Soccer

Matthias has decided that he would like to play soccer on BYU's soccer team when he's 18.  We've told him that it's a lot of work and he needs to start learning skills now so that he can be really good to get on BYU's team when he's older.  We decided that we would help him out by signing him up for a little soccer league this year.  So for six Saturdays this Spring he has a half hour practice followed by a half hour game.  It's really cute to see him out there playing and he loves it.

Kindergarten Celebration of Learning: Is it living?

At the beginning of April, parents were invited to join the kindergarten classes in the morning so that the kindergarteners could show off their work and their learning.  I felt so lucky to be able to go and be with Matthias.  He showed me a folder of all of the hard work he has been doing for their unit on living things.  He had to observe, write notes about, draw and label, and discuss birds and plants as living things.  I'm so proud of this big boy who is learning so much and doing so well in school.

Good work, Matthias!

Matthias with his class.

Internship Celebration

We are just missing Bianca in this picture.  Way to go everyone!

A lot of people in my program applied for and matched for internship this year!  We are heading out for all different programs throughout the US.  We had a reception mid-way through April to celebrate our success in matching.  It's exciting to be almost done with school!

Sparkling Cider.

A map showing where everyone is going.

Spring Break Camp: African Safari

We love Ms. Mary's Camps through Cartwheel camps.  The kids always have a great time.  Over spring break they attended three days of African Safari camp and loved it.  Here is a sampling of all of the different crafts they made.

Six Flags Day

My mom got us passes to Six Flags for our birthdays this year.  We've been twice and the kids think it's amazing.  The second time we went was for the first day of spring break.  It ended up being the perfect day--it was cloudy but a good temperature.  That means that everyone else stayed away.  We were able to get our picture with Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck almost as soon as we walked into the park and walked on to tons of rides throughout the day.  The kids loved it an so did I.

A favorite one for the kids.  I think we did this one three or four times.

Some proof!  :)

Easter 2015

Happy Easter!  We love celebrating the life, teachings, example, death, and resurrection of our Savior.  We felt especially blessed to celebrate by listening to the prophet and apostles testify of our Savior's Grace during General Conference.

We started these celebrations a week before Easter at our church Easter party.  The kids enjoyed dying and finding eggs (which represent new life).

Both kids got to dye a lot of eggs at the party.

We then continued the celebrations with General Conference which started the Saturday before Easter.  The kids enjoyed listening for key words in order to get treats and coloring pictures of General Conference.  In between the two sessions of conference, we headed out to the park and played soccer together as a family.  The kids really loved running around and getting their energy out.

Matthias' drawing of Elder Oaks.

Lizzy's drawing of Elder Oaks (I hope you can see it).

Lizzy's coloring for conference

Matthias' coloring for conference.

Matthias wrote, "I want Easter!!!!!!  I want general conference!"

Matthias' Easter bunny.

Sunday morning, the Easter bunny did come with new Easter outfits and treats for the kids.  We also make Easter pancakes.  Then we got ready for the day in order to go to the chapel for the first session of conference.  The kids did a good job trying to keep occupied and listen to the prophet.  We were excited to learn about the three new temples announced and hear more about the importance of the family.

Later that afternoon we made dinner together, which consisted of pasta al forno (with slices of boiled eggs within the pasta), pizza, and salad.  The kids were a little disappointed that we didn't make an Easter bunny cake this year, but were okay with our Easter bunny pizza substitute (trying to reduce our sugar intake).  :)

We love Easter and are grateful for our Savior's atonement.  His Grace is so important in our lives and we are grateful that we learned more about it during General Conference this Easter.

April Fools Day

Matthias' favorite breakfast is egg-in-the-nest (toast with an egg in the middle of it).  You can see a recipe for it here.  I decided on April Fools to get my family with a tricky breakfast.  So I prepared the bread the same way, but instead of filling the hold with an egg, I poured in pancake batter first (to look like the white of the egg) and diced peaches next.  I also covered the back with more pancake batter.  It looked pretty realistic and I totally fooled my family.

Matthias got me back later that night.  He made me "juice" that I couldn't drink.  It was actually red jello in a cup.  Fun times.