Jake's 7

Jake had his first friend party this year.  Theme was of course dinosaurs 

               
                                                                     Volcano cake

                                          The kids loved it when the cake started smoking

We kept waiting for it to explode but all it did was bubble and pop

   
                                                              They still had fun (watch out little dino)

                                                                      make a wish

                                                       It was nice to have Devo there to help

                                       10 boys at the party, Crazy!  Next year maybe only 4 or 5

                                                                 dinosaur eggs race

                         
                                                       Jake's favorite activity was the pinata

                                                                  Watch the tail fly

                                     technical difficulty it fell apart and we had to refill with candy

                                                        Emmy was a great helper

Dinosaur stomp

     
                                                                The winner Heston

Piano Festival

Emily earned her first gold cup for piano solo this year.  She had to memorize two songs and play them before 3 judges.  This is her 3rd year getting superior so she received her cup.  We are very proud of her and her hard work.  She has really become quite the little player over the past three years.  She definitely has a little natural talent.  Good job Emily we love hearing you play.   

Spring Break

Day 4

"Uncle Toe come lay down here so we can body slam you"  He agreed. Crazy!  Emily said this was her favorite activity of the vacation.

 He ended up using them as weights

Pillow fight

 The kids kept begging to go swimming in the freezing cold. It was only 50 degrees.  We finally just said okay. They lasted for about 15 minutes.

Thanks Aunt Terri and Uncle Toe for lots of fun and especially for letting us crash your "hotel".

Spring break Day 3

We headed to the L.A. Zoo It was much larger than the Hogle Zoo Lots of walking, the kids did a great job.  It only cost us a churro and an icee.

 This was the reptile snake area and the best thing was it didn't stink like Hogle Zoo!

Jake loved all the snakes and reptiles

 This is Jake reenacting Steve Irwin tackling a croc.

 The gharial  was Jake's favorite

 Emily loved the koalas

Spring break day 2

It was cold and rainy so we went to a movie Mirror Mirror.  Then Uncle Toe came home from work early and took us to Dave and Busters.  It reminded me of Vegas except for kids.  All the noises and blinking lights.  A little overwhelming at first.  The kids had a blast.  

 They love the car racing games but they didn't give out any tickets.  We all played an airplane war game in honor of Papa Due.

The games that gave out the most tickets were the favorites

Uncle Toe even spent a few dollars on his favorite coin game.  He won a lot of tickets.   Mom's  favorite game was deal or no deal. 

The kids ended up with 1,600 tickets They traded in for some stuffed animals

Even Aunt Terri joined in for some fun.  

Spring Break

Dad had to work most of spring break so we headed to California to visit Aunt Terri.

Day 1: 

The only scheduled semi nice day, so we headed to the beach.  The first hour at the beach was perfect.  Except the water was freezing!

Uncle Toe told them all about catching sand crabs but we didn't have any luck.  Even the birds were coming up empty.

This is our sand castle master piece.  Emmy was quite proud.  Watch out sand wars!

Jake had fun feeding the birds all our snacks.  He was in heaven with about 20 birds waiting for him to throw them a treat.  They weren't shy.  If you left the food unattended they would rush in and steal it right out of your bag.

Love Aunt Terri and Swedish Fish

Trying to get warm in the sand.  After the first hour the wind came up and started misting us with salt water.  A little chilly.  We had to move way back on the sand away from the water to keep warm.  Not as fun with out playing close enough to see the water.

On the way home, we stopped by our old place to show the kids where we lived when Emily was born. It's all gated up now but we snuck around back, through and open side gate, to get a picture.

It was fun hanging out in Pasadena again remembering the fun times we had while Devon was in school.

Easter

It was kind of nice to have church early this year on Easter Morning.  No time for Easter baskets and eggs.   It was nice to concentrate on the real meaning of Easter first.  We started a new tradition this year.  The kids had to follow the clues to find their Easter baskets.  They loved running all over the house to find their baskets.

This was the first year I can remember having an easter egg hunt outside.  No Snow!  A beautiful sunny day.  The kids had fun hunting for eggs.

 So this year after the kids were done gathering all the eggs, I told them who ever had the empty egg was the winner.  Then we were going to discuss why the empty egg would be the best egg. Trying to reinforce the real reason for easter. No one could find the empty egg.  Well, while Devo was  taking care of the eggs, he realized it was empty and filled it with candy.  Too funny.  Next year we should do a little more communicating.