Play date and Zoo trip

This week Caroline had her friend, Lucy, over for a play date. They had so much fun together - it was really cute to watch. They both love the show "Wild Kratts" on PBS and were pretending to be the Kratt brothers, so I suggested they make some creature-power discs for their little game. (the Kratt brothers use their creature power discs to give them powers from whatever animal they're studying)

They loved it! We used safety pins and velcro so that they could change their discs for different animal powers. Caroline was a falcon and a crocodile and Lucy was a crocodile and a grizzly bear!

Speaking of Animals...

Caroline had a school field trip to the zoo this week that we were both really looking forward to. I don't have a zoo pass any more, so it's been a while since I've gone. It turned out to be a beautiful day at the zoo. If only it wasn't SO packed with school field trips!

Miles was not impressed with the Zoo...

Easter Activities

The day before Easter we headed up to Memphis for some fun.

We love going to Bass Pro Shop to look at the fish and animals and they often have kid crafts and activities on Saturdays. They had an egg hunt and pictures with the Easter bunny this time. Gotta love free activities!


We also went to the Gem and Mineral show and had fun walking around looking at all the beautiful displays. They had a little dig for kids. For a quarter they got to dig in the sand for 3 minutes and keep all the rocks, gems, minerals, and fossils they could find. Caroline loved it, did it twice, and got some cool stuff! They also had a station where kids could make pet rocks which I thought was pretty funny!

Dying Easter Eggs for family home evening.

Caroline and her buddies at the library's annual Easter egg hunt.

Miles on Easter.

Easter Sunday was pretty low-key on purpose. Dave says worldly Easter traditions (the bunny, candy, baskets, etc) kind of bother him and I have to agree. Obviously we let Caroline participate in these things because they are fun and we enjoy them as family activities, but we decided to do them earlier in the week rather than on Sunday. Easter celebrates truly the single most important event in the history of the world, and eggs and bunnies and new clothes have nothing to do with it. At least with Christmas there are songs and giving and traditions that actually remind us of the true reason we celebrate it. But with Easter it seems that the world has it all wrong. So we decided to start a tradition. Each year on Easter we watch "The Lamb of God" and have a family testimony meeting. We skipped a part of the movie for Caroline because we thought it would be too intense, but still it was a great experience and Caroline really learned a lot from it. The next day for FHE, she said she wanted to give the lesson and she retold the whole Easter story. I was surprised by how much she understood and absorbed.

Brother and Sister

I've been wanting to take pictures like these for a long time!


Look how happy she is!


I was helping Caroline clean up her super-messy room when Miles started crying. I told her I was going to have to stop and go feed him. So Caroline had a suggestion: she would feed Miles and I would clean her room! Deal!

I love how he is just staring at her in all these pictures!

Around the house...

Here's just a few pictures from around here lately...

I was taking Miles' picture and Caroline slipped this little bunny under his arm and it looks so cute!

We call this his "Boss Baby" outfit. If you haven't read the children's book "The Boss Baby" by Marla Frazee, you've got to check it out from your local library - it's a good one!

Caroline's preschool class went on a pretend trip to Japan. Her teacher made them all these "kimonos" and pretend airplane tickets! She learned a very cute song with Japanese words and I love hearing her sing it.

Miles and I on his blessing day. I could kick myself for not getting more pictures on his blessing day, but most of the time he looked more like this...

Yes, our sweet little guy is quite a fussy one. I wouldn't say he has colic - he doesn't really scream and we can usually get him to calm down if we wrap him up and hold him standing up. But don't you dare sit or put him down, or he's not happy!

The other day I was trying to get ready and he was awake. He was not happy that I wasn't holding him and I gave up and said, "Ok, well you'll just have to cry for a minute while I get dressed." So he cried on my bed while Caroline was playing Gameboy. He stopped crying and I turned around and saw that Caroline had put down her game and cuddled him and he was perfectly calm! It was so sweet.

Here is a more recent picture for my mom. I told you he's gotten chunky!

Final Four

A few weeks ago I had the chance to go to the Final Four in Houston with my friend Dan. He had bought the tickets a while ago and the guy that was originally going with him couldn't, so he asked me if I wanted to go (after he asked Ryan, but Ryan had his little girl in town and couldn't go, too bad sucker!). Dan owns a flooring business and we have him do all the carpet in our houses. It was Dan and I, then we met his brother Floyd down there. At first I wasn't sure how it was going to be spending 5 days with 2 guys pushing 60, but was fun, they are both laid back and funny "older" guys. (The pictures aren't the best quality, I took our old camera because it's small and could fit in my pocket)

They had the games in Reliant Stadium, where the Texan's play there football games.

Outside the stadium they had the "Tailgate Tip Off". All of the sponsors had their tents and there was different activities going on. There was different bands playing all weekend. In the picture is the Flutie Brothers Band, and if you look closely that's Doug playing the the drums.

We were up in the "cheap seats", but i didn't care we could see fine. We went to the two semi final games Saturday and then the national championship Monday night.

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We stayed in Galveston right on the Coast, it was about 40 mins or so south of Houston. I'm glad we did, it's not every day this Arizona boy sees the beach. This was the view from our hotel room.

One of the days we spent the afternoon at the Kemah Boardwalk. It had some rides, shops, and restaurants.

My favorite rides were the roller coaster (above) and the drop ride. There was never very much of a line at the drop ride, all the little kids couldn't ride it and it scared most of the adults, so I rode it about 12 or 13 times. And no matter how many times I went on it, it always would freak me out when we'd get to the top.

This is Dan, myself, and Floyd

I do have to thank my sweet, wonderful, lovely, kind, amazing, nice, ridiculously good looking, giving, smart, funny, generous, fantastic, understanding, caring, great, awesome wife for letting me leave her with Caroline and our 3 week old baby for 5 days. Thank you sweetheart!!!!!!! I really really really had a good time.

Ode to Grandmas

We were so lucky to have our moms come and visit this last month. They both helped us out A LOT with the kids and house, and it was just nice to visit too. Before Miles was born we took my mom to the Pink Palace Museum. My mom was so wonderful while she was here. She acted as my chauffeur to and from the hospital while Miles was in the NICU. We went 3-4 times a day so I could feed him. I loved being able to talk to my mom so much while she was here. Since I went to college, I've lived in a different town as her, and I'm just not a very good phone-caller, so it was great to just talk and talk with my mom! She helped with cooking, cleaning, and entertaining Caroline. I really don't know what I would have done those 2 weeks without her. Dave's mom was here this past week. It was great to have her here for Miles' blessing on Sunday, which was also her birthday! She was so good at playing with Caroline, who we started calling our "Activities Coordinator" because she would tell Nana, "Ok, we're going to play Polly Pockets, then we're going to color, then we're going to play hopscotch outside..." She definately kept Nana busy!

I feel VERY blessed that Dave and I have such wonderful mothers and our kids have two very loving, supportive grandmothers. I'm starting to feel like I'm doing one of those Mother's Day posts, but really, I just feel so grateful for these two women who are such good examples to me of motherhood.