Me: Sure, go ahead.

After the downstairs bathroom is clean

Cambrie: What about your bathroom?

Me: Mine is big, so I'll take care of that.

Cambrie: Don't we have any more chores?  That was fun.

Me: Each week will be a bit different.  McKenzie and I already did a lot of the other chores earlier this week.

McKenzie: Ya, we cleaned everything!  

Cambrie: What do we get to do next week?

Geez, I hope they remember how excited they were this morning.