Betsy Ross

Sarahs' class had a "Time Machine" program. The class would come out of the time machine as a historical figure. Sarah was Betsy Ross.

They all had to tell about their person. Sarah did great!
Sarah's class full of characters.
Sarah & her friend Helen Keller, aka Meghan.

Easter 2011

Easter weekend started with us dying eggs. The kids had to clean up the playroom before they could dye the eggs. That was a great motivator!

Mitchell wanted to be in on the action, but we did not let him touch any eggs or dye. Maybe next year.

We dyed some boiled eggs then dyed all the raw eggs too. It's fun to cook with colored eggs the week after Easter.

Sarah set out the Easter baskets as well as a plate of goodies for the Easter Bunny. She also may name cards for each basket since she did not want the pink one this year.
Filled baskets. Yum!
Somehow my mom was able to have us dressed before we dug into our baskets. My kids will not wait that long, so we have pictures with their baskets in pjs. Oh well.
We got Peeps this year for the first time ever (not my favorite!). Mitchell did not want to have anything to do with a peep, which is funny since he loves marshmallows.
Sarah demonstrated that peeps really can be eaten (even though I really don't think they should be!).
The kids had to wait for me to hide the plastic eggs in the backyard. They'd hidden the real eggs for each other earlier in the family room.
Sarah found the most eggs. She had them sitting in her basket on the grass while she looked for more. Mitchell decided to help himself from her pile rather than looking for more. She was not pleased.

Taking out the loot.
Dressed up and ready for church. And doing a little rock climbing.

We buzzed up to grandma & grandpa's for Easter dinner. We had an egg hunt first.

Emma was feeling a bit frustrated at not finding enough eggs. She's into this hunched over walking when she's not getting what she wants. She looked so pathetic dragging her bag along. She perked up after a while.
Mitchell helped himself to any candy he could find.
It was so nice that the kids wanted to eat outside. I felt like I was feeding a puppy as I put Mitchell's plate on the patio then called for him.
After dinner the cousins climbed the big trees in the backyard. I don't have any pictures because I think I would have had a heart attack seeing how high some of them were! My kids are begging to go back to grandma's to climb the trees again. Yikes.

Stuffed

Sarah has always LOVED stuffed animals. Even when she was little she preferred a stuffed animal over a doll. She laid all her animals out on Saturday & counted 131. Yikes! No wonder there is no room in her closet!

Emma laid her's out too. She had to add a pillow or two to boost her numbers.

Great Grandma's funeral

Todd's grandma passed away the Sunday before Easter. She was 91.

This was the first funeral our kids had ever been to. It was neat to hear all the stories about grandma, she was a neat lady!

We also were able to have a nice reminder of the importance and miracle of Easter.

Todd's uncle handmade the casket several years ago, at his parents' request.

Todd's family. We were all a bit chilly!

Spring Break 2011

Todd had spring break off this year so we decided to go camping. We went to Goblin Valley.

The kids loved it! The weather was in the 60's and we had no rain, nice.

After we got the trailer all situated we headed to the Valley of the Goblins or Goblin Hatch as Mason calls it. The kids thought it was great to run around & climb on all the "goblins".
Mitchell even took off & thought running in the open was the greatest thing ever.


This was a hill in our campground. The kids had fun exploring while Todd & I made dinner.
The next morning we hiked in Little Wild Horse Canyon. It's a slot canyon that got very narrow.
Emma was a great little hiker, then she got tired & grumpy. Here she is not wanting to go any farther.
It's a good thing we did go a bit further to the best part, where the canyon got really narrow.

Todd almost did not make it through with Mitchell in the backpack.
Todd took Mitchell out of the pack towards the end of the hike. He did not want to follow us & seemed content to sit in the middle of nowhere by himself (for a kid who refuses to be left in nursery at church we found it odd that he was fine being left alone out here!).

We drove to nearby Hanksville where Todd's mom had grown up. This is her parents' headstone.

Mitchell did great on our trip, but there were times I wished I could tie him to the picnic table! If he was outside he just ran around the trailer & truck, then through the dirt, then into the road, then by the fire, then to the next campsite over, then back to the trailer, around & around.
He likes to unscrew the caps on the tires.

Penned in finally. He spent a bit of time in his pack & play.
Our last day with the goblins. We had a fun trip other than I had a terrible cold as we left & Todd was feeling rotten the day we came home. I feared I'd have to drive the trailer home.

Our trip took Monday thru Wednesday of Spring Break.

Thursday I went to Bountiful & spent the day with my parents & sisters. We had a fun day.

Friday I took the kids to BYU to see the Carl Bloch exhibit. Todd was going to come with us, but was still feeling too rotten. I teased him about taking his sick time off 6 months in advance.

We hurried through the exhibit since that's how my kids are, then went to the BYU bookstore to buy shirts for the kids. We also stopped at the Cougareat for a mint brownie. It was fun to be on campus but I felt so old!

Saturday I spent at a funeral for my cousin, Brian Russel. It was a sad day, but fun to see all the family.

The cousins who were still around at the end for a picture.
My dad & his siblings.
Emma's new dress. We call it her Build-a-bear dress since it has the same coloring as her build-a-bear. She felt so beautiful in it!

So that sums up Spring Break. Now it's back to real life. Fun fun.