Easter Sunday

Easter Morning was fun watching the kids

look for easter eggs that the Easter Bunny hid 

everywhere.  Even after church we found more.

I think Owen is getting the hang of it with the 

holiday traditions. 

Church was wonderful and the sun was shining

making it a beautiful day.  The girls dresses from

last year fit this year so I did not have to buy

 new ones!  Yeah! 

There were no flowers blooming this year with 

Easter being so early in the year in March. 

But the weather was great! 

More Easter Egg Fun

After the Easter Egg Dive we colored boiled eggs.

As a mom I feel like I have to let the kids color

eggs because they love it.  But Brandon and I don't.

And later that day learned that Brandon's mom,

Lisa always dreaded it when her kids were little.

Maybe I need to think of another tradition. 

Afterwards we went to Grandma Gardner's

to have an egg hunt and dinner with the

family.  

This year Grandma had the dad's

hide the eggs for the kids.

 All the cousin ran out of smiles. 

 Another fun thing for the kids was after their

egg hunt Grandma gave them more eggs to hide

for the parents.  We are always happy to score the 

big bucks from Grandma and Grandpa! 

Egg Dive

So I heard about this Easter Egg Drive at the Clearfield

Aquatic Center.  I told my sister and my two sister in laws.

It was fun for the cousins to be together. 

Four and under had to have an adult in the water with them. 

And of course that age group went last.  Owen and

Emery were trying to be patient waiting for their turn while 

holding the buckets they were given. While Owen was waiting

he fell in and Brandon had to scoop him out.

 It was our first year and I was not sure what was

going on so it made it hard to get around to take pictures

of all the kids. Sierra and Josh were in the same group.

In Riley's age group she got to actually dive for the 

sinking eggs. After collecting the eggs the kids got

to turn in their eggs for prices.  After all the age groups

were done they opened the pool to everyone to swim

for another hour and a half.  

Spencer and Bailee, Kami and Emery, 

Brandon and Owen and Jeff and Tate . 

 Brandon said the water was cold but Owen did not

notice.  He was laughing the whole time.

 Owen would not go within 10 feet of the

Easter bunny but my girls loved it!

 Owen is my little fish and loves the water. 

Kindergarten Egg Hunt

After donating filled Easter eggs I volunteered to help 

with Sierra's school egg hunt.  It really was not

so much as an egg hunt but a name hunt.  

All the eggs were scattered all over the field

and they could only put the eggs in their bag

that had their name on them.  Sierra's teacher,

Mrs. Poulsen is so sweet and had eggs for Owen

with his name on as well.  She also gave him a bag

to decorate to put his eggs in.  Sierra liked having 

her brother there and she took care of him wonderfully!

Owen got in line with the class to walk back to the

room like he was one of the Kindergarteners.  

Riley's Habitat

Riley had a habitat project for school.  She picked the Rain Forest

habitat.  All the kids got to make a miniature habitat in a shoe

box to display for all the school and parents to walk around and

see.  Riley was happy that Grandma and Grandpa Avery were

in town that day and got to come and see her at the habitat fair.

Brandon's Birthday

Brandon had his 33rd birthday on March 25th.  His parents,

 Sister and Brother and their families came over to 

eat cake with us.

Since Brandon's birthday was on a Monday night we waited until

Friday to go out for his birthday.  We spent the evening in Salt Lake.

We went to the movie,  G.I. Joe, which had my three favorite actors. 

 I couldn't have been more happy!  We then went to the 

Cheese Cake Factory at City Creek.

The wait was an hour and a half.  Which wasn't too bad because we

got to do some shopping while we waited.
We always have a good time out and even though we were gone
for six hours together it still went by so fast. 

Owen's New Bed

Owen finally realized he could climb out of his crib and 

so it was time to say good bye to it.  Exciting but sad

at the same time.  It's fun to introduce your children to 

something new but sad when you know it's the last time

you'll experience that with your child. 

I got three videos of Owen that show his mood change

through out the bed changing process.  At first he

was not real sure he wanted a new bed and then just

flat out mad and sad about the entire thing.  

Later he decided it was not so bad and was thrilled

to have a new bed. 

He fell out a few times at night but for the most part

stays in when we tuck him in at night. 

Grandpa's Birthday

I tried to make it some what of a fun day for the girls

being St. Patricks day and all.  But I was a little off my game.

I forgot to wear green and forgot to put out the green candles 

I brought for dinner with the green plates. But I made up for it 

with green food for dinner like green mashed potatoes, 

pistachio pudding  and cabbage with a roast.  Poor Sierra was

 so sick that day.  With a fever and all. 

  After dinner we went to my dads house

 for his birthday to  bring him a cake and sing to him.  

You can tell Sierra is trying real hard to look pleasant in the 

picture but is down right  miserable.  Poor thing. 

Display of Achievements

Brandon and I attended Riley's Activity Day's

Display of Achievements.  Riley's age group

acted out a small skit about Little Red Riding

hood.  Riley got to be Granny in the skit. 

She only had to say, "Come in Dear".  

Which was great for Riley's shy personality. 

But the wig made the part!  Riley

has great leaders that put a lot of their time

into making these activities special for the girls.

I'm so glad Riley has something like this that

she can look forward to and accomplish things

herself.  Another great reason the church is such 

a blessing in our life. 

Family Swim Night

We met up with Brandon's parents and siblings and

their family's to swim at the Bountiful Rec. center

and have dinner after.  It has become an

annual thing we do and we love it!  Brandon's parents

are so kind to pay for us to swim as well as have us

over for dinner which is always so yummy.

Lisa only knows how to do the best of everything.

We are so grateful for her and her love. 

Owen just loves the freedom in his floaty.  And

 swims everywhere.  He is showing Brandon his 

big boy muscles.  

 The girls just had their swim lessons not long ago

and felt a little more daring to swim away from

the edge.  

Sierra still needs her life jacket but has no fear

of flipping of the edge.  We were all doing

are own thing when we noticed Sierra just

flipping off the side of the pool.  I don't think

you are allowed to do that but no one noticed her

little body flipping.  So I got her on camera! 

 After a couple hours of swimming and going down

the slide Riley was tired and ready for dinner. 

Soap Experiment

So to keep my kids and I from going completely crazy

while they were off track we decided to do a little

soap experiment.  I learned of it on Pinterest of course!

We took a bar of Ivory soap and put it in the 

micro wave for almost 2 minutes and watched it grow.

It was cool watching it grow.  It was very 

fragile thought.  You could easily smash it

and have soap dust everywhere. 

We put it in a mixing bowl added a little bit of water and 

food coloring and let the kids press the soap into 

shapes.  Now they can have their own soap

shapes for the tub.  

Swim Lessons

I signed the girls up for swim lessons while they

were off track.  They were every morning for 2 weeks with 

Friday off.  It is nice that the classes are not

to big but unfortunately I don't think that will be the 

case next year with more schools going year round. 

The girls had great teachers and progressed onto

the next level.  Riley and Paige were in the same class

 and had Teddy as their teacher.  Sierra had her same

teacher as last year.  Sierra's class was just right for her.

A casual take it easy kind of a class.  You can tell she 

did what she wanted most of the time. 

Riley I think got over her fear of jumping into the

deep end.  She is a strong swimmer and did so well

this year.  Paige stayed right up there with Riley.

Owen sat with me really good.  I thought he would

want to get in the water but he was content watching them 

or staying close to me.  The snacks helped of course! 

Sierra

Paige

Riley

Home Depot

After Riley's piano recital we stopped at Home

Depot to pick up a few things and saw that they

were doing a free clinic for the kids.  Of course

the kids wanted to do it.  The Home Depot aprons

were luring them in!  They got to build a race

car with nails and glue and got their own

apron which they came home and wore it all day

playing like they were Home Depot employees. 

Brandon did have work that day but we were not

in any big hurry and it felt so nice to just have a 

casual take it easy Saturday.  We have not had

one of those at home for a while.  Usually 

we have things going on and Brandon has to work.

I hope we get more of those Saturdays. 

Riley's Federation Piano Recital 2013

Riley had a Piano Recital and played her 

2 Federation pieces.  She gets better and better

from recital to recital.  It's so nice to hear the

church hymns and primary songs played in our

home!