Easter...and more

We went back to the citygarden park in St Louis and found a bunch of fun treasures we didn't find last time.









Kind-of weird

We brought Miranda and met the Anconetanis there and everyone seemed to have a great time.







We love our neighbors.  They have a kid each of our kids ages plus one more in the middle. We did an Easter egg hunt.  Andrew is not loving the fact that we stopped to take pics.








Enjoying the treats after the hunt

I love Easter! We spent Holy Week studying the final week of Christ's life and I'm so grateful for Him and His atonement.  I also enjoy all of the other Easter traditions like dying eggs.





Eating a Jerusalem dinner

Enjoying an Easter Eve bonfire with friends

He's holding a baby turtle...it was so cute!



The fire was so hot!

This was so sweet!







Its the best I got

 

 

Bird watching in preschool...I will update my preschool blog with more pictures if you want to check it out http://preschoolatjillshouse.blogspot.com/

Here's our log walk

Our backyard neighbors just had twin girls and they are so cute! My kids have been so excited to meet them so we've loved that they've come to visit a couple of times.

Eliza feels so special that she got to hold them...thanks Sarah! We're excited to get to see them often hopefully.

My family and the temple...the reason Easter is so important.  I get to be with them forever!



Crazy kids!



It has been fun watching them play Soccer.

Craziness

I underestimated this little tire swing...it gets a lot of love



Just going on a walk on a rainy day...with a lightsaber in case its needed



love it

Forget the umbrella :)

Ethan took his turn to join us at preschool

Eliza loves Niki and especially Niki reading her stories.  After I witnessed it for myself I didn't blame her, she made the books come alive :)



I gave Eliza my phone to take pictures of Andrew's football game. This is what I got :). Andrew continues to love football and his coach and team continue to be awesome.  Their games are fun to watch.

Every day when we drive into our neighborhood Ethan asks if he can race me home.  I love watching him run.





I had to document the fact that they decided they liked broccoli.



Using the cook-um stick to cook rolls on the campfire and stuffing it with chocolate and marshmallow is a new fav.

The benefit of breaking down on the way to church right after visiting the temple is there is nothing else to do other than take pictures while we wait for our wonderful home teacher to come rescue us.







I have a lot of pics with Eliza sticking her tongue out...yikes







I forget which child took this but I love it and I'm so grateful for Daniel and all he does! It's been a crazy couple of weeks with everything breaking...the car (a few times- mostly with different things wrong each time), the air conditioner, the tree, the hard drive, Daniel's back, and probably more that I'm forgetting. Daniel saved us A LOT of money by fixing almost everything himself.  Thankfully most of it happened during his week off school and a light work week so he had the time to do it.  We're also grateful for family and friends who helped him out.  Although its been difficult we've been very blessed.







Craziness.  Our poor tree. It was the loudest boom and the brightest flash and Daniel was right in front of the window when it got hit by lightning.  Eliza, Ian, Niki and I were in the basement and it was still crazy. The other kids were at school.  We are grateful no-one got hurt. Pieces flew and stuck into the house and there were also pieces of it all over the cul-de-sac and neighbors yards. It cracked all the way down.

Eliza was very scared and Ethan was very sad because he "loved the tree".



Andrew did a family history easter egg hunt.

Ethan wanted last pictures taken by the tree before they left for school because it was the last time they'd see it.



Daniel and his brother in law chopped it down.



Sawing in preschool



And now...here is our stump :(

Eliza loved petting all the baby animals at purina farms Easter village

The logs did provide a lot of fun.  We used a bunch to make a "log walk" in the backyard.

The reason I don't have as many pics of Andrew is he's often out doing this. He made a nice shot in this pic.

Bubbles!

Preschool Easter egg hunt.



I love that they love Winnie the Pooh.