Spring has Sprung

Spring is here and we are loving it! As is typical in Utah, the weather is warm one day and cold and rainy the next. We are sure taking advantage of those beautiful warm days and go to the park nearly every day that the sun is shining! We had a fun family date night one rainy Wednesday (that we all just needed to get out of the house) to see Kung Fu Panda 3- which is now at the Kaysville theater! I'm not sure if the boys were more excited to see the movie or to eat popcorn, but they had a great time. We all did- Ben and I loved being there with our excited kids. This was only Hudson's 2nd movie (and the first movie I've been to with either boy!) and he did great- except one mid-movie meltdown (that definitely involved him giving me the "heisman") that was fairly quickly resolved. It was nice that we were at a dollar theater on a weeknight, so the theater was fairly empty! 

I'm loving this time of year that trees have beautiful blossoms and tulips are popping up everywhere, the weather is just amazingly pleasant and we can play outside again! One Thursday night we packed up the kids and a yummy picnic and headed to Layton Park for a few hours. The kids played and played and had a great time. We went and fed the ducks, including the most darling baby ducklings! Hudson started out by yelling across the creek "Mama Duck! Are your babies hungry?! Are you going to feed your babies dinner? We have dinner!" 

Then we found a shady spot to dig into our picnic. I don't think we've ever had such a successful picnic with the boys, who are usually too busy to focus on eating. They sat and ate and we all talked and laughed and had the most pleasant dinner! It was one of those nights that is just perfect and we all left the park happy and thankful.

Museums and Farming

 We started out April with a trip to the Natural History Museum in Salt Lake. Chase loved it when I took him a few years ago, but I knew he'd love it even more now. He is way in to dinosaurs. The boys loved seeing the dinosaurs, although Hudson wanted to move quickly through them and Chase wanted to stop and read all the displays- thank goodness I had my mom there with me, so I mostly stayed back with Chase and she moved ahead with Huds and Nora. They also had a gecko exhibit there which was way cool and both boys loved- although just the opposite of before- Hudson wanted to admire each gecko, while Chase just wanted to identify them and move on to the next thing!

 We had a really great General Conference weekend. We had a good balance of getting stuff done and watching conference and relaxing. My parents watched Sunday morning session at our house after we all enjoyed Ben's amazing biscuits and gravy for breakfast. I snapped this picture of Hudson watching conference, because how comfortable does that look?

 Among other funny things Hudson does on a daily basis, I came home from the gym one morning to this! Ben had an early conference call for work, so he stuck the boys in front of a show and I laughed out loud when I walked in and saw Hudson watching with his sunglasses on and his little feet tucked into the couch like that!

My sweet friend Katie is on the board of directors for the Treehouse Children's museum in Ogden and she got us all in to play with her! The boys loved it! We hadn't been in over a year, so it was mostly new for them. There were so many fun things to do and explore. The train tables were a big hit, as was the little diner where Hudson cooked up quite a storm. 

I took the boys out to a farm on Saturday morning where my dad was helping a friend plant kale- which I even admit, was really interesting to watch. The boys helped plant some kale by hand, and then rode in the tractor with Papa for awhile. I love this picture of Hudson helping carry the trays back to the truck. I wish I had audio of his little voice saying "I'm helping. But this is really heavy!"

March Stuff

 We had Dr. Suess Day on March 2nd. We read several Dr. Suess books (which my kids love) and did our Dr. Suess puzzle. Then we watched "Green Eggs and Ham" and had green eggs and ham for lunch (which the kids surprisingly loved). Sometimes we just do stuff like this so that average Wednesdays are more exciting. We talked a lot about Dr. Suess and a few days later Hudson randomly told our neighbor "Dr. Suess is dead. The bad guys found him and they killed him."

It has been gloriously a little bit warm this last week. We spent some time at the park and it felt amazing to be outside in the fresh air. This winter didn't feel especially hard, but now that the beauty of spring is upon us it makes me realize how much we miss playing outside! We met a whole bunch of friends at the park one Friday and Chase and Jazzy built this little sand castle together. When I went to take a picture of them Chase said, "Jazzy come be in this picture. It's a memory."

We didn't do a lot for St. Patricks Day this year, but since that week Hudson kept reminding me that we hadn't made cookies in a really long time, we decided to make mint chocolate chip cookies and dyed them green. The boys are getting to a stage where cooking with both of them isn't the huge disaster it once was!

 On actual St. Patricks Day we did a green breakfast (green smoothies and green crepes) and got the boys dressed in their green. Chase had a blast at preschool that day and came home talking all about how funny leprechauns are and how they searched for gold and made rainbows (one of which is adorably adorning my fridge). That night we had a little lesson on Ireland to continue our "around the world" thing. We did NOT have a traditional Irish meal, however, because nothing from Ireland seemed appetizing or like my boys would even remotely try it. We did color Ireland's flag though. (Although I didn't take pictures, it needs recording that our Italian night was a big success and the boys did/continually do give Italian food two thumbs up.) Chase repeated basically our whole lesson for my friend the next day, "There is this little island by London and that's where St. Patricks Day comes from and they LOVE green there! And they speak our same language." So I think he's got the grasp of Ireland :)

Ben and I went on a bunch of fun dates this month- none of which were photographed. Our favorite was a fancy night out at an Italian restaurant in Ogden called Zucca. The backstory is that we stopped in to get dinner there the previous week and were turned away because we didn't have a reservation (and the restaurant was clearly 80% empty at the time- it was weird). We were kind of put off by that so I emailed the owner and told him what happened and that it was weird and off-putting and we wouldn't be likely to try to come back again. He was super apologetic, frustrated with his staff that should have seated us, and offered us dinner on the house if we would come back. So we did. And it was absolutely worth it. Our dinner was seriously divine- and the dessert was even better. We had a beautiful meal (that I crave every time I think about it- the butternut squash ravioli was out of this world- as was Ben's lamb) and the whole atmosphere was fancy and elegant and fun. It was the best. And it was FREE! We already have plans to go back to celebrate our anniversary this summer.

Our dear friends, the Franks, now have 15 baby chicks! We took the kids over to meet them and it was the cutest thing ever. Hudson was smiling ear to ear and kept saying "Oh! He likes me!" 

 I picked up some watercolors at Target a few weeks ago. We hadn't watercolored before and it has made for hours of entertainment for us! The boys really aren't into coloring, but they do love painting! I think our general rule is messier = better.

 Chaser is riding a bike! He decided he wanted his training wheels taken off, so we did. And then we forgot about it for a few weeks. Then one night he said he wanted to learn to ride so I held him on the bike while we rode down the street to our church parking lot. Once we were there I let go and he just rode his bike! I was amazed! He was a natural and grinning the whole time. When I told him I was so proud of him for doing it he replied, "Yeah mom, when I decide I'm going to learn something I just do it." Which is so true- he really does. He can do anything he sets his mind to!

Easter

 We had a wonderful Easter weekend this year! We made so many good memories and had so much fun with the kids. I really wanted to keep Easter focused on Christ, so we had a couple of lessons throughout the week about Jesus and what we were really celebrating. I made some paper Easter eggs that we taped to the wall and the kids got to pull one off each day this week. On the back was written an act of service to do that day. We talked about how Jesus gave us the gift of life after death, so as a gift to him we can serve others. I think the kids very favorite activity was making these little birds nests out of rice krispie treats that we delivered to some neighbors.

As soon as we finished those we dyed Easter eggs. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that Chase is five and this is the first time we've ever done that! The boys loved it though. 

 On Saturday morning we had an epic Easter egg hunt at Nana and Papa's house, followed by a delicious lunch. It was so fun! The kids were all so cute and excited about the eggs and little toys they found, and so sweet and considerate of each other. At one point, Hudson spotted an egg and said, "Here Nora, you can get that one!" Nana knows how to spoil these kids.

The boys were so excited for the Easter bunny to come that they had the hardest time going to sleep Saturday night. All that work on making things Christ-centered, and the most exciting part was still the Easter bunny to them! The Easter bunny even "caught his tail in the door" (aka- a cotton ball) in his hurry to leave our house. They were thrilled with their baskets!

 Ben made us a delicious breakfast- strawberry shortcake on biscuits! It was delicious!

 We have 11:00 church so we decided to make our contribution to dinner in the morning- which was dessert, of course a bunny cake! Chase helped me make the cake and Hudson helped Ben with the frosting. Hudson insisted that they needed sunglasses to properly make it- and insisted that Ben wear MY sunglasses.

We had a wonderful meeting at church. Chase got up with the primary kids to sing "He is Risen" and did so great! He's been practicing for a few weeks now. I was thrilled that both kids gave us fairly accurate and in-depth explanations of what Easter was all about afterwards. Hudson's version included angel's knocking on the door of the tomb and then afterwards Jesus took off in a rocket-ship. So, ya know, close. 

 After church we met up at my parents house for a delicious dinner and family time. My mom always pulls out all the stops for stuff like this and we ate like kings! Mostly it was so great to be surrounded by family celebrating this beautiful holiday.

As I get older, Easter means more to me. Part of it is me trying to teach my kids what it's all about. I think part is that as I've gone through more trials and hardships that have come with being an adult, the Savior and his Atonement mean more. I'm so grateful that we have the gospel in our lives. I'm thankful for Christ and the hope and joy his life, death and resurrection bring to me. I'm grateful that I know He lives. Happy Easter!

Out of the Mouth of Hudson

After we had told Chase to go back to bed for the 5th time one night, we heard Hudson yell from his adjacent room "Go. To. Bed....STINKER!"

After finally deciding that his beloved Elephant was named Ellie, he has now recanted. "No, his name is just Elephant. Elephants don't have names. Bears have names. There is a grrr-bear and a polar bear. Grr-bears are black and brown and polar bears are white."

Walking up to a lady in our neighborhood who has her one-year old in a stroller, "We have a baby too, Noira. Only, our baby talks." (Hudson has been calling Nora "noira" for awhile now. And let it be known that the non-talking baby is a good 6 months younger than "noira")


He ends every single prayer with "and don't hit and be nice to my bro-ver" (This behavior is out of his hands now, he's calling on divine help)

One night he said a particularly sweet and specific prayer: "Please bless that my excema will go away. Please bless Nora that she'll feel better. Please bless I don't hit and be nice to my brover. Please bless us to have a baby gwil..." (Occasionally, both boys pray for a baby girl- because, ya know, Will and Matt have one (a baby sister) and they want to be just like them.)

He yelled out in the middle of sacrament meeting, "Three, Two, One....FIRE!" and then when Ben sat him all by himself between Ben and a wall he muttered "this is RIDICULOUS!"

While watching the Land Before Time Hudson became very concerned about how little foot's mom died. He finally gave himself some clarity, "She just went POOF! She poofed it!"

Hudson: This just makes me sick! (while rubbing his arm)
Me: What does Huds?
Hudson: My fur!
Chase: Huds, that's hair not fur!
Hudson: No, it's my fur!
(Hudson does pretend he's some type of animal quite frequently)

On this particular morning he was hanging out completely naked FOREVER. When I asked him to put clothes on, he pointed his little fist at me and through a totally mischievous little smile yelled, "Never! Never! Never! You little nugget!"

(He was really proud to show me how he made his bed without being asked)

Second Half of February

As soon as I got home from Florida, Ben left for 5 days in San Diego for work. Ben actually flew out on his birthday (we did get to have cinnamon rolls for breakfast with him first and give him his presents). I didn't take any pictures of Ben's birthday, but let it be recorded that he turned 31 and I think we all feel good about that. 

While Ben was gone the boys were so good! I was pleasantly surprised once again. It was probably partly due to the fact that I came home from my girls trip really refreshed and rejuvenated and much more patient with my kids. And they really were just really good. We watched Nora a bunch while her parents were working on packing up their house and moving and one day I pulled out my camera and took a bunch of pictures of the kids. I kind of loved the result- just really candid pictures (because heaven knows that posing these three is just really not an option) that shows how much they love each other (and Nora's persistent mistrust of Hudson- even though she likes him the majority of the time). 

We spent more time at the museum and then went to the free day at the zoo! I love those days! We always get there right when it opens so we have a good hour before it gets crowded (because by 10 it is REALLY crowded). We took Nora with us, which was fun and cute and a little crazy. Hudson was so excited to see the elephants (all named Ellie, of course) and Nora loved the Polar Bear. Chase was really into the reptiles, and I noticed that since we've done that dang reptile house probably 10 times now I'm growing from paralyzing fear to just normal fear of snakes. I'm also fairly certain that Chase loves the reptiles partly because he knows how much they creep me out!

 The weather started getting warm, which means the boys can finally use their Christmas presents from Santa! Chase easily mastered the new scooter and zooms around the neighborhood on it. Hudson is having a slower learning curve with the balance bike, but he's been persistent and I'm sure he'll get it down soon.