May

 Oh I love May! The weather is just dreamy, blossoms are blooming, the air is fresh and smells amazing- and it's so full of fun activities with my kiddos! The kiwi crates arrived late one night and I found the kids are 6:30 on Saturday morning busily putting them together. These have been such a fun activity for these smart boys!

We had the cousins over to play one afternoon and I can never pass up an opportunity to photograph these two together. On this particular day they were struggling to share, well, anything. Including the chair. But they did settle on sitting in it together.

She looks so cute all dressed up for church- I love it when I can actually capture her sweetness in a photo. 

Now she's really committed to walking and walks everywhere these days. It's darling, and also so much easier on the toes of her shoes. Also, I'm a little lazy so she doesn't actually wear shoes all that often.

Davis has so much energy, but when he does chillax on the couch he looks so cute and grown up! He actually doesn't watch that much TV, but when he does he takes it very, very seriously.

The big boys started baseball! I love baseball season so much. I love watching my boys play. I love spending so much of our spring outside (it's so pleasant!). I love seeing them learn new things and make new friends. Davis was sure he was playing this year. We've been reading "Froggy plays T-ball" every single day (Davis likes to choose a set of about 5 books that we read over and over for weeks at a time). At Hudson's first game, he stood on the bleachers and yelled "I gotta GET IN THERE! I've gotta hit the ball up, up, up and out of the park!" (Direct quote from Froggy). It was so cute and funny.

But Davis actually meant business. I think he figured that his exclusion from the game had nothing to do with his age, and everything to do with lack of proper gear. So he came to the next game prepared. He wore a jersey. He grabbed this old football helmet. And with his little plastic bat in hand, literally just tried to scale the fence to join the game! (As soon as I snapped this picture I went to retrieve him, and he was almost over the top at the fence at that point). Ben tried to let him play there on the sidelines, but he was adamant that he only wanted to play on the legit field. He's going to be so excited when it's finally his turn!

Of course we had to celebrate May the 4th! It was actually a busy evening full of baseball games- but I did make these R2D2 brownies for the boys after school snack, which they were thrilled about. It was funny to remember this day last year. It was a Monday, but since EVERYTHING was cancelled back then (school, sports, church, all social activity) we had the whole day at home. We did festive brownies AND watched a movie. No time this year! It made me appreciate the sweetness of the time we had together last year, and appreciate the beauty of getting to be involved in the busyness this year.

We had an early Mothers Day dinner with my family. It's always a party with this gang!

Hudson's baseball season was so fun! He hit the ball twice and actually got on base! One of those times he actually got home! He was on a team with lots of good players and they won almost every game. Mostly, he loved hanging out with his team, laughing in the dugout and sometimes playing in the dirt in the outfield. I'm so glad he got on the same team as Richie- that was a blast!

This is Davis's little gang! This group of boys plays together all the time, mostly bopping between our yards. He loves his little friends! Next year they'll all be in school, except Davis, and I'm not sure how he'll handle it!

Lila started wearing little pony tails and pig tails and it's the cutest thing ever. 

Chase's house at school (Isibindi) won their little house challenge, and the reward was a chalk dust fight! He was so excited and came home from school so messy! I made him go straight to take a shower.

Doing Lila's hair became a real highlight of May for me :)

Just my sweet boys dressed up before church one Sunday. We are back to two hours of church! They kids get to go to primary! Davis is officially a sunbeam, or a "butterbean" as he's been calling it. For our first time back in Relief Society we decided to make it a little party and we had cupcakes and balloons and it was so cute and fun! Lindsay helped me decorate like 100 cupcakes and they turned out so pretty, I felt like we were ready to host a wedding or something!

The boys are helping Papa put in a huge garden at Aaron's. Their plan is to have a little farmers market in the fall and sell all the produce. The boys have big plans of what they'll do with all their money! Davis is the most enthusiastic helper.

Chase's baseball season has been a real growth opportunity for him! They let the kids pitch this year- which is a huge challenge. Chase got to pitch in a few different games and did great! He's been practicing pitching at home with Ben and he's got quite a good arm. He's also hit some great runs this year. Chase's competitive side has really come out and sometimes he's struggled to control his emotions when the game didn't go well, or he struck out, or had unfair calls made. I think he's learned a lot though! 

For Chase's 4th grade county report he got Garfield county- which is kind of nice because we actually visited it earlier in the year! That's where Bryce Canyon is! He had to choose a special project to do about his county and he chose to make a diorama. I love how it turned out! Literally all I did was make the salt dough and buy him paint, he did the rest by himself. For a kid who doesn't necessarily love an art project, it was fun to see him enjoy doing this.

The cutest little spectator at brother's games!

I snapped this photo of Hudson on first base! This was after he got his 2nd hit of the season. I wish I could have captured his face when he actually hit the ball- mix of surprise and excitement!

May went so fast! It was so busy with school, end of year activities, baseball and playing outside in the beautiful weather as much as we could. Over the last few months we've been playing the game of "this time last year" and remembering what the world was like. May was a big month of settling back into mostly normal- baseball resuming, 2 hours of church, mask mandate went away. We are getting back to normal and it feels so good!