Busy April--The Rest of the Month

The day after Easter we joined some friends from MBA days at their beach house in Ventura.  They've had two more kids since we lived around the corner from each other and all 4 of their kids are so cute!

Emily got some great shots of the kids throughout the day.  She has a thing for little boys with buckets.

This kid loved his bucket and shovel and the sand.  The water was a little too cold for him to get in but he didn't seem to mind.

The adorable Ruby had so much fun making faces at and getting reactions from Will.

Avery and Ruby both have naturally curly hair, but at the beach it was out of control curly, especially Ruby's.  Aren't they cute, though?

The water was really cold but that didn't stop Joseph from getting some boogie boarding in.  He had a blast and stayed out for much longer than I could've ever lasted!

The other guys went out a little later as well.  They were smart to wear wet suits, even if one wasn't necessarily worn properly. :)

Sophie thought this was a fantastic use for the boogie board.  Joseph pulled her all over the wet sand on it.

What a ride!

This day also marked one of our favorite holidays, a national waterfight day we honor every year.  Borrowed from Poland it's called Smingus Dingus, and we love getting each other wet to commemorate it.  What better place to do that than on the beach?

We never take pictures of just the two of us, so I'm so glad we actually remembered to once.

So at home at the beach.

Joseph and the girls built this sandcastle kingdom that looked like Rapunzel's kingdom.

Hooray for sandcastles

Still dragging that bucket.

Their beach house was literally right on the beach.  You'd walk out onto the balcony and immediately run into stairs taking you down to the sand.  It was awesome.

Thanks for a very fun day, Widdisons!  It was great seeing you again!

Our backyard is in full bloom right now and it's so awesome.  These roses I call Metzli's roses because my sweet little Young Woman Metzli gave them to me a year ago and I immediately planted them at our new home and they have bloomed so beautifully.

These were also a gift from my mom that she dug out of her garden because they weren't getting any sun.  We thought they were tulip bulbs we were give so we were surprised when irises began to bloom.  They were beautiful but didn't last long; I think they're having the opposite problem now and getting too much sun.

Just like his sisters, this boy is a true water baby.  He loves his baths, and I love snuggling him in his towel after.  My cute little monster.

Sophie loves dressing up her stuffed animals and mommying them.  What a tender heart she is.  Love this girl!

Here's a cake I made for a baby shower in April.  Fondant's fun to play with, that's for sure.

Oh, I love this little guy, too!

And I love this girl so much!  She makes me laugh every single day.  It's always something new, too, and she never means to be funny which is why it's so much funnier.  This day she decided to put cones on her feet and walk in them.

I couldn't believe she could actually manage it, but she walked all over the room in these.  Maybe we'll see her in pointe shoes someday!

Busy April--Easter

We had two Easter egg hunts this year.  One was with some friends for our second annual hunt with them.

Avery squealed with delight after every single egg she opened.  What a sugar junkie.

I think Sophie enjoyed the hunt more than the spoils for the first time.  Her basket was overflowing.

Our first hunt was with our cousins who we spent the day before Easter with.  The kids started things off playing dress up and refused to take them off for the hunt.  My personal favorite was Gabe's get-up; he loved that blue dress and wouldn't take it off.

 Austin was a super hero, of course.

 And the girls were princesses.

 The hunt took us all over the back yard, even onto the trampoline.  Joseph and Peter had fun being the Easter bunnies for the first time.

Even Will found an egg. 

At least he thinks he did. 

 They're wondering why they have to take one more picture instead of getting to their candy.

Here's our sweet kiddos in their Easter finery before church. 

The two handsomest men around. 

 Me and my girls.

The 3 in blue...

 ...and the 2 in pink.

 My favorite people in the whole world.

We might have a few screws loose, but it makes life that much more fun. 

 We dyed eggs and I was proud to say that Avery managed to do it without spilling any dye on her dress.  I think that's a first.

Happy Easter!

Busy April--Spring Break

 April Fools' Day kicked off April with a fun practical joke by the girls on Daddy.  We made some vanilla pudding and emptied out a mayonnaise bottle and put the vanilla pudding in.  Joseph had been gone so when he got back I had the girls eating out of the mayo jar and he took one look at them and asked, "What are you eating?  Mayonnaise?"  They responded, "Yeah, Mommy said we could."  He believed them for half a second until he saw that they were enjoying it too much and then he knew they were fooling him.  The girls thought it was awesome and wanted to prank everybody the rest of the night.

 Spring Break began with a trip to the Huntington Library with our friends the Valles.  The kids loved this maze in the grass.

 They ran and ran and ran so I wasn't surprised when they all 3 conked out in the car on the way home.

I love these 3 rascals.

 We ate our sack lunches in the Chinese Gardens.  They were so beautiful!  What an incredible place the Huntington is.

 Our last stop was the children's gardens and it was a good thing we saved it until the end, because Will and Avery got soaked.

He started out just touching the water, but it didn't take long before he was sticking his whole arm in...

 ...then leaning all the way over and sticking his mouth under to drink.  There was nothing I could do to stop him, either!

 I love that I knew to bring extra clothes for Avery and Will because they wouldn't be able to help themselves from getting wet,

 but I didn't bring anything for Sophie, because I knew she would stay dry.  Occasionally I feel like I know my kids!

But she did get her mouth in it too, she just did it gracefully.

 All the kids were in love with this place.  We need to go back again soon!

 There were rainbows coming through the center of this tunnel, and Will was loving them.

 Don't let Avery's look here fool you...she loved getting drenched!

The kids had a cute little tea party in this garden house.

 How sweet is that?  We need one of those for our back yard!

 The next trip during Spring Break was to the beach.  I don't know how kids can still eat things that have sand on them, but it doesn't seem to bother them to bite down and hear a crunch.

The swimsuits are new now but they'll only last for a couple months, especially now that they have sand in the lining that won't go away! 

 Will liked the water so long as I held his hands firmly the whole time, but he was fine spending most of his time right here playing in sand.

 Avery got buried by her siblings and friends and thought that was the coolest thing.

Will was a little confused about why he could only see Avery's head, but he thought it was pretty fun.

Will's little friend Coug is just a few months older than he and they're becoming good little buddies.

One of my favorite Young Women, Megan, came to the beach with us to help keep an eye on all the kids we had running around.  The kids love Megan and had a great time with her there.

 Sophie would spend every single day at the beach or the pool if we'd let her.  I see many more beach trips in our future this summer I think.  We had such a fun Spring Break and it made me excited for summer!