Easter

We had a wonderful Easter this year.  I had big plans for making Easter more meaningful, but I think in the end the few discussions and the Family Home Evening we had were far more meaningful that the activities I considered putting together.  Our Family home Evening the Monday before Easter was simple and wonderful.  We talked about the empty egg and the empty tomb, the joy of the Resurrection, and our Savior.  Then we colored our puppets of the tomb, stone and Savior.  After our lesson, we let the boys have a play egg hunt, with empty eggs; it was made even more fun, because Grandma Dee Ann and Grandpa Wyn joined us on Facetime.  The boys understood the lesson from the day and surprised us every once in a while during the week by referring to it, or retelling the story, and even sharing their appreciation for the Atonement.

 

Easter morning was as exciting as ever.  The boys woke up before us and went on a hunt for their baskets, they found Brandon's and woke us up enthusiastically to get us going.  The baskets were filled with treasures of candy, bath toys, notebooks, new Book of Mormons, and other little toys.

 That night we enjoyed a wonderful family dinner at my parents house with a fun egg hunt afterwards.

 Then on Monday morning we had a very fun playgroup with another egg hunt in the Primary room.

Scheels

We finally get around to visiting the much talked about Scheels sporting good store.  It was a fun outing, glad we have seen it, but we wont likely revisit.  The boys did have fun, posing for a few pictures, riding the Farris Wheel, golfing, shooting, looking at all the animals, looking at the large fish tank, and playing in the playground.  It was a good outing considering the weather outside. :)

My Dad - Undefeated!

I mentioned in an earlier post that while we were hiking and enjoying Moab Utah my dad continually complained of his legs going numb, on one of our hikes he was thrilled because he could suddenly feel blood warming his legs again.  It was weird, and strange things like this were happening throughout the trip.  So he scheduled a doctors appointment when we got home.  It was discovered that he had Spinal Stenosis - pressure on your spinal cord and the nerves that travel through the spine.  His doctor was surprised that with the severity of his condition he could still walk - he should have been paralyzed.  The doctor attributed his good health and active life style for the reason why he was still mobile.  He was scheduled for a doctors appointment on Thursday the 21st. 

I was very nervous about his surgery - VERY!  I had a few bad reactions from acquaintances who knew about the surgery, which led me to thinking the worst.  Once again my testimony was strengthened; prayer and fasting work!!

My dad was able to have his surgery early in the morning and the surgery when perfectly.  The doctors thought he would need to be in the hospital for a few day to recover, he was able to go home after just one night.  The doctors did not think he would be able to be up and about for two weeks - the Monday following his surgery he was able to return to work - for just a few short hours; by the end of the week he had put in a full 40 hours.

He is doing well - remarkably well!  I am grateful!  I am so impressed with my dad's resilience!!

St. Patricks Day

St. Patrick's Day was on Sunday this year - but that did not stop us from having a few parties.  We got together on Friday with Natalie, Chandler and Grandma Julie, the weather was beautiful so rather than do a bunch of activities we would just enjoy playing outside - it was a very good choice!

On Monday we had play group - we kept it a bit more simple then last year - because our "Leprechaun" couldn't make it to the party :).  We let the children follow a path of little green footprints all around the church building into the kitchen where three food rainbows and gold candy awaited.  The children were thrilled and the mothers felt good about giving them fruit and veggies instead of piles of candy. :)

I love play group!!!!!!!!!

Dr. Suess' Birthday

Not sure why, but I thought it might be fun to celebrate Dr. Suess' Birthday.  So I looked at our collection of Dr. Suess books and came up with some ideas for each one.  For there's a Wocket in my Pocket, we went on a scavenger hunt with our own "monsters" like;

There's a Zable under my _______

 There's a Fiano on my ____________

 And last of all There's a Shirobave in my _________________.
Inside the microwave there were cut up bananas and strawberries which we put on skewers for Cat in the Hat hats.

 

 We went through an obstacle course for Oh The Places You'll Go

We also went fishing with pretzels, cream cheese, and gold fish crackers for One Fish, Two Fish, We jumped on the mini tramp for Hop On Pop, We balanced bean  bags on our heads for Ten Apples Up On Top, We watched The Lorax, and we had green eggs for lunch for Green Eggs and Ham.  It was a fun day, however - completely silly and unnecessary.  I often wonder why I go to so much effort to plan activities like this for my children - do they really benefit from it, do they really enjoy it, is there a better use of my time spent with them?  Conclusion - I probably wont do this activity again - though it was fun. 

Some More Fun Pictures From Our Moab Trip

My brothers adore their nephews!  I am so grateful my boys have so much fun with their uncles, and love them so much!

 One night after putting the boys to bed in their rooms we stayed out to play games, when we came in the room to go to bed we could not find Grant anywhere.....

 Then we looked under our bed, somehow he had rolled under the bed. :)  Funny boy!

Dead Horse Point is beautiful!!  It was so fun to visit!

 Chandler is such a little dare devil. :)  Wonder where he gets that from :)

 What do you do when you come upon a small pond covered with sheet ice?  Well if you belong to our family you choose a piece of sheet ice and smash it over your head - yup, that is what you do. :)

Presidents Day - last day - Dead Horse Point

The last day of our trip :(.  We really enjoyed our visit to Moab for the weekend, the place where we stayed was delightful!  Wish we had more time there.  Part of the grounds for our condo were turned into a beautiful park, with a pool, winding stream, mini water falls, and a mini pond.  We had a great time playing here even if it was only for a few minutes.

 On our way out of Moab, my dad pulled over to show us the place where we had gone sand sledding many years ago, or that is what I thought he was showing us, he was actually showing us a big carving in the sand - RO JO 2 18.  It was my parents anniversary on the 18th so early that morning he rode his bike a few miles, climbed the hill and carved their initials and their wedding date in the sand - so romantic!!!  It was even more impressive because all weekend my dad had been complaining about how his legs kept going numb, on our of our hikes he got excited because he could finally feel the blood running into his legs.  Needless to say we were a bit worried about him, and rightly so - I will elaborate in a future post.

Before heading home we went to Dead Horse Point, a favorite for my family, because of all the red rocks that are so fun for climbing around on. :)

 Last stop was a visit to J.C. Mickelsons for dinner.  This was a very fun place to eat because the whole place had model trains of various sizes running through it - a perfect place for our three boys, even if it was out of the way. :)

Our weekend was wonderful - a great, quick get away!  Thanks mom and dad for making it happen!