Annie's Dance Recital

This past Saturday Annie had her end of the year dance recital. She loves dance and she did a great job! Brad got to dance on stage with her. Her class danced to the song "Butterfly Kisses" and they had the dads on stage with the girls. It was awesome!! I can't even describe how sweet it was to watch 12 little butterflies in purple flutter out on stage followed by 12 handsome dads dressed in white shirts and ties. The audience just oowed and ahhhed. They seriously had the loudest applause after their number (I'm not just saying this since it was my daughter and husband!) I saw the dance teacher after the show and she told me the whole back stage was teary eyed. None of the pictures really captured the moment very well, but they are still fun! I'm sure both Brad and Annie will remember this for a long time.

Brad and Annie right before the show was about to begin.

Grandma and Grandpa brought Annie roses for after the show!

This is Annie receiving a flower and a ribbon for her second year of dance. (on the last day of class)

The dads getting their directions from the teacher at the dress rehearsal.

Brad and Annie practicing during the rehearsal.

Brad is looking excited!

Brad listening to make sure he knows what to do.

A cute pose before we left.

Annie and her favorite teacher, Miss Lynn!

This video is of the dress rehearsal. I knew I wouldn't be sitting as close at that actual show, plus I just wanted to enjoy watching at the real show. The real thing was a little more dramatic with all the dad's dressed up and the girls all done up with hair and make up. It really was great!

Sunday Activities

What else would you do when church doesn't start till 1pm?

They had every blanket and stuffed animal that they could find. The best part of it all was that all our beds got made before church?

(just a side note: at about 36 seconds you can see Luke dancing. One of Annie's stuffed animals plays the Hannah Montana song "Best of Both Worlds" and it goes off during the fight. Luke starts to do a little jig to the song.)

Our Easter in Pictures!

We had a great Easter Weekend! It started on Friday with the kids being out of school. I got to do my favorite activity, and sleep in! My friend came over and we made these cute cupcakes inspired by a post on Bakerella (blog). The kids go into the action too and had fun putting as much candy on these cute cakes as could fit.

These were some of my favorites.

Just a closer look. Don't the peep bunnies look cute?

On Saturday morning we went to the Bell Family Farm (a family in the other ward). They were hosting their annual Easter Party. This was our second year to attend and it was fabulous. Thanks Bell Family, we had a great time!! Luke loved the sand box...I however wasn't too excited about it since we had a baptism to be at later that afternoon.

Macey playing on the sew saw with her friend.

After everyone plays Easter games, does crafts, and plays on the playground we break for a bring your own picnic lunch. After lunch the kids divide into different age groups and go read books while the adults hide the eggs for the hunt. This is Luke in his group, he wasn't too happy about sitting without me.

Since Luke was sad we went to take pictures of the other groups. Here are Kambree and Annie at the front.

Here's Macey sitting by her friend. They were in the 9-12 group. Her friend doesn't turn 9 for a few weeks, but she was nice enough to go with Macey and the biggest kids.

Here is Nelson and some friends on the other side of the older kids group.

Here is Luke picking up eggs. He loved the hunt part! He was really good at finding eggs and putting them in his basket.

Here is Macey (pink tee shirt) checking the ground for more eggs.

This truck was in the field where the kids were hunting for eggs. I don't know if you can really see, but there are eggs all over it!

Kambree found LOTS of eggs!

Annie did pretty good too.

The kids showing off their haul. Some of the eggs had numbers on them and you could trade the egg in for a prize.

When we found Nelson he showed us what he got too.

The kids hanging out and checking out their stuff. Some of the eggs had money in them. I think Macey ended up with almost $6!

On to the next part of the day, dying eggs!

Luke kept getting mad because I wouldn't let him beat the eggs with his spoon, remember I was trying to keep him kind of clean so we could go to the baptism later.

Finishing up!

Don't they look good? By the way, Luke did end up with a bath after. We attended my nephew's baptism later that afternoon and it was wonderful. Then we headed out for Bruno's pizza with all the extended family.

On Sunday morning we had Resurrection rolls for breakfast. The kids are sitting here waiting for them to be done.

Their half full Easter baskets, by this time they'd already eaten lots.

All dressed up and ready to go to church. I made the girls skirts and crocheted the flowers to attach to the shirts. (I wish they had Easter bonnets Lavinia!!)

Acting goofy

I know it's been a long post of pictures. It was a long weekend too!! We ended our Easter weekend with dinner over at Grandma's and Grandpa's. I hope you all enjoyed your Easter as much as we did!

Spring Has Sprung!

Between conference sessions on Sunday we went to see the Azaleas. Tyler has an Azalea trail every spring. People come from all over to see it. There is an Azalea district and there are signs posted along the roads so you can follow the "Trail." On the weekends the "Belles" are out to greet the visitors. There are a few houses that invite you to walk in their gardens. The weekend we drove the trail and actually got out of the car to walk around was at the end of the season so lots of the Azaleas were already done blooming. (plus we'd had a lot of wind, which blew off the blossoms.) At their peak the Azalea bushes are truly breathtaking. The bushes are completely covered with flowers. If you happen to get the magazine "Southern Living" there is a mulitpage article in the April edition featuring the Azaleas and the gardens that we walked through.

Annie was the only one of my girls who would get out of the car to pose with these Belles.

The front of one of the houses. These Azalea bushes were still looking beautiful!

The family!

The girls!

When we were out of the car walking, Macey and Kambree decided they were brave enough to take pictures with the Belles too.

All the kids in one of the gardens

One of our two Azalea bushes. They are kind of sparse, but we do have some!

The girls by our other bush.



These next pictures are from April Fools Day. For lunch that day I sent the kids to school with a April Fools Day lunch. I put a gummy worm in their apple. I got whale crackers and animal crackers that were packaged individually and opened them from the bottom, exchanged their contents, and then taped them back up. I wondered if my kids would even notice, they did and thought it was a lot of fun. At dinner I served "Lemonade" which was really lemon jello and "Meatloaf" that was really a chocolaty Rice Krispie treat loaf. I really got them with the meatloaf. They all hate meatloaf and I told them that I had tried a new recipe. Brad sliced it up and put a piece on each of their plates. I told them they couldn't be done with their dinner until they tasted it. They figured out the "lemonade" pretty quickly, but we were probably half way through dinner before they figured out the "meatloaf." No one wanted to taste it! They really thought it was funny and of course for the first time ever, everyone finished up their meatloaf at dinner! Nelson took the last slice and put it in a napkin to take to cub scouts to show his friends. Fun stuff!! (thanks Familyfun.com for all the great ideas)

Lemonade

Meatloaf (not a great pic sorry!)

Dinner is served!

Macey's Birthday

OK, I haven't posted my pictures from April 1st yet because I haven't downloaded them yet, but here are some fun pics from Macey's birthday party! Macey turned 9 on the 15th of March and then we had a party for her on the 20th. She invited the girls from her primary class, plus two friends from school. The party was a "late night" and was from 7 to 10pm. The girls brought their pillows and came in their pajamas. We had a great time tying flip flops, eating cake, decorating sleep masks, playing games, and watching a movie! Thanks to my friend Melissa who came over to help me, everything went really well and all the girls had a ton of fun!

All the girls tying stips of fabric onto their flip flops!

Macey opening her presents.

Macey got lots of great stuff! Thanks Macey's friends!

All the finished flip flops!

Look at these cute girls with their new flip flops!

Macey's Flip Flop cake!

Blowing out the candles.

Decorating their sleep masks.

Miranda

Jessica

Kambree spent the party in the hallway asleep. She came home from school sick. She didn't end up going back to school till the next Friday. Poor girl, she was very excited about the party, but she was so sick this is as far as she got to the action.

Rhea

Morgan

Amy

Megan

Leah

Macey and Natalie

After all the crafts and playing games, the girls settled down to watch High School Musical 3. They only got to watch for about 20 minutes because we didn't have much time left. We had too much fun doing everything else!