bubble bath...

I was going to give Azlyn a bath after dinner and I decided to add bubbles to it. I thought she would like it. When I first put her in it she wasn't very sure and just kinda sat there. Then she kept trying to get the bubbles off of her hand. Then she went into a full-on melt down and I couldn't help but laugh. She really did not like the bubbles touching her at all. Needless to say this was a super fast bath.

Chalk

Seriously, EVERYTHING goes into this little girl's mouth. I try to keep small things and chalk and crayons and such off of the floor or where Azlyn can't get them but it's kinda hard when Mathias keeps getting them out to play with. I had to take chalk away from her TWICE today. You  wouldn't think it would taste very good but apparently Azlyn doesn't mind it.

a race track made of paper

You tend to try and get a little creative indoors when the weather isn't cooperating very well outside. Mathias came up with and made this paper track all by himself. It was a little hard for the three of us to race around though.

chocolate-induced tantrum

I let Azlyn play with a zip lock bag that had Mathias' Easter eggs and Easter candy in it. She liked the noise it made when she shook it. I didn't think that she would be able to get into it and if she did the only thing not in the plastic eggs were smarties and those are almost impossible for ME to open. Apparently I was wrong. When I noticed that she was being unusually quiet behind me I turned around to find that not only had she opened the bag but that apparently there was a Reeses mini cup in there that was not in a plastic egg. She was going to town on it, wrapper and all. This little girl LOVES chocolate already, just like her big brother. Needless to say she wasn't very happy when I took it away from her. However, I did not expect a full-on tantrum. She started crying pretty hard and leaned forward and put her head on the floor then sat up and hit her head on the couch. I actually thought it was pretty funny but I know it won't be so funny in another year or so. Man, the drama seems to start a little early with girls. It doesn't help that both of my kids have that sassy red-headed temper! ;) You know what I am talking about mom! ;)

nerf war

Since Mathias got a second Nerf gun for Easter he was excited that he could have Nerf wars with Dev. It is so fun to watch them chase each other around the house and hide behind furniture and scare each other. Mathias thought it was pretty fun to shot Devin in the butt.

A post of pictures

I really wanted to get some pictures of the kids together by some flowers in their Easter outfits so we headed out to Thanksgiving Point. I had a couple of things going against me though from the start. We had to work around Azlyn's nap schedule and meal times so the only time we were able to go was in the middle of the day when the sun was the brightest, so there was a lot of eye squinting and shadows on their faces. Then Azlyn just wanted to check out the dirt and flowers and such instead of looking at the camera. Oh well, I still got a million pictures and because I have a very hard time narrowing them down I posted most of them!

Mathias loves to help Azlyn walk. He gets so excited every time she stands by herself and has to make sure that anyone around her sees it. He is seriously such a good big brother!

Don't mind that both of their outfits are huge on them. At least they will be able to wear them for a long time.

Getting a natural smile from Mathias these days is near impossible. He just looks like he is in so much pain while smiling for the camera. Gotta love it.

Here they are looking at a little fountain. Mathias is such a great help to Azlyn. He really didn't want to let go of her in case she fell and then got really excited to see her stand by herself.  That never gets old to him. Azlyn wasn't too sure about touching the bushes. She would put her hand on them and then quickly lift it. She does this with grass, too. It is pretty funny to watch.

Ok, I seriously love the pictures where they are looking at each other. They did that all on their own. Melts my heart!

It was such a beautiful day out and the flowers were just gorgeous!

These next couple of pictures were taken were Dev and I had our reception. I seriously love coming back to wear it all started and bringing the kids.

They loved looking at the little stream that went under the bridge and hung out here for a little bit.

Checking out the little waterfalls.

Mathias really wanted to take some pictures of the flowers. So I let him run a round with the camera for a minute and these are the pictures that he took.

Check out my little stud Mathias. He came up with these poses all by himself! We were only able to get one of Azlyn because she just wanted to crawl around and explore. At least she was smiling in the one we were able to get.

Some more failed attempts to get some pictures of them together. I swear it is nearly impossible to get good ones of the two of them together.

I seriously just love these kiddos so much! It was so fun to hang out, take some pictures and go exploring together!

Easter

The Easter Bunny had to stay up pretty late waiting for the kiddos to go to sleep so she could get the Easter basket stuff set out. She was gonna hide them but couldn't really think of were to put them that wouldn't be too hard or that would wake up sis in the morning so she just sat them on the couch again this year. Maybe next year...

The kids got really spoiled this year!

 

We actually locked Mathias in his room the night before because he was so excited to see what the Easter Bunny would bring him. We wanted to make sure he didn't just go straight downstairs without us.  We wanted to see his reaction. 

He had the best reaction. He just stood in front of his basket with an amazed look on his face. He checked everything out for a bit then wanted to hunt for his Easter eggs. Azlyn was still asleep at this point.

 Mathias missed the ward Easter egg hunt this year because he was in Moab with Dev so this was the only egg hunt that he did this year. The Easter Bunny hid ten big eggs around the living room filled with cars. We started doing this when he was 2. He loved it so much that we bought some more the next year. I then figured it would be cheaper to just buy the 5 pack of cars and fill the eggs myself after that so that is what I did last year and this year. Plus I could pick out which cars I thought he would like the most. Anyways, Mathias loved finding the eggs and even needed a little help to find the last few. He was pretty excited and he loved all the cars that he got. 

After the Easter egg hunt it was time to get ready for church. The kids and I got new church clothes for Easter. As usual I didn't have a ton of time to get ready so I went to church with wet hair. Oh well, the kids sure looked cute in their Easter clothes. Dang my hubby and kiddos are cute!

After church Azlyn finally got to check out her Easter basket. She kinda just stared at it for a while then went straight for the little Zu Zu pet bunny rabbit. Mathias has a Zu Zu pet and she loves it so the Easter Bunny got her her very own. She mostly just played with that for a while then she found the candy. Poor little girl already has a sweet tooth like her mommy!

It has become a tradition to get these little Reeses Pieces-filled carrots for the kids' Easter baskets. Azlyn instantly put it in her mouth. The funny thing is is that I have a picture of Mathias doing the same thing when he was 2.

After some quick lunch it was time to color and decorate some Easter eggs. Again, we didn't do this sooner because the boys were gone. There were only nine eggs to color because the other three got used just before. Oops! Azlyn really wanted to help, but much to her dismay she only got to watch. Maybe next year. Mathias had fun putting the eggs in the dyed water and checking on them. After he dyed them, we had to let them dry so we could decorate them. Mathias got a little impatient at this point. He wanted to decorate them right away.

After dying the eggs, we all went over to my in-laws for an Easter dinner. It was seriously so good. Melanie and Kelly are amazing cooks. After dinner everyone started watching the new Harry Potter Movie but it was Azlyn's nap time so we went home. When we got home we put Azlyn to bed then started decorating our eggs.

We try a different egg dying kit every year. This year we got the monster one. Mathias loved it. These are the ones he made . One is missing because I apparently forgot to take a picture of it.

This is the one that Devin made.

Here are the ones I made.

Here are all the completed eggs. It was pretty fun.

We had an amazing Easter being surrounded by our family.

A quick trip to Moab

Joe Huish and I wanted to cruise down to Moab for Easter Jeep Safari this year, but the best way to pitch the idea to our wives was to each take a kid with us. So Joe, his boy Parker, Mathias, and I went down to Moab for an over-nighter. Neither of us could take time off, so it had to be a quick trip. So we split the costs and put Joe's new-to-him Wrangler on a trailer and off we went.

As seems to be par for the course, within five minutes of getting Joe's jeep off the trailer in Moab, it wouldn't run. We'd drive it for a couple minutes, then it would sputter and die. Turn it off, back on, start it up, drive it for a couple minutes, then it would sputter and die. Here's a typical shot of Joe looking at his jeep, in a parking lot, in Moab.

Since jeeping was no longer on the docket, we headed to the Jeep/Mopar display in town.

The weather also did not cooperate. The forecast called for cooler weather but no rain. Fine, we can wear sweat shirts and jeans, as long as it doesn't rain. What happens? It rained. Not tons, but enough to dampen our spirits. So we ended up spending a little time at Potato Salad Hill watching the idiots and show-offs, grabbed some dinner, went to the Jeep display, then back to camp. Joe put a new fuel filter on the jeep, hoping it would solve his problem, but it didn't work. Still no jeep.

Saturday, the weather was still unpleasant. Cold and rainy. We piled into Joe's truck, hit up Tater Salad again, then went out to see the vendor show taking place at the rodeo arena south of town. We found a mostly empty parking lot with a few vendors finishing packing up. Apparently the vendor show closes Friday night. Crap. So off to Area BFE, hoping to see some cool buggies playing around. After driving around on some dirt roads south of town, we found Area BFE - found it to be empty. Cold and rainy doesn't go over well with people who have no tops or heaters in their buggies. So back to town we went, packed up everything, and headed home. On the way out of town we stopped at the big sand hill and played for a good hour or so.

We went down with four main objectives - see people with lower IQs try to drive up Potato Salad Hill, do a little jeeping, go to the vendor show, and see Area BFE. Well, we got one thing checked off the list. 25% isn't bad, is it?

Kindergarten Passport

Today we had Mathias' 5yr/kindergarten check up. He was a little nervous to go to his doctor's appointment because he knew he had to get shots. He went with me to Azlyn's 12 month check up the week before and saw her get shots and was very concerned about it.  He did really well though. He said ouch a few times and shed a tear or two but then said, "You are right mom, it wasn't that bad and only hurts for a minute."

Getting him to do a natural smile these days is just about impossible!

 The pediatricians office made it a fun day though. They set this day aside to mostly do kindergarten appointments. He got a t-shirt and even got to choose what color he wanted.

After his check up he got to take a picture with his doctor and got a passport for kindergarten.

The top picture is the front and back of it and the bottom picture is the inside. I thought this passport was a really cute idea.

Here are Mathias' stats at 5 years old.

Weight 49.1 lbs = 88.47%

Height 45.38 inches = 86.99%

Mathias is still consistently a pretty big boy for his age!

 

I seriously cannot believe that my baby boy is going to be in kindergarten this year. That is just so crazy to me!

what do you think?

Azlyn 12 months

A lot of people tell us that Azlyn looks a lot like Mathias as a baby. We really don't think that she does. What do you think?

Mathias 13 months

family party

Azlyn had just woken up from her nap when everyone started showing up. She wasn't so sure about everyone being there and was not a very happy camper unless I was holding her.  It just made me think of and want to sing "It's my party and I'll cry if I want to."

  Here are the decorations for her little family party. Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures of all of the family that was there. Oops!

We decided to let Azlyn open up her presents first for a couple of reasons. One she was a little cranky since she just woke up from her nap to a lot of people and two because it would take a while to clean her up from eating her cake. She was still kinda cranky and wanted me right next to her the whole time so I didn't get the best of pictures. Towards the end she started to get a bit more happy and then it was time for cake.
I have to explain the wallet she got from my sister-in-law. Azlyn loves my wallet. She is obsessed with it really. She will dig in the diaper bag just to get my wallet out and then she will take everything out of my wallet. So she got her own wallet with fake laminated money, old gift cards and even a laminated picture of her for the license. It was awesome!

She wasn't so sure about everyone singing to her and watching her but she now knows what cake is and she went right on daintily picking at it. Her mood instantly changed and she was all smiles.

I just love her cute frosting covered face!

 This time though she got a lot more messy. We let her eat it a lot longer plus it was pretty warm in the room with everyone there so the frosting was really warm and was starting to get pretty runny. I love that she played hide and seek with her frosting-covered hands.

  

This is the end result. Nice and sticky and messy.

  

This is only her second time getting a sink bath. As you can see she loved it.
We love being surrounded by all of our family and feel so blessed that a lot of our family live really close by.

friend party

We waited a week to have Azlyn's birthday party because we wanted to have it at a nearby park and we were hoping for some nice weather. The weather turned out to be perfect!  Here are the decorations for her little party. It has become a tradition to get a number balloon for the age that they are turning for our kids birthdays.

Since it was such nice weather a lot of people had already made plans so only two of our friends, the Huish's and the Larsen's, were able to make it. My mother-in-law came as well. After we ate the kids went to play on the playground and the adults sat and watched them and chatted. It was really laid back.

We ate some lunch of sandwiches on rolls, a veggie tray and a bowl of mixed fruit. After lunch we of course had cake and ice cream. Azlyn ever so daintily picked at her little flower cupcake. She just kept picking at the frosting, I don't think she ate any of the actual cake.

Here she is signing "more".

I just had to share some close ups of her cute little frosting covered face.

After she was done with her cupcake she moved on to the flowers. Seriously EVERYTHING goes into this little girl's mouth.

Unfortunately everyone had to leave by the time we got to presents.  The Larsen's got her a little baby doll. It was the perfect gift, as Azlyn loves babies. I could hardly get it away from her to open the next present. She had to have it with her in her car seat on the way home in the box and all.

We got her this little gumball machine that came with some little hard plastic balls that have things in them like dogs, diamond rings, teddy bears etc. These little balls were really popular when Mathias was a baby but we didn't have anything to go with them so I thought that this would be perfect. When you push the little lever to let the ball twist down it lights up and plays music. I love that in the last picture she is clasping her hands and saying ooooo while looking at it.

 When we got home from her little party we decided to take advantage of this nice weather and play outside some more. Azlyn has been learning to walk by pushing her little doll stroller. She always seems to make it turn though. It was so cute to see her walk with it. Of course Mathias was playing with his cars in the dirt.

While I was getting Azlyn ready for bed I noticed that she got her first little sunburn. Luckily though I think that she is gonna have my skin where the sunburn will quickly turn into a tan.We are so lucky that our red heads actually tan.

I thought that it was funny that you can see where her little bracelet was.
It turned out to be a perfect, relaxing day at the park spending time with friends. It couldn't get much better than that.