Snow?

Woke up this morning and to my surprise there was SNOW! Are you kidding me? Snow at the very end of May? Crazy. My main concern was that Morgan and I had planted our tomatoes on Sat. I hope they will survive. Only time will tell.
Today was also Memorial day. The kids and I went up to visit my brothers grave. Joe is buried up on a hill in Bountiful. Right close to the Temple. It's so wonderful and peaceful to be up there. I knew since it snowed down here in the valley that there was going to be snow up there to. So I had to go down stairs and get the snow boots and heavy coats out of the storage. Something I never thought I would have to do in May. As we got up to the cemetery there was snow and mud every where! You should have see me and the kids climb up the hill in the mud and snow. I swear I still don't know how I didn't fall. I slipped every step of the way back down the hill. It was quite the adventure and would do it again for my little brother. I miss him so much. Thanks for watching over me and for doing little things to let me know you are here with me. I love you.

A day at the Zoo

Logan's kindergarten class went on a field trip to the zoo. Logan couldn't wait to ride on a school bus for the first time. All weekend all he did was talk about how excited he was to go. On Monday morning, Logan got up early and was dressed and ready to go by 7! Poor guy had to wait and hour and a half before he needed to be at school. Needless to say it made for a long morning for all of us.
When Logan got to school, the kindergartners loaded on to the school bus and didn't get back to school until 2:30.
When I picked Logan up from school he came running over to me holding a tooth! While Logan was at the zoo he lost one of his bottom teeth. He was so excited to show me.
I guess after he lost it, his teacher, Mrs. Gray, had him put his tooth inside her wallet for safe keeping.
Before we went home, Logan went to the office and the secretary let him choose a tooth container and pick out a tooth sticker.
He was so proud he had to call dad right when we got home to tell him all about his day at the zoo.

St. George

Now that Morgan has a sweet four on four off schedule, we decided to go and visit our friends in St. George. It was nice to see them and have some fun! I have known Jill since I was 12. That is a long time to know someone. I love her to pieces. Originally we were going to go down to visit on Sat, the day before Easter, but felt that we needed to go to our ward on Sunday. So after church on Easter, we drove straight to the Bates. When we got there, Jill had made a yummy Easter dinner for us. Thanks Jilly!

Our first stop was to the kids most favorite place to go when we visit the Bates. Jumping Jacks.
Who said this place is just for kids?


Playing some video games
On our way home we decided to stop and visit the St. George Temple. It is beautiful! And look how gorgeous it was outside. Dark blue skies. We went from visiting 75-80 degree weather to yuck at home!
I heart this picture
In Logan's words, 'let's stand by the pom pom tree"
Awww what a kiss
There wasn't anyone around to take a family picture for us. So we tried to take one of all of us by ourselves. The problem was that while sitting on the Temple stairs, the sun was shinning right in our faces. The kids couldn't look at the camera without squinting. Luckily Morgan and I were wearing our sunglasses.
While visiting the visitors center we got to see a display called, I walked where Jesus walked. There were the most beautiful pictures of places that Jesus had walked while on this earth. It had me in tears. And what perfect timing being that Easter was just three days prior. It was so uplifting and made me appreciate my Savior so much more. What a perfect ending to our Easter get away.

Silly bunny!

Easter morning the kids decided to come and wake us up at 4:30!!! Yeah that's right, 4 stinkin' thirty!! Now I'm one to do such a thing when it's Christmas, but I am not getting up at 4:30 to find where the Easter bunny had hid the kids Easter baskets! So I made the kids go back to bed and they got back up at 7:00. Not to shabby I guess.

Here is where the silly bunny hid Bays basket.

Bay got a nice BIG kite.

Little sister got up at 8:30 and found her basket under the table.

Avery got a Cinderella figure set!

Logan's basket was found on the stairs going to the basement and I wasn't able to get a picture of him finding it. But, he did get bat bag. Perfect for the up coming baseball season :)

Carson was a bit worried when he couldn't find his basket any where. Finally when he went to go to the bathroom he found it sitting on the toilet seat.

Carson got a Toy Story figure set!
All dressed in their Sunday best. Gotta love our beautiful cherry tree blossoms as the backdrop.

Easter lesson

I want my children to always remember why we celebrate Easter. It's important to me that they know what our Savior has done for us. He gave his own life for us and was resurrected.
I found this AMAZING story that helped them to understand some of what our Savior had to go through in his last hours before his death, and then to testify that he has risen.
What better way to grab the attention of children, or adults for that matter, than with food! The story I found is called The Easter story cookies.

Here are the supplies we needed. We had to make these cookies right before bed on Easter eve, so they could work their magic over night. I had to set the oven to 300 degrees before we started. What is cool about this story is it had a scripture to go with each ingredient we added to our bowl.

First, we hit a bag of pecans to illustrate how the soldiers beat our Savior and broke him.

Second, we let each child smell some vinegar. We explained that when Jesus was thirsty on the cross, he was given vinegar to drink.

Third, we added egg whites to the vinegar. The eggs represented life. We explained that Jesus gave His life to give us eternal life.

Next, we sprinkled a little salt into each child’s hand. We let them taste it and brush the rest into the bowl. We explain that this represents the salty tears shed by Jesus’ followers, and the bitterness of our own sin.

We told the kids that so far, the ingredients were not very appetizing. So we added 1 cup of sugar to the bowl. We told them that the sweetest part of this story is that Jesus died because He loves us. He wants us to know and belong to Him.

After all the ingredients were added to the bowl, we had to beat the ingredients with a mixer, on high for 12 to 15 minutes until stiff peaks were formed. (This took forever!) The color white represented the purity in God’s eyes of those whose sins have been cleansed by Jesus.

After we had peaks formed we folded in the broken nuts and dropped teaspoons of fluff onto a cookie sheet covered with wax paper. Each mound represented the rocky tomb where Jesus’ body was laid.

We then put the cookie sheet in the oven, closed the door and turned the oven OFF. Each child put a piece of tape on the oven door to seal it. We told them that Jesus’ tomb was sealed.

Then we went to bed! They felt a bit sad to leave the cookies in the oven overnight. Especially because it took to long to mix, But the lesson here was that Jesus’ followers were in despair when the tomb was sealed.

On Easter morning, we opened the oven and gave everyone a cookie. I had them notice the cracked surface and had them take a bite. The cookies were hollow! On the first Easter, Jesus’ followers were amazed to find the tomb open and empty.

This is something I plan on doing each year. It is truly a story they will always remember!

Eggs

We had a egg dying party! Well not really a party, but fulfilling a family tradition I should say. We have had Nana come over to help dye and hide Easter eggs ever since Bay was a baby. This year Avery was able to participate. Let's just say I decided to dye eggs outside this year :) Unfortunately, Morgan had to work this egg coloring day.

Look at those chubby hands :) Love the dimples.

After the eggs are done drying, the grownups go out in the back yard and hide the eggs. This turns Nana and I into silly little kids again. We laugh and place the eggs in some funny places. It's my favorite part of coloring the eggs.

Yeah our grass was a bit long. Made it easy to hide eggs in ok ;)