April

This is a busy month for us . . . Jim's birthday, Easter, then Lena's birthday.  I haven't posted for a while and wanted to hurry and get up some pics for the few of you who pay attention!

We went to St. George for Easter and Jim's birthday.  Downtown St. George has some fun water features for kids to play in, and the girls had fun . . . ALL the girls, so it would seem.

Saturday morning we took the girls to the local park for the "easter egg" hunt.  I put that in quotation marks because there were not many eggs involved, mostly saltwater taffy thrown onto the grass.  But it was still fun.

Later we created our own Easter Egg Hunt with plastic eggs filled with goodies for Michelle, Lena and Cousin Morgan.  That was MORE fun.  Here they are going through the loot! This picture made me think of them all playing poker.

Saturday night, of course, we died Easter Eggs, and what kid doesn't LOVE that?

Yes, Travis was there, but he never puts a shirt on, so I guess you get one without!

Easter morning the girls found their Easter "baskets" (we use hats and purses) filled with a few treats, clothes, hair things and toys.  They also had to find Easter Eggs the Easter Bunny hid!

They were ADORABLE in their Easter dresses with their hats and purses.  My mom got WAY BETTER pictures, but I don't have copies of those yet.

Trevor and the kids got into an Ultimate Pillow Fight.  It was really crazy fun!

A couple weeks later it is Lena's birthday!  Grandpa and Grandma Thompson came up for the party, which we enjoyed in the backyard, the day before her actual birthday.

For her actual birthday, we took her out for ice cream at Arctic Circle and let her play on the toys!

These pictures are obviously not from sunny April.  This is an earlier trip to Steilacoom, and we took the girls down to ride the ferry.  They were so cute in these hats they got for Christmas from Grandpa Jackson I had to post these pictures!

Nothing Exciting

Well, the post-holiday doldrums arrived!  We didn't do much of anything in January.  We worked on a kitchen remodel, a little bit at a time.  We are still working on it, trying to keep the kitchen functional at the same time.  Jim's brother Gary is in the interview process for Union Pacific, which is very exciting!  Finally, this past weekend, we got to try out our new cross-country skies!  We went to Island Park.  It was a lot of fun, though we didn't go on any trails, just on the golf course in the backyard.  Also, we didn't take the camera, so the only pictures came from my Droid, which I have yet to master, so some of the pictures are blurry.

Dad went outside to ski again, Michelle took the opportunity to don his boots and hat!

Lena wanted to help clean up!

We Had a Merry Christmas!

I know Christmas was a couple of weeks ago, but we had a good one, overall.  The week before Christmas we took the girls to ride the trolley downtown, to the museum for the Christmas displays, and to the zoo for Christmas with the Critters (and Santa).  Christmas Eve, after visiting my parents in Garland, we opened new pajama presents and a family game to play.  Christmas day the girls had fun, and that is what matters most!  I got a 24 hour bug that morning, so that really irked me, but what can you do?  We got a new keyboard so the girls and I can play the piano!  And we got cross country skis so Jim and I can take up a winter sport, since we live somewhere it is winter half the year!  Michelle got fish in a Little Mermaid tank and Lena got a garden cart for which she mostly loves to carry around the flowers and say "fower."  Yeah, it is pretty adorable.  You can see for yourself how adorable they are.

Lena had a grin on her face for the whole trolley ride!

Michelle just kept wanting to see the horses.

At the museum they have a children's area and Lena was crawling through the cave.

Michelle loved climbing UP, but was a bit frightened of coming DOWN.

It was FREEZING at the zoo, but Santa came and made it all worth it.

Christmas Eve in our new pajamas and with our new game, Uno Moo!

Christmas Eve was our last night for the "house" which is our advent calendar, and to open our advent book.  That was a fun thing to do for Christmas, open a Christmas story every night before bed . . . the girls liked that, but not as much as the TREATS in the house!

Santa brought a playhouse for Christmas morning . . . it was DEFINITELY the biggest hit of the day! 

Lena is wondering what to open next.

Smile . . . please smile . . . sometimes they smile for everything EXCEPT a picture!

Now THERE is a smile . . . as is standard child behavior, she loved the box at least as much as the toys.