Sleepy Sunday

This is what we looked like yesterday after church. We haven't done that kind of napping in quite some time. Ahhh - felt good!


(Notice Megan in both shots - yep, she slept and slept and slept yesterday. I was afraid she would be awake all night, but she was back to sleep by 10 PM last night - we must have worn her out).

Goin' to the Chapel of Love

Well, actually it was the temple (even better, right?). On Saturday we took a LONG day trip up to Oakland to go to our good friend, Sid's wedding to his perfect new bride, Michelle. Sid and Sean have been good friends since their freshman year at BYU, and then we all became friends when we were in the same ward (when Sean and I started dating). It was also great to see so many of the Crusaders (that's what they called each other at BYU).

The Bay area is beautiful at this time of year: lots of green trees and rolling hills - perfect. We wish we could have spent a couple of days there - I guess we will just have to go back.

Just Another Manic Monday

Does anyone else's house get trashed on Sundays? Every week my house need a serious overhaul on Monday morning. Maybe it's because I usually spend an hour or so every morning cleaning up the house, but on Sundays we have church at 9 AM (yesterday we had to be there at 8) and so I spend a good hour messing up the house. Then it just never recovers until the next day. Oh well. Good thing Monday is my cleaning day.

Randomness

* The weather has been beautiful this week: sunny and clear, but still cool and just pretty much PERFECT! Ahh - I love Spring.
* I threw a baby shower at my house this week, and I realized it was the very first time I have ever done that. I decorated in a jungle animal theme (simple, but cute) and made some yummy treats (which I am still eating leftovers from). Pretty fun - I guess I should volunteer to do that more often.
* Just an hour or so before the baby shower started I remembered that there were 5 curtain sconces left in a cupboard in our kitchen when we moved in. I also had a nice curtain swag that my mother-in-law gave me several months ago, so I thought what a great time to get my husband to put those babies up. About 10 minutes later I had a nice window covering in my front room. It makes it look so much softer and homier (is that a word?). I love it.
* We finally got our tax return - WAHOO. Too bad most of it has places to go already, but it's still nice to have, right?
* We got a new vacuum cleaner. I've been using a shopvac since we moved, and it just doesn't do the trick when you have three girls in a house and a dog that comes in occasionally. It's nothing too fancy, but it sucks and that's what I like.
* I love this show. It is witty and clever and has some awesome 80's references. Caelan recently decided that she also likes it quite a bit. We netflixed the first season, so we have been watching it for the past couple of weeks.


* The other day Megan (my three year old) asked me to help her put a game together (Don't Break the Ice). I told her I could do it in just a minute. Just a moment later she ran up to me excited that she got the ice border hooked together by herself. "Look how you can do so many things all by yourself," I told her excitedly. "But I can't do so many things. I can't do this [referring to inserting the ice into the border]. That's why I'm not a super hero." HE HE HE. Where does she get this stuff?
* Today we purchased a new TV. It is mounted on our wall (thereby freeing up the cove in our living room to put our love sac) and we can hook it up to our laptop (so we can watch netflix instant movies on the TV as well as the few shows that we watch online). Much better viewing on a TV than the computer monitor. Sean is in heaven. HE HE HE.
* I went to a parent-teacher conference with both Caelan's teacher and Ben's preschool teacher last week. I'll just say the meetings filled a mother's heart with joy. I love these kiddos.
* Sean and I are going on another cruise (this time with all the married siblings in my family) in two weeks. Can't wait.
* Here's just a funny picture of my two shirtless dudes: one couldn't find his jammy shirt and the other just wouldn't stay still long enough for me to put it on him.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

We celebrated with some green eggs, green applesauce for the kid's lunches and then corned beef and potatoes for dinner (which was a BIG hit with everyone).

Personal Pizza Pie

Last Friday we all made our own pizzas: homemade crust and sauce and everything. Everyone got to roll out their own dough and then choose what toppings they wanted (pepperoni, peppers, onions, pineapple, mushrooms and olives). Then we cooked them up and ate them. Delish! The kids thought it was pretty fun to have their very own pizza pie.

Mr. Mischievous

This is a little fit he likes to throw (and sometimes he looks up and looks around just to make sure someone is watching him).



Here is Mr. Naked buns on the run.



And finally, Nathan is OBSESSED with the bathroom: the toilet, the sink, the bathtub, etc.

Mommy-Daughter Date

A friend of mine had a neat tradition where she and her husband take turns every month taking each of their kids out for a one-on-one parent-child outing. I told Sean about it, and we decided we wanted to adopt something like that in our own family. We did it a couple times while we were in Murrieta, but then with the move we kind of fell off the wagon, and we decided to pick it up again. So Caelan and I went on a mommy-daughter date on Saturday night. Her school class went to the little community theater in town to see the production of Charlotte's Web on Friday (the day that we were out of town), so I thought I would take her on Saturday night when we got back from our trip. Caelan wanted to get all dressed up (she wore a new dress that her Aunt Lani sent last week in the mail). It was a cute production. There were LOTS of families and kids in the audience. We had a fun time being together just the two of us. We ended off the night with a Taco Bell burrito and a quick trip to the store (to get milk for the next day). Can't wait to make this a regular thing.

Shaver Lake Weekend

This past weekend we took a little trip up to Shaver Lake. We met up with 4 other families from our ward and rented a cabin for a couple of nights. It was a nice cabin: 6 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a nice kitchen, a huge kitchen table, another game table, a fireplace and a big deck almost all the way around. We spent the weekend playing games (Settlers of Catan, Phase 10, Bananagrams, etc), playing in the snow, watching movies, eating yummy food and enjoying the company of friends. The kids had a blast playing with all the other playmates. We got up there Thursday night. We intended to go skiing/snow boarding on Friday (the men, the teenage boys and I thought I would give it a whirl too), but as we started to head up the mountain to Sierra Summit we saw a big white sign saying it was CLOSED for the day. WHAT?? Apparently something broke and there was no power for the lifts or anything else for that matter. So, we went back to the cabin and practiced snow boarding on the hill behind the house. It was the first time I have ever been on a snow board - I fell A LOT, but it was fun. Maybe we will have to come back up again so I can try it out on a good sized mountain (then I wouldn't have to keep getting in and out of the board/bindings and climbing back up the hill). A storm came in on Saturday morning. There was some trouble getting down the mountain and most people needed their chains (luckily our big tires were sufficient to get us down). Caelan got sick that morning, so she threw up before we left and on the ride down, but we all made it out of there safe and sound. All in all it was a fantastic weekend!