April 2017 Celebrations

April was another busy month of parties for us. Jon's cousin's daughter turned one and her Grandparents (Jon's Aunt and Uncle) threw a party at the zoo to celebrate. I wasn't sure how the boys were going to handle being at the zoo but not being able to see all the animals we usually visit. They actually loved it. One big reason was that they had a zookeeper come in and talk about three different animals and let the kids touch them. It was very interesting and the boys were really into the interactive discussion. It was nice catching up with Jon's side of the family too. Unfortunately it was the day that a half marathon comes through the zoo and it was a mad house getting in, out, and around the zoo. We told the boys they could each pick an animal to visit after the party was over and we barely made it out of the zoo before Kieran had a full blown meltdown over life!!! We did manage to feed the giraffes and see the new baby rhino so at least Reed was pretty happy.

The following weekend we attended a baby shower for Jon's friend from high school, Jake, his wife Melissa, and their older son Leo. The party was at the restored train depot in town and of course the boys loved the train theme!!! They immediately took the cute toy train centerpiece off of the table and started playing with it. They also loved all of the games - especially making a baby out of playdoh which Reed decided he needed to do in mass (which resulted in some very interesting looking "babies"). Jake and Melissa currently live out of state so we don't get to see them often. It was nice for our families to get to spend time all together since usually when they are in town it's just Jon and Jake that see each other.

Last weekend was Jeffrey's construction themed third birthday party. Kieran always loves playing with Jeffrey and both boys were so excited to go to the party. They had a blast playing in the sandbox Mikael just finished building and also loved decorating the toolboxes Erin and Mikael had built for each of the kids. One of our other friends ended up having a first birthday for her daughter at the exact same time. We had thought that we might be able to make it to that party with the boys as well but I just couldn't tear them away from the construction party (specifically the cupcakes) so Jon ended up taking them home for naps and I went to Josephine's adorable "rainbows and unicorns" party. It was fun to catch up with some of our friends that don't live in Kingsburg and enjoy a kid free hour actually talking to other adults. However since I had no kids there I totally failed to take pictures, I've resorted to stealing a few of Beth's so you can see the adorableness!

Easter 2017

Easter morning the boys received their Easter baskets - I tried to keep them simple with swim toys, bathing suits, beach towels, and new Dodgers t-shirts, but I did throw in a pair of bunny ears, some hot wheels, and licorice for good measure. We once again combined families into one big celebration which is always a lot of fun. The Stoothoffs were able to join in the chaos as well, which meant we had five egg hunters this year (way better than when 20 of us used to follow just Reed around)!!! It's so fun watching the Littles hunt eggs and even more fun spectator watching. I had rules for the egg hunt - the kids had to let me take a picture beforehand, they each had one big egg with their name on it to hunt for, and the main rule being Ben and Maisie were the only ones allowed to get the eggs that were just laying on the grass. For their part Reed, Kieran, and Lyla did a great job leaving those eggs alone. We tried to make lunch simple and took up Grandma, Pepe, and Aunt Penny on their offers to bring side dishes. We couldn't have ordered nicer weather, it was warm but overcast, a perfect day to spend outside. Maisie, Zach, Lyla, and Kieran all managed to take naps in the afternoon so a lot of us played games out in the yard and had a few drinks while soaking up the nice weather.