Skagit Valley Tulip Festival

On Saturday we headed north to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. During the entire month of April this little valley bursts with color and we just had to see it ourselves. It was rainy and so so muddy but as we rounded the corner and this field came into view all of us gasped at the gorgeous colors and field after field of beautiful flowers. We ventured for a walk around the fields but we were cut short by a downpour. Luckily I was able to get a few pictures before it really started to rain. 

 One of my favorite things was seeing all the different tulip varieties. I had no idea there were so many different styles and colors of tulips.

After visiting a few more fields we made a quick stop at Snowgoose produce for ice cream. All of their ice cream is homemade and these gigantic cones were only $3. I was very skeptical that the kids would be able to finish their cones but all 4 of them ate it all (and we had some tummy aches to prove it). 

We also got some fun local artisan foods at the market and had a delicious dinner after coming home.  I know I say it often but I love where we live. We could literally do something different every weekend of the year and still not even scratch the surface of all that Seattle has to offer!

The rest of March

I've decided to do a quick recap at the end of each month just to get a few more of my pictures up here so that "someday" if I do blog books I will have my pictures in one place! March turned out to be a pretty unpleasant month but I'm not one to sugar coat my life so here's the recap in all it's glory!

After Makenna's baptism and all of our family left, I plunged head long into getting stuff ready for a giant consignment sale I participated in. I've kept most of my kids clothes over the years and I had boxes of stuff to get ready. It took me hours and hours and literally took over my house and life for about two weeks. I participated through JBF, which is a national chain of kids consignments sales and I love how easy it is to use their system. Once your stuff if priced and tagged, you can keep putting your stuff in any consignment sale in the country. So... I washed, organized, tagged, hung everything... many hours. In the end I put about 400 items in the sale and sold about half. I felt like that was a good return for my first sale. I'm in the process of changing some of my prices and I will put the stuff I didn't sell in another sale this month and then I'll donate the rest. It's a huge burden lifted to be getting rid of this stuff even with all the work it is.

I was so relieved the day I made my big drop off for the consignment sale and was ready to get my life back together and my house clean after spending so many hours prepping for the sale. Until I got the call I have been dreading for all my kids childhoods. Makenna's best friend had lice. Her mom called to let me know and suggested that I check Kenna's head. Ugh. I about started bawling because I knew if her friend had it, she would too. These girls do everything together and I just KNEW.  Sure enough I had her flip her head over and I immediately found a live bug on her head. Ironically, that is the only live bug we ever found so we are so so so lucky we caught it so early. I took all the kids into the school nurse and she checked us all and we only found it on Makenna's head. She showed me what to look for and told me how to go about picking nits out of her hair.  The problem is that she has SO MUCH HAIR. I literally spend HOURS over the next few days combing out her hair, doing natural and toxic treatments, washing endless (endless) loads of laundry all while trying to keep anyone else from being exposed. It.was.a.nightmare. I swear  I would rather deal with 10 kids throwing up than one child with lice. After 3 days I wasn't finding any more nits in her hair so I thought we were in the clear. On day 5 I found a few more nits in her hair and that's when I really lost it. I knew that if after the hours I spent checking her hair that I had still missed nits that I would probably never be able to get them all out myself. And so... I did what I should have done when we first found it. I took Makenna to a professional lice picker. Yes, there is such a thing. One of my sisters-in-law recommended the service to me after her kids had lice but it is expensive so I wanted to try to get rid of it myself. That was a huge mistake. This service guarantees that they will get all of the nits, which is why lice is so difficult to get rid of (unfortunately I've become somewhat of a lice expert this month). Anyway, the service will check all of the family for free so I took everyone in (even myself and Allen) and we were checked. They ended up finding lice on Carter that I had missed so I paid to have both C & M treated. We were there for about 3 hours and it was THE BEST MONEY I HAVE EVER SPENT. No joke, I felt like a physical burden was lifted when we left there and I knew we were all clean.  They rechecked us all after a few days and we were in the clear. Ok really, this is one of the very worst things I have had to deal with regarding my kids. If we ever get it again, I will go straight to the professionals and save myself the time, hassle and stress.  Carter being treated:

There were a few bright moments in the otherwise hideous month. Allen and I were able to go see Cirque du Soleil. It was an amazing show! I got him the tickets for Christmas and it was worth the wait!

 We had fun on St. Patrick's day. Our naughty leprechaun came and wreaked havoc on our house. He turned the toilet water green and left funny notes scrawled on all the bathroom mirrors. He turned the furniture upside down and turned the milk green. He also left a fun treasure hunt for the kiddos with a some funny hats and treats for them.

Addie made a funny cabbage leaf hat white I was cooking St. Patty's dinner. We had corned beef, potatoes, yummy Irish cole slaw and lime sherbet floats. 

A fun treat that we got for the kids (we don't usually do sugar cereal so this is a fun treat for them!)

 A few other pictures from the month. This is Emery's grumpy face that totally cracks us up. It is often accompanied by hands on her hips in a sassy way. She is very TWO lately!

The girls enjoying treat/bribery from Costco. I'm so glad I get to spend my days with these two. They crack me up and I will be so sad when Addie goes to school next year. I'm guessing Emery will be pretty lonely too.

The weather has been GORGEOUS. It has been unseasonably warm and sunny for about two weeks and we've spend every second outside that we can. The kids even asked if they could run through the sprinkler the other day (it was about 65 degrees) and were mad when I said no.

 Reading... always lots of reading. I decided to keep track of the books I read to the little girls in one day and then piled them up for a picture. There were 17 books that day and a couple we read twice. This is a pretty typical day but I had never kept track before.

 A visit to the Fremont troll. There are so many cool neighborhoods and things to do in Seattle so we try to visit a few new things every month. This troll is built under a bridge and is pretty popular. The kids had a fun time climbing around and playing on it.

Whew! Like I said, not my favorite month but we survived! April is shaping up to be super busy with lots of travels + spring break! 

Easter 2013

We had a lovely time celebrating Easter this year. It definitely helped that the weather has been gorgeous here - sunny and warm - which is pretty unheard of for this time of year in the PNW. It's amazing how a little sun can make everything better. We spent the week before Easter doing short devotionals during our evening scripture study about the last week of the Savior's life. It was a nice way to bring in the true meaning of Easter. We finished on Friday night by having a (semi) traditional Passover feast. We have done this for the past few years and the kids love it. I served naan, goat cheese, hummus, kalamata olives, figs, dates, grilled chicken, grapes and couscous.  We talked at length about the meaning of the feast and how it fits into Easter. 

 On Saturday morning our neighborhood had a fun egg hunt complete with a visit from the Easter bunny.

After spending most of Saturday playing outside and enjoying the amazing weather we dyed our Easter eggs. We had 3 dozen eggs this year and everyone was sad that there weren't more to dye! 

There was a visit from the Easter bunny who brought lots of treats and fun. Once again the kids favorite thing was the Cheetos carrots. Cracks me up.

And of course some new Easter finery (well, for the girls since Carter will only wear suits these days)

 We capped off the weekend with a delicious meal with some good friends. It was a perfect weekend. We are so grateful for the Savior and the beautiful knowledge of the Resurrection.

I LOOKED.....

Out the window

And what did I see? Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree!

Spring has brought me such a nice SURPRISE! 

Blossoms popping right before my eyes

I can take an armful

 And make a treat. A popcorn ball that would smell so sweet

It wasn't really so

But it seemed to me

 Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree!

{As sung about 50 times a day by the cutest 2  year we know!}

Makenna's Baptism

Makenna was baptized last weekend and we enjoyed a lovely day together! I am so happy with the way things came together although there were a few glitches along the way. We arrived at the church very early so we could take a bunch of pictures. In the end I'm SO glad we decided to arrive early because when we got there the baptismal font was EMPTY with no sign of anyone there to help get it filled. We were so lucky that Allen had been helping with seminary security during the week and had a key that would open every door in the building. We were able to get the font started while we took a bunch of pictures (another ward had a baptism before ours but they forgot to leave the font full!)

 We were also blessed to have lots of family in town to help us celebrate. My sister came with her family and my parents and Allen's mom were there to help our gorgeous girl celebrate.

We did have to start the service about 15 minutes late while we waited for the font to finish filling but all things considered, it wasn't too bad. The service itself was so special. Both of the grandmas bore their testimonies (our stake does this instead of talks) and our family sang a musical number. Makenna was nervous about the baptism but it went perfectly. Allen, my dad, brother-in-law Jon and several friends confirmed Makenna a member of the church. She was so happy and truly radiant all day long. She took her baptism very seriously and spent a lot of time thinking about the promises she was making Heavenly Father. We are so proud that Makenna chose to be baptized! 

After the baptism we had an party at our home for friends and family.  I decided to go with a rainbow theme for her party after I found the print in the picture below. It plays off of the primary song "When I am Baptized" that starts with the phrase "I like to look for rainbows..." Makenna loves this song so it was a perfect theme.

Some of the decorations:

We had a candy bar with little bags that the kids could fill and take home with them:

 I made this fun fabric banner and strung it up in the kitchen. It took me ages to make (You can't tell from this picture but it is really long). I'm planning to use it with my St. Patrick's day stuff in the future. It is was such a fun pop of color!

For food we did a lot of fun things with the theme. We had rainbow fruit kabobs:

 I slaved over mini rainbow jello cups. These seriously took me HOURS but they turned out so cute that they were totally worth it! They got lots of oohs and aaahs by party goers and even tasted really good!

 Allen made rainbow rice krispie treats using Fruity Pebbles and they were surprisingly good (and very sweet).

 We also served chicken salad on croissants, veggies and different varieties of chips. It was a fun spread and a super fun party for me to put together. We had several friends come that we know from our first time living in Seattle 6 years ago and we really appreciated their love and support for our family. We also had lots of new friends join our celebrating which we are equally grateful for. We mostly loved getting to spend so much time with our families celebrating Makenna's first ordinance and the beauty of the gospel!

In the next couple of weeks I'll show you the baptism scrapbooks that Allen and I have put together for Carter and Makenna's baptisms. They have turned out so beautifully and are a real keepsake for our kiddos.