Easter Sunday

Yes, I know.  Our Easter pictures were pretty much a disaster this year.  I'll try to recreate it in a couple of weeks or so.  Part of the problem is that I didn't take the picture until after church.  I should have known better.  Jacey's ponytail holder broke, Sadie desperately needed a nap, and Broden....well, honestly I think he just had too many people tell him how handsome he looked to be excited about having his picture taken in his new suit.  Broden hates the "H" word.  If you really want to compliment him, tell him he looks cool.  Too bad too, because he really did look very handsome! Oh, and don't mind the prop.  We had a surprise late-night visit from a patient the night before, and the adjusting table just didn't make it back in the closet.

All of that aside though, our Easter was wonderful.  The older I get, the more I realize how much Easter is really one of my favorite holidays.  We hope you all, like us, had an opportunity to set aside mayhem that comes with the candy, bunnies, and having the perfect Easter clothes, to think about our Savior, the miracle of His resurrection, and the wonderful gift that He gave to us. Happy Easter.

Easter Weekend Festivities

 

If you live in Western Washington, you know that Saturday was the first warm, sunny, day we’ve had all year, so please forgive my picture heavy post.  We had fun.  We packed as much Easter festivities and time with friends in as possible.  Saturday afternoon we got together with a few friends and had an Easter Egg Hunt in the woods behind our church.  The dads kept the kids busy in the meadow while moms hid the eggs in the woods.  When we were done, the little kids started coming in slowly at first..

Until the big kids showed them how it was done....

Unfortunately for Sadie, Mom made a rule that crawling children are not allowed to participate in an egg hunt through sticks and stinging needle. 

After the egg hunt we sat in the meadow and the kids played and played and played.  I love it when imaginations turn a pile of scrap wood into a make-shift teeter-totter.

 

 Broden tried his hardest to impress Layne with dandelions throughout the afternoon

Sadie explored the seating area pretty thoroughly

Of course our Easter Bunny came, and brought slightly unconventional, but LOVED gifts.  Broden liked his Costco pack of AA batteries.  The poor kids has been bringing me a different toy every day for weeks asking me to "fix it".  Our playroom is alive and kicking now!

Jacey loved her lip gloss among her other goodies.

 Sadie just liked playing with empty eggs.

 

But our kids' favorite?  I was so surprised.  I was a little nervous this year, because we tried something new.  We are not anti-candy, but I feel like every Easter we are just over-loaded.  Because they had both already gotten some from Grandma, and I knew they'd get more at their Easter Egg hunt, we decided that our Easter Bunny wouldn't give candy.  Instead, they got this:

hard to see, I know, but it was just strips of paper with special privileges typed out on them, rolled up and stuffed into eggs.  Things like, "stay up 30 minutes past bedtime" or "10 minutes with mom" or "10 minutes with dad" or "choose what's for dinner" were a few.  Oh my goodness.  I hugely underestimated my children.  They were so excited, and we're having fun doling out special privileges here and there.

Oh of course we dyed eggs, can't forget that!  Actually some of us dyed eggs....

 Others sat in their booster chair and said "CHEESE!" in a very demanding voice anytime mom would take pictures of her siblings and not her.

I didn't mind.  Pretty hard to resist taking pictures when she's in a smiley mood!

Daffodil Parade

I promised myself after last year that I would never do the Daffodil Parade again.  We didn’t get there early enough, Dan was at a scout fundraiser, we had to park sooo far away, it was WAY longer than I thought (3 hours!) it was raining, we had standing room only, standing shoulder to shoulder with straingers, and I had a nursing baby.  No thank you.  After having a year to get over it, I reluctantly agreed to try again.  This time Dan could come with us.  This time we watched it from a side street, not the main street through town.  This time we got there 2 hours early to stake out our section with our chairs.  This time we packed a lunch.  This time it didn’t rain.  This time Dan drove, and he knows all the back ways through Puyallup way better than me.  This time was delightful.  Personally, I’m still a little partial to Toledo’s Cheese Days.  Call me crazy, but I love the small town, throwing candy, floats.  But this was wonderful too.   Our kids loved it, and it held their attention much better this year with a place to sit and food to eat.  We got there so early that once we put our chairs up we walked over to the park. 

It wasn’t raining, but it was cold.  Sadie had her first trial in a baby swing.  Funny, I didn’t realize until that day that the park we usually go to doesn’t have baby swings, so it was a new thing to her.  You can see how much she loved it. :)   

We finally got cold enough that we convinced the kids to spend the rest of the time before the parade in the children’s section of the adjacent library.  It was perfect to spend an hour or so in there being warm before going outside again for so long.

Finally it was back outside to wait for the parade to start.  

We all had our favorite parts. Jacey loved the Daffodil Court.  She was watching for her because the queen (I guess?) came to her class.  She was thrilled when the queen gave her her own special little wave.  I'm sure she didn't remember Jacey, but it sure made her feel special!

Broden loved the clowns. 

Dan's favorite was this guy.  He wasn't an official part of the parade, just a die-hard Sonic's fan walking around with a "Save our Sonics" sign (although I think it's a little late for that), and calling for a boycott on Starbucks.  I don't think Dan is calling for a boycott on Starbucks, but he is still pretty bitter about the Sonics leaving Seattle.

I'm not sure what my favorite part was, but I'd be lying if I said that the tractors that came through didn't make me feel a little closer to home!

 Who am I kidding?  These guys were my favorite part.  It's always fun to watch your family have fun together.  It may have been chilly, and a bit long, but it was worth it.  We might even go again next year... :)

I can't help it.....

My kids should have been asleep long ago.  It's precisely 9:18 p.m. and we started bedtime almost 2 hours ago.  I've given up on Jacey falling asleep early.  We try, and I know she should get more sleep than she probably does, but even if we think she's falling asleep early like she's supposed to on a school night, she's really just reading the book that she hid under her pillow before bedtime.  We decided it's easier just to let her lay in bed and read until she falls asleep.  We've realized that she ends up falling asleep earlier that way than if we drag it out by going in and taking her books away, her getting upset, etc.  Besides, it also distracts her from remembering that she's scared of the dark, since she has her little flashlight in bed.

Broden, on the other hand, is usually our golden bedtime child.  He'll snuggle to read a story, say a hilarious prayer (which now consists of praying that it will snow while he's asleep so that Jacey won't have school the next day every night), then lay down, roll over, and fall asleep.  So why is it that tonight, an hour and a half after he's usually fast asleep, that going to bed is the last thing on his mind?  I've heard him in there reading, looking at books, talking to Jacey, singing a song, using his flashlight to make animal shadows on the wall, talking to his Lightning McQueen car, which is supposed to be safely stashed in the playroom, etc.  For awhile I loved it.  I love hearing the sibling interaction, especially when it's not arguing.  (Yes, I realize that it's odd that my son and daughter still share a room when we have enough rooms for everyone.  We can't convince them that it's a good idea to split them up.  For now we've just decided to make them change in different rooms and enjoy it while they want to be together.)  After awhile though, I was ready for the 4-year-old bundle of energy to take a break for the night.  I was just about to go in and tell Broden that the nice mommy went to bed and now he has to put up with me, when he had the audacity to run out of his room, down the hall, over into the loft where I'm checking my email.  Lesson learned:  wait a split second before opening your mouth in moments like that.  I'm glad I did tonight.  What was so important that he was willing to face certain punishment for getting out of bed for the hundredth time and having the nerve to run out of his room?

"Mom, do you know how much I love you?"
"How much?"
"One hundred and thirty thousand."

Then he buried his face in my neck, found the perfect nuzzle spot, gave me a great big cuddle, then turned around and ran back to bed, layed down, rolled over, and fell asleep.

I melted.

Thanks Broden.  I love you one hundred and thirty thousand too. 

Spring Break, Days 2-7

I'm glad we got outside on the first day of spring break, because every other day it rained, and poured, and dumped, and any other verb you can possibly think of that could describe heavy rain.  Not just our famous "Mister Drizzle" that our weather people are always joking about, which I can tolerate being out in.  (Pretty corny joke if you ask me.  They use the phrase "mist or drizzle" so much that they've just nicknamed it as a regular friend who visits, named "Mister Drizzle.") Nope, it was a downright downpour.  Such a bummer.  That kind of weather is always fun for a day, but after the first day of it we had already baked cookies, watched movies, read books, and by the next day we were bored.  On Wednesday we headed out to "Super Jump Party Zone" in the Supermall.  It's just another inflatable toy place, but in the middle of our mall.

Jacey had fun, but Broden LOVED it.  He is the perfect age for these places, and was even impressed with the music selection.  He had a hard time keeping his place in line because he couldn't suppress his urge to dance as shown here:

Sadie was a super good sport, considering they had a no children under 2 allowed on the toys rule.  She just cruised around the picnic table for an hour and a half.  Nope... no walking yet.  Sheesh people, she's only 16 months! :)  She did just start standing up though! :)

Our adventurous spring break, day 1

 

Don’t get too excited.  It wasn’t really that adventurous.  We had fun, but gave up on the adventure after the first day.  Dan had Monday off, so we decided to make the most out of it with a fun family activity.  Have you ever heard of letterboxing?  It’s like a juvenile form of geocaching, but with no GPS involved.  Basically like a treasure hunt, but the “treasure” is a box with a rubber stamp in it that you stamp in your little notebook.  We thought it might be fun for the kids.  So we found one at 2 different parks close to off and set off for our adventure.

First stop, Decoursey Park

Ready for our adventure to begin

I didn't notice that the last time this particular letterbox was found was 2005 on the directions until we got there.  We followed the clues, and got to this location where it was supposed to be tucked under this fallen tree.

But it wasn't there.

Or there.

Or there.

So the searching continued.  What I didn't get a picture of was 2 seconds after this, when Broden tripped and fell into a patch of stinging needle.

Boy Scout Daddy to the rescue.  Dan knew just the right kind of fern to find to rub on Broden's hand to take some of the sting away, and luckily in Washington with our abundance of Stinging Needle, we also have an abundance of fern!

 Then we gave up, threw some rocks in the stream, and were off to the next park.

Bradley Lake is a much newer park, with a nice paved trail that goes around a lake.  Don't you like how Jacey found a fern early in our walk, and carried it with us the whole time... "just in case."  Most of our trek on this one was on the trail, until we got close to our destination where we were supposed to venture off the trail a short distance and find the letterbox right behind this "huge stump"

 Which was apparently removed a short time ago, judging by the fresh loose earth surrounding this dinky little group of twigs sticking up out of the ground!

Valiant effort kids!  Maybe next time.  Now off to the toys, and the day is saved.

My favorite milestone!!

We have a reader in the house!!  I should correct that...We have one voracious reader and one up and coming reader!  A few weeks ago I was looking at a book with Broden and it struck me that since he's known all of his letters and their sounds for awhile, there's nothing in the way of him reading.  I got out some of the books my mom gave me from when she taught 1st grade (which we had never read), and selected Max the Cat.  He sat down with me and read the whole thing (very slowly, of course) with very little help!  I love all of the milestones.  It's fun to see my babies, crawl, walk, begin to talk, but this is hands down my very favorite milestone ever!  Way to go Broden!  Sorry it took me so long to realize you could do it! Now what are we going to do for the next year and a half until you start kindergarten?

*Edit*

I snuck into Broden's room hoping to get a little clip of him reading to put on here.  It is very long, because Jacey ended up recording for me, and well... he's just not the speediest reader yet. :) 

Sadie missed the memo

Someone forgot to tell this little girl that it is her responsibility to never grow up and stay my baby forever.  I ran across Jacey's old recital costume in Sadie's closet, and my curiosity got the best of me.  I almost cried when it *almost* fit her.  Yes, I did have to tie the straps in the back for modesty. :)  The sad thing?  This wasn't even from Jacey's first recital!  Can you believe that Jacey is in her 6th year of ballet?  I am so looking forward to the girly world Sadie has ahead of her.  Now we'll just have to figure out a way to afford two dancers in the family if it's something Sadie decides she wants to do :)  Seriously though, how cute is she?  She is becoming more and more fun every day, and we can't imagine life without her!

Fun lunch surprise

We love Washington.  We really do.  I will admit, though, sometimes during late winter/early spring I need to remind myself of that.  I never used to give much credit to the whole "seasonal depression" theory.  Then we moved to Texas, and I realized that I really just love sunshine.  I didn't mind the 100+ degree temperatures in the summer as long as we could be at the pool.  Really, I just love waking up in the morning to bright sunny skies.  It makes me happy.  Don't get alarmed- I don't suffer from seasonal depression.  I'm not sad.  I'm not grumpy all of the time.  I don't lock myself inside all winter waiting for the sun to come back.  In fact, I don't really notice a big difference until we do have a fluke sunny day in the middle of February or March.  It makes me giddy, and I actually look forward to getting outside and doing some weeding.  But I will say that when we lived in Texas I couldn't drive 5 minutes away and feel like I was on my way to go camping.  We couldn't drive to Grandma and Grandpa's only an hour and fifteen minutes away and literally go over the river (and mountain!) and through the woods.  We went to NW Trek last weekend (an outdoor wildlife park) and I was reminded of why I love living where I do.  I love the mountains and the woods.  I love the wildlife.  Which brings me to our fun lunch surprise.

We were sitting at the table eating lunch, and all of the sudden Jacey looked out the sliding glass door and said, "We have an eagle in our backyard!"  Poor girl, we didn't really believe her.  We looked out the window expecting to correct her.  Then Dan says, "That's a bald eagle!"  Sure enough, up in the tree just on the other side of our fence was a bald eagle.  I do not have a fancy camera, nor do I claim to be an expert wildlife photographer.  In fact, I took the pictures so fast that I didn't even take the time to put my camera on the right setting before I took it.  But there you have it.  A bald eagle right here in Puyallup, Washington.  I really do love where we live. :)