Random sayings

My oldest child will be getting baptized soon.  We talked for a while this morning about making right and wrong choices.  We talked about the Holy Ghost and the still small promtings you can feel in your heart when making choices.  His response, "so when I'm doing my math homework and I have a yucky feeling in my tummy, it's the Holy Ghost telling me that I shouldn't do my math."  I honestly didn't know how to answer that, other than laugh.  He's cute!

Followed by Cole, for his homework he had to make a list of all the words he could spell.  Two of his words were:  Heaven and God.  I smiled and felt so proud that he considered those part of his spelling words.

Pabst Mansion

This past week I was a little spoiled.  My sister Brooke, who lives in DC, flew up to help me out and spend some time with me and the kids before she moves to Morocco next month.  She was the second mom around here for a few days and I'm pretty sure Liv likes her better than me.  We had lots of fun making and eating cake balls and playing countless rounds of Jenga (Liv's obsessed and pretty good for a 3 year old).  While the boys were in school Liv and I took my sister to the Captain Fredrick Pabst Mansion.  It's something I've wanted to see for a while, but I could never convince Shawn to go with me.  Captain Pabst was a world famous beer baron and sea captian who built one of Milwaukees famous mansions during the early 19th century.  The house was amazing, full of detail with German influence.

(I don't even have a picture of you Brooke, sorry!!) 

Jelly Belly

I was supposed to work all weekend, but got called off so I new we needed to take advantage and go do something as a family.  We ended up driving down to the Jelly Belly factory that isn't too far.  They have a cute little tour (train ride through the warehouse), and free sampling.  We were not brave enough to try the nasty flavors (booger, barf, rotten egg, skunk, etc.)  Liv loved bubble gum, Ethan liked buttered popcorn, and Cole liked the Root beer.  I liked the new chili mango jelly bean and the dipped jelly beans and Shawn just wanted to leave :)

Afterward we headed to the near outlet malls for some spring shopping.  Crowded outlet malls on saturdays with three unruly children is a bad idea (although we were still able to spend lots of money).  Shawn's getting excited at finally having a child old enough to go golfing with him.  Here they are gearing up for the upcoming golfing season.  The second picture makes me laugh because it looks like Ethan is telling Shawn how to golf.

the sun is shinning

It's been several long months, but the snow has finally melted and the sun is shinning (kind of).  It's hard not being able to go outside and see the sunshine for months, but I think we survived.  We made a bunch of bird feeders for all the birds that live in our yard.  We have some beautiful red cardinals and lots of other birds in the trees.  The boys didn't have school yesterday, so they were outside all morning digging a swimming pool for the birds.

March Family Dinner

We had a great St. Patricks Day this year.
Everybody made sure to wear green and the Leprechaun made surprise visits to the boys school,
 and our home leaving pots of gold behind.
The boys even had a concert at school with Irish Dancers.
(like river dancers, only smaller, but with big hair)
It was cute.
I'm not fond of green food.
In fact anything died green makes me gag.
Irish food isn't my favorite either so we had a....

RAINBOW Dinner Party!!

 We had stuffed french toast with raspberry cream cheese, a rainbow of fruits, rainbow jello, rainbow fizz drinks with rainbow ice cubes, and rainbow cake.  I'll be honest, the rainbow cake was the main reason I wanted to do this dinner.  I've had it on my list to make for a while now and I finally did it.

 

 

Star Student

This past week at school Cole has been the start student. He got to do something fun each day to celebrate.

Monday-Cole (mom) made a  poster to share with class full of pictures of his favorite things, people, etc.
Tuesday-Cole got to bring 5 favorite things to show his class (I think he chose the 5 biggest things he could find and made me carry them to school in a garbage bag).
Wednesday-Cole got to bring a book of his choice to school and read it for his class.
Thursday-Cole got to bring a special treat for snack time, and also received a special treat from his teacher.
Friday-Cole got to have his mom come and read a story to the class and then mom and Liv went to lunch and recess with him.

Cole has definetly been feeling special this week :)

It's so fun to see Cole at school with his friends and teachers.  I'm so proud of him and all his hard work :)

Paper Coterie

Last summer I did some freelance photography work for a company in Utah that makes some amazing photobooks, calendars, cards, posters, etc.  I kind of lucked out in that one of the founders of this company happened to be one of my childhood friends, Jessica.  Our moms grew up together and were college roommates so naturally our families spent lots of time together.  We did lots of fun things together even renting an RV and spending some time in Jackonshole.  Recently we reconnected and started working on some projects together.  Jessica is a brilliant graphic designer and runs the company Paper Coterie, www.papercoterie.com.  Check out the website, it is so cute and truly has some stunning graphic design work and products.  Jessica hired me to do some of the photography for several of their products.  Naturally many of the pictures I used are of my own children so if you check out the website, specifically the boys and girls hope and dreams photobooks :), you will see them.  You will also find my cute kids faces splattered throughout the website in other products if you keep looking.

here are some examples

I also used some newborn pictures I took of a friend of mine's sweet baby, Teslyn (Rebecca check out the website, and you can see the final product with Teslyn's pics).  

Check out the website, its amazing!!  You can link to it below by clicking on the logo.

Chubby Bunny

We played a rousing game of Chubby Bunny last night after FHE (stuff as many marshmallows as you can in your mouth and say Chubby Bunny, whoever gets the most in wins).  This was immediately followed by Shawn reading the instructions/warnings on the back of the marshmallow package in hopes the kids would never try this again.  The package says, "CHOKING WARNING.  Eat one at a time.  For children under 6, cut marshmallow into bite-sized pieces."  Well, this game totally violates all those rules, but we had medical staff on scene just in case.  Here is a small glimpse of Ethan.

Fish Sculpture and a Dance Party

It became evident early on in Ethan's life that he is a creator.  He loves to draw and create things.  I even save things most would consider junk, like cereal boxes, sour cream containers, toilet paper rolls (it took Shawn a long time to convince that we needed to save these) for Ethan to make "inventions" and "creations".  

A letter came home with Ethan from school about a week ago that said, "Congratulations! Your childs artwork has been selected to be part of  the annual Barnes and Noble Booksellers Art Exhibit."  Ethan was so proud and excited and made sure we didn't miss his first art exhibit.  Last night was the big night.  Ethan's project was a fish sculpture.  I'm not really sure, but they look like they are made out of paper mache type material.  

 

After the Art Exhibit we went out to dinner and then home to a movie and dance party.  

This next picture makes me laugh.  Look at Liv's eyes....and notice Cole in the background.  Sometimes our parties get a little wild and apparently this time Cole's shirt came off!

Liv and her brothers

I spend a lot of time volunteering in the boys classes at school.  Most of the time Liv comes with me.  The boys love to show her off to their friends, she seriously gets so much attention.  I found these pics on my phone today of the times she has been at school volunteering with me.  I think it's cute to see how protective and cute Ethan and Cole are with her.