The Bothwell Easter Egg Hunt - April 19, 2014

Saturday - April 19, 2014

We haven't been to an Easter Egg Hunt since we went to the horrible Tremonton Easter Egg Hunt in 2006.  The Tremonton hunt was such a horrible experience, that I vowed never to go to another one.  They had all the little kids line up.  I figured, since they divided them into age groups, that it would only be that age group searching, but that wasn't the case.  As soon as the hunt started, parents and siblings of all the little kids went running out to get as many eggs as they could.  It was scary how aggressive they were being.  So, each of my little ones only got one or two eggs.  Then they announced, that all of the eggs are empty.  To get a candy, you had to wait in line and exchange each egg for a piece of candy.  We got in line and were slowly pushed to the back by all the super aggressive parents and kids.  By the time we got to the front of the line, we gave them our eggs and the told us that they just ran out of candy.  It was a miserable experience.  I had 3 little ones who did not understand what was going on.  They expected that they were going to get some candy, instead they got pushed around and we left with nothing.  They were all fussy and crying by the end of the whole experience.

So, I was hesitant to go to the Bothwell Easter Egg hunt.  But the kids had heard about it and they really wanted to go.  The people in Bothwell have always been much nicer than the people we met in Tremonton, so I hoped that would make all the difference at the Easter Egg Hunt.  It did make a difference.  This Easter Egg Hunt was very enjoyable.  Each egg had a treat in it.  Some eggs even had money.  Parents and siblings were not allowed to help, so it really was their own age group.

 Here they are all lined up, waiting for the hunt to begin.

 Brinley found a half dollar.  She was so excited!

 They had a little petting zoo.  It was fun to see the animals.  The kids were a little nervous to touch some of the animals, but they had fun.

 Here we are, after we got home, sorting through the eggs to see what we got.

 When Roger woke up, we decided to go out and play.  We went to the Corrine playground.  We think that is one of the best playgrounds, but we don't go over there very often.  We love it because it has a teeter-totter, a merry-go-round, and swings.  For a while they had done away with all the swings at the parks around town.  That's why finding a park with swings was so exciting.  Now, the parks have swings again, so that's not a big deal.  But you rarely find a park with a merry-go-round or a teeter-totter.

Parker's Super Cool Magnetic Sculpture - April 17, 2014

Thursday - April 17, 2014

Parker's Hair - April 15, 2014

Tuesday - April 15, 2014

Parker's hair grows too fast!  It's hard to keep up with his haircuts.  He likes to have his hair cut, but he doesn't like the actual process of getting it cut.  He really wanted his hair cut before he went to school today.  I was planning on waking up earlier so we would have more time, but I just couldn't get out of bed.  So, I woke up at our regular time.  That meant I had to be quick with his haircut.

I had such a hard time waking up this morning because, I stayed up a little later than normal to watch a movie with Roger.  Then, I set my alarm to wake me up around 1:00 am, so I could see the moon all red.  I was so tired when I got out of bed to see it.  I was cool to see the moon looking different than I've seen it before, but it wasn't very red.  I was hoping we could just see the moon from Alissa's window, but we couldn't.  We had to go outside to get a good glimpse of it.  If Roger weren't here to look at it with me, I probably wouldn't have gone outside.  As I'm writing this, I'm realizing that I am just way too fussy when I am tired.  If the moon thing was during the day, it would have been a whole different story.

I just checked KSL to see if there were any pictures of last night's lunar eclipse.  There were some pretty cool ones.  I think I would have been more excited had I seen the moon around 2:45.  I saw it shortly after 1:00am, when it wasn't very red.  I would have liked to see it when it was at it's reddest and after, when you can see a line on the moon as it is going back to normal.  Here is a picture that someone submitted to KSL.  

Playing Jelly Belly's Bean Boozled - April 14, 2014

Monday - April 14, 2014
There was a blood drive over at the high school today, so Roger and I went and donated.  This was my first time.  Roger has donated before.  I never went with him, because I was either pregnant or had to be at home with the kids.  It was nice to be able to go with him this time.  I know this is probably not a good thing, but I finally beat Roger at something (he wins everything).......  My blood drained much faster than his.  The guy said that I was going to beat the record time that day.  He didn't tell me, if I beat the record, but I did beat Roger's time. So I won!  .......at losing blood.

When the kids got home from school today, we decided to play a fun and disgusting game, that I bought while on the sister's fling.  I bought a pack of Jelly Belly's called Bean Boozled.  It's a container of Jelly Belly's filled with some good flavors and some really yucky flavors.  Each good flavor has a yucky flavor that looks exactly like it.  Here is the Jelly bean list:

I did not enjoy playing this game.  It was soooo.... yucky!  My first two that I ate were yucky ones.  I ate barf and rotten egg.  They were horrible and it was not easy to get the taste out of my mouth.  I couldn't go on after that.  I quit.  Roger, Alissa, and Parker kept getting lucky and eating the good ones.  Brinley and I did not have good luck.  Roger, Alissa, and Parker kept at it and ate a lot more yucky ones than Brinley and I.  We both quit after having such bad luck with the game.  I took more video than pictures.  I had some brownies in the oven, so we could have something good to get the yucky taste out of our mouths.  The brownies, were cooking while we played the game, so we ate the batter that was left in the mixing bowl, when the Jelly Belly taste was too much for us.

Sister's Fling - April 11-12, 2014

Friday - April 11, 2014
I got to go on a Sister's Fling with my sisters in Roger's family.  They did a sister's fling once before, but it was either right before Roger and I were married or I my kiddos were really little and I couldn't or didn't want to leave them.  Anyway.... we decided to start having a sister's fling every April from now on.
So, I got the kids off to school in the morning, then I quickly gathered my things and Roger drove me to meet Caroline at the Maverick near the freeway.  I loaded my stuff into Caroline's car, Roger headed home, and Caroline and I went on our way to start our fun weekend sister's Fling.  Before we met everybody, we stopped at a french restaurant.  Caroline bought a treat that she wanted to share with everyone.  Then we headed to a different french restaurant to meet everyone and have breakfast.  The food was really yummy and we had a lot of fun talking.  After breakfast, we had to find things to do for a little while before we headed to Park City where we were going to stay the night.  The Van Bibber's told us about a fun store in Draper, called Pirate-Os.  We spent a while there.  I bought the kids some fun stuff for Easter and a funny gift to give to Roger for Father's day.  When we finished there we went to IFA to look at the baby chicks.

 Caroline and I had a fun time trying to find where we were supposed to meet everyone when we go to Park City.  We had a GPS with us, but I was talking and not paying close attention and Caroline is used to having Scott with her navigating where she is going.  We missed our exit and had to head back.  Then we couldn't figure out where we were supposed to meet at the hotel.  It took us a while, but eventually, we figured it out.  We got all checked in.  Cindi was ready to get the food started cooking.  Caroline needed to buy some of the food that we needed for our dinner, so we went out to find a store.  there was a store in the hotel.  On our way to find that store, we passed a relaxation pool that was not full of kids and looked so inviting.  We decided that we would go swimming there instead of the big pool outside.  The store in the hotel was too small and too expensive.  They didn't have what we needed, so we had to find another place.  Melissa remembered a 7-Eleven that was just a Gondola ride away.  So, we headed out to find it.  When we got there, we learned that the Gondola costs money, to ride, but the Cabriolet is free.  So, we rode that down.  It dropped us off right by the store.  We bought what we needed and headed back up to the hotel.  It was really fun to ride on that thing.

 While dinner was cooking, we decided to go swimming.  We looked funny in our robes and Caroline with her shower cap on, so of course, we had to take a picture.

 When we finished swimming, Missy and I sat in the Sauna to dry off.  It felt so nice!  I didn't want to get out.  when we finally did get out, I couldn't cool down.  We got back to the hotel and I took a cold shower then I sat with a cold rag on my head.  Nothing was working!  My face was still red and I was still feeling hot after all of that.  So, I went to sit outside with my cold rag and a glass of cold water to see if that would help.  I took a picture of myself while I was sitting out there.  It was so crazy that it took me sooo.... long to cool down.

We ate our dinner then spent the rest of the evening playing games and talking.  The VanBibber's made up a funny game using plastic Easter eggs.  It was like truth or dare.  We had to pick an egg and read what the paper in the egg said.  One of the eggs had Melissa and Joyce arm wrestling.  That was pretty funny.  Joyce won.  Missy said, "Go" and Joyce won before we even had time to realize what had happened.  One of the eggs let Melissa choose someone to sing a love song out on the balcony.  I got stuck doing that one.  It was embarrassing, because the pool was right below us and there were lots of people out.  I picked an egg that asked if there was something that I could do that nobody else in the room could do and show them if possible.  I had a hard time thinking of something.  The thing that came to my mind is that I can talk with a Minnesota accent.  Nobody else could do that, so that  was fun.  And they all got a good laugh at how I talked.  They asked how I learned.  It's funny how I learned.  My friends and I, when we were in high school, went to see a movie called 'Drop Dead Gorgeous'.  It was a good dumb funny movie that took place in Minnesota.  When the movie ended and we were walking out of the theater, I turned to my friends to say something and it came out in a Minnesota accent.  I was so surprised!  I said, "Oh my gosh! I can't stop talking with a Minnesota accent."  My friends thought it was fun.  From that point on we talked with Minnesota accents a lot when we were around each other.  We still do it when we get together.  It's funny.

Saturday - April 12, 2014
We had a nice relaxing morning.  When it was time to check out, we loaded all our stuff out into the cars and headed to main street for breakfast.  Here is a picture of Missy and I on our walk to the restaurant.

 I can't remember the name of the restaurant.  The food tasted alright, but not great, and it was overpriced.  The waitress didn't come around much and became horrible at the end.  She put all our orders on the same ticket, then got fussy with us when we told her we needed them separated.  Then she added her gratuity onto the check, so she got a much larger tip than she deserved.  I probably wouldn't have left her anything because of her bad attitude at the end.  So, that was a little frustrating.

 After breakfast we walked to a candy store that was super expensive.  I paid too much money for some yummy treats.  Only one of the things I bought was worth it.  After that we decided to ride on the trolley while we decided what to do or where to go next.

 We decided to go to some other stores, but we needed to drive there.  so we got off the trolley and headed to our cars.  On the way we passed this bear and had Melissa Pose with it.  Tyler and her were going to go to a fancy dinner with Tyler's boss, so she wore her curlers, so she could get ready quickly when we were done.

 Jeanne, Melissa, and I had to leave at 3:00, so Melissa could get home and get ready for her dinner.  Roger met me at Tyler and Melissa'a house.  We left their house and went to a bowling alley in Draper where we were able to pick up our pass of all passes.  We thought we would bowl, but it wasn't covered with our passes, so we decided to find something else to do.
One day when the kids were complaining about the walk to the bus stop, Roger told them about how easy they had it compared to the walk Roger had to take.  Not only is their walk shorter, they don't have to walk it alone, like Roger did a lot of the time.  He told them that one day he would take us to his childhood home and we could walk the path that he took to go to school, so they could see how good they have it.  We decided that since we couldn't go bowling, maybe this would be a good time to take our walk.  The kids thought it would be fun and that way we could spend some time playing on the playground when we got to the school.  The walk wasn't that bad and the weather was nice, so we all enjoyed it.  Plus, Roger told us stories of his childhood and pointed out all of the places he used to play.  It was a lot of fun to hear his stories.  The kids had fun playing on the playground.  Then we found a ball and we all played four square for a while.  As we walked through Roger's old neighborhood, I couldn't help but feel jealous.  There were so many trees.  I love trees!  The neighborhood was so beautiful because of all the greenery around.  Tremonton hardly has any trees.  It should have more trees.  Especially since Tremonton starts out with the tree sound.  I'm just sayin'.  Also, I think snowville should be a beautiful town with lots of trees and it should have lots of snow.  That's all.

The Pinewood Derby - April 10, 2014

Thursday - April 10, 2014
Today is the Pinewood Derby.  This was Parker's first, since he wasn't able to go last year.  He ended up getting really sick.  He was so bummed.  This was my first time of ever going to a pinewood derby also.  I didn't realize that they race the cars so many times.  I was a little nervous about how Parker's car would do.  Roger and Parker were much more nervous than I was.  But, it turns out, we had nothing to worry about.  Parker's car won every race!  It was so fun to win the pinewood derby.  Parker and Roger deserved this win.  Here's Parker showing off his car before the race.

 The race didn't start until 6:00pm.  Alissa and Brinley went to activity days, while we finished up Parker's car and got all our stuff ready for the race.  The picture below, is when they came home.  Brinley and her friend Sierra were telling ma about all the fun princess stuff they did.  It was a 'Frozen' themed Party.  They had a lot of fun.

 After Alissa and Brinley came home, we got ready and headed to the church.  We went a little early, so we'd have time to figure out if we needed more or less weights on the car.  It was a good thing we were early.  Because the car was way under weight.  Roger drove home really fast to find some weights we could use.  We duct taped the weights to the top of the car and called it good.  We were worried that they way we had the weights taped on would slow down the car.  Here's Parker running to see his car and right after his first race.  He won!  We were so excited!

 Each race started with his car just a little bit a head at the start of the race, then shortly after getting on the flat part, his car would speed ahead of the rest.  He won most races by a car or two lengths distance.  The pictures below are from one of the races where one of the cars fell off the track.  Parker thought it was kind of cool.  He wanted to be able to show and tell his teacher about the pinewood derby, so I told him I would print up a picture or two for him to show her.  He chose one of him holding his trophy and the other one he chose was the one where the car comes off the track.

Go Parker!  He is our winner, winner, chicken dinner!

 When we got home from the race, Parker informed me that they were doing an egg drop at his school tomorrow and he was supposed to bring an egg to drop off the roof.  It was already past their bedtime and we were tired, but we did our best to make something we thought would protect the egg when it dropped.  This is what we made.  I thought it would work for sure, but I was wrong.  The egg broke.

As soon as we finished making this, I got all the kids in bed, then I had to hurry and get as much of my packing for the sister's fling done as I could.  I was going to be leaving first thing in the morning, so I wouldn't have a lot of time the next day.  I did as much as I could, then went to sleep.  I was exhausted, so I fell asleep quickly.

Jeanne Steven's Park - April 6, 2014

Sunday - April 6, 2014
I was desperate to just get out of the house and get some fresh air, so Roger took us to Jeanne Steven's Park to play.  We brought the football, water, and some snacks.  We tossed the football back and forth for a little while, then we all played on the playground.  Roger was so funny playing on the playground.  He makes me laugh.  I can't go on that thing he was playing on.  It spins around and makes me so sick.  Before we headed home, we walked around on the walking trail.  The kids looked for golf balls, then we threw or bounced them as hard as we could.  We all had fun and it was so nice to get some fresh air.

April Fool's Day

Tuesday - April 1, 2014
Happy April Fool's Day! I had fun fooling the kids this year.  Parker was the first one to wake up.  He woke up at 3:00 am and came running into my room, to tell me that something was wrong.  There was toilet paper all over his room and he didn't understand how that could happen.  In a tired fog, I told him, "April Fool's!  I toilet papered your room."  He said, "Ohhh... okay."  Then went back to bed.  I woke the kids up at 5:00 am. They came downstairs to see a Christmas Tree set up with presents under it.  They were so excited!  I was going to wrap not so nice presents, like stinky socks, but I was too tired last night to go and find anything, so I just wrapped up some of their toys that were sitting close by.  I bought each of them a return bouncy ball from the dollar store.  They were excited about that. They loved all of the fun surprises I did for them.  After they opened the gifts, they ran around the house looking for the other tricks that I played on them.  They knew to look for the colored milk, because I've done that before.  They were surprised when they went to get their cereal and discovered that the bags were in the wrong boxes.  Then they couldn't find the silverware.  When they went to get their shoes on, they discovered that their shoes had toilet paper in them and their backpacks were all turned inside out.  They thought it was a fun morning.

While the kids were at school, I put up these funny signs on the door to fool them and see how long it would take them to get inside the house.  It didn't work.  None of the kids fell for it.  Parker and Brinley stopped and thought about it for a bit, but then remembered that it was April Fool's Day, so they came right in.

I told the kids I had a yummy new drink for them to try for after school snack.  It was Jello in cups with straws, so it looked like a drink.  It was funny watching them try and figure that out.  Then they were all nice enough to keep trying their drinks so I could take their pictures.

After Roger went to work, Alissa's friend, Sydney came over.  Alissa made me promise to save one prank to do when Sydney was over.  What I did was, I swabbed food coloring on to the faucets, so when they turned on the water, it would come out colored.  I made a treat for the kids, then I told them all to go wash their hands so they could have some.  Alissa washed her hands in the kitchen sink.  She didn't put her hands in it, she stared at it for a second, then said, "Mom? What's happening?"  I was laughing at Alissa's reaction, when I realized Brinley had gone in the bathroom to wash her hands in that sink.  I quickly ran in their to see her reaction.  When I got in their, Brinley had quickly pulled her hands out of the water when she noticed the color and she was staring at them with a confused and disgusted look on her face.  The color I used on both sinks was red, so she might have thought it was blood at first.  It was funny!  I love pranking the kids on April Fool's Day.  I'm not a fan of mean or embarrassing jokes, just funny and weird.  It was a fun day!