Only in Utah....

...does 60 degree weather make for an ideal day for running around in the sprinklers in your underwear!
The boys were out playing in the yard with our neighbors while my mom and I watched from inside. They had turned on the hose to rinse their hands. Next thing we know they have the sprinkler going full blast with shirts off. Had I been a good mom, at this point I would have said, "No, it's too cold, turn it off." But instead I said, "Take your shoes off so they don't get soaked." They interpreted this to mean, "Strip down to your unders." Had I been a good mom at this point I would have said, "Enough, clothes back on and hose off." Instead, I grabbed the camera and snapped some beauties of them having the time of their lives in the ICY and I mean ICY water.
"Attack the water. I am not it's prey!"


Into the icy depths goes Tavita

Brayden taking it on

Not to be shown up boy the boys, Emma proved a girl could hang too!


While running around in their freezing bliss, Carson (our neighbor boy/the boys' brother from another mother) picked up a bat and flung it to get it out of the sprinkler. As he did so, Brayden ran right into the line of fire and got this humdinger of a goose egg on his head. A week later he now refers to it as his "chicken egg" because it's no longer big enough to be a goose egg.
These pictures do it NO justice. You could see his bump before you could him when he turned a corner.



While the kids were turning themselves into ice cubes, Bowzer continued his day long battle with this cat. He/she decided to make our house it's home for the day and was very friendly toward the kids. Bowzer was a different story. He constantly hissed, batted at, pounced on, and chased Bowzer. Did Bowzer get a clue he wasn't wanted, of course not. He thought it was the greatest game ever and loved having a playmate.


After the festivities, Brayden took his favorite little sister for a cruise. She thought he was pretty cool for doing so.


Tavita was so tired out from all the playing he couldn't even stay awake to eat dinner.


Junior brought home a giant box from work. It has been the source of much entertainment for the boys. A few days ago I handed them some markers and told them to decorate the box. Brayden apparently thought I said "Tavita" instead of "box"


Today was absolutely BEAUTIFUL! Sunny, clear, and warm. We spent the day getting stuff done and just enjoying the fact it was nice enough to be out. We were eating lunch outside and Kalei played in her exersaucer. She was completely content babbling away when she suddenly let out an excruciating scream. We looked down and there was a wasp, yellowjacket, hornet or whatever (I can't tell those things apart) crawling around on her stomach. I swatted it out, picked her up, and sure enough there was a red welt forming on her thigh. She screamed good and hard for 5 minutes or so but thanks to some ice, tylenol, and a cigarette (for the tobacco to make a paste and take the sting out not a smoke to calm her nerves) she was back to her smiley self again.
Shortly before

Shortly after (She's one tough cookie!)


Brayden has been begging the past couple days for me to dig out his sunglasses which I packed away last summer. I pulled them out and he transformed into Mr. JoeCool fo the day.

Vita's Birthday, Easter, and a few randoms

Here's a post I started almost a week ago, but here it is nonetheless. Sorry if it's overkill on pictures but with family so far away we try to document A LOT!

Since my surgery I've been slacking pretty bad but I'm finally up and going. Slowly starting to feel some semblance of normalcy in my life so hopefully I'll do better. Here's a catch up of a few things we've done over the past bit.

Tavita's 3rd Birthday
This boy has been talking about his birthday for MONTHS! His birthday was actually yesterday but we had his party on Friday. He was very broad on what theme he wanted for his birthday. He asked for Thomas, Hulk, Basketball and the color pink. We were able to incorporate it all. Thomas was the main theme with a bit of hulk and baketball. We only had a few friends over (couldn't imagine reigning in a huge crowd of 2 and 3 year olds) but it was a lot of fun. As they showed up we decorated bags with train stickers then they headed off to play with train tracks and watch Thomas while the other kids arrived.

We played Pin the 3 on Henry (thanks to Junior's AMAZING artistic ability)

The "Hulk" Relay Race. They had to jump of the building and pop the baloon, blow over the bad guys, and smash through the brick wall. All they cared about was the brick wall, the could have spent all day building the wall and knocking it back over.

Tavita starting the race
We had to incorporate basketball so we shot some coal into the coal tender

Another great perk of the boxes, excellent hiding spots, can you find Spiderman?

After the fun outside we headed in to sing Happy Birthday.

Like I said, Tavita had quite the request of things to include on the cake, but we got them all. I wrote with pink frosting, Thomas theme, Hulk riding on the caboose, and some gummy bears playing basketball. The kids ate and ate, I'm sure all the parents loved me for sending their kids home with enough sugar in them to make them twitch for days!

The gummy bears in an intense game.

After cake we were off for our Easter Egg hunt!

All the leftover boxes made for great hiding spots!

Then the highlight of the day (for Tavita at least) PRESENTS! This kid had Thomas coming out his ears, he was in HEAVEN!

As Junior was cleaning up, he waged war on the kids with the coal.

The aftermath of the cake at the end of the day, the kids at the party made a pretty good dent then my boys continued picking the rest of the day.


Here are a few stats of our Vita:
Weight: 31 lbs
Height: Just under 3ft
Favorites:
color: Pink and Blue
Food: Noodles, Cheese, Cereal, CANDY, CANDY, and CANDY (no surprise)
Characters: Thomas and Hulk (obviously)
Activities: Digging in the dirt with his trucks, visiting Beebee (our nieghbor)
Movie: Diego
Place to Visit: Going with Grandma to the store (huh?)
Thing: His "blue blankie" WILL NOT go to sleep unless he has it
Toy: His trucks
Things he's good at:
-has a great arm on him
-making faces, he has some killer ones
-cooking, always in there helping me
Tavita is always looking for an adventure and loves to explore. Him and Brayden make quite the duo and have a lot of fun together. He's his own man and is not one to be told what to do. He has a heart of gold and is always out to protect his mommy and little sister (even though it's okay for him to bully her, no one else can!) This little boy's HUGE personality really adds a lot of life to our house!

Easter
We had a very relaxing and enjoyable Easter. The Easter Bunny lovingly hid eggs inside and out ready for the kids to have fun in the morning. However, we woke up to quite a surprise; 3 inches of snow on the ground. You couldn't see the majority of the eggs outside. The boys had a blast searching the house for eggs, after those were found they were pretty hesitant to go out and look. Brayden finally braved it, tromping through the snow searching for eggs. Later that afternoon when the snow melted, they returned to the search. Brayden would pick them up, wipe them off and Tavita would toss it in the bag.
The view out the window when we woke up, all the pics from Tavita's party was just 2 days before. Gotta love Utah weather!

At the top of the stairs ready to go!

Tavita scoring a find

Brayden with one of his prizes

LeiLei with her basket

Tavita found his basket in the pantry, his favorite room in the house!

Brayden searced and searched and finally found his under the sink in the mud bath.

Tavita taking a break from huntin to enjoy some of his bounty

The boys with some of their loot. New pj's and watches from Grandma, light sabers and chocolate bunnies from the Easter Bunny

NOTHING can come between Brayden and his eggs!

Tavita thought it was just plain crazy to go tropping around in the snow looking for eggs

Brayden found quite a few, any hidden 3 inches or lower were a lost cause


Since Easter was also Tavita's actual birthday, we did presents that afternoon. After a weekend of pigging out on candy, cake, and more candy, I couldn't bring myself to make any more sweets. We had rootbeef floats instead (leftover from the party) which Tavita was perfectly content with anyway.
Found this at a thrift store and knew I had to get it for Tavita. He LOVES it. When he first saw it he couldn't even speak. We're planning on painting it and sprucing it up a bit. The color Tavita has chosen: A bright pinkish red. Try as I may, I couldn't get him to choose another color. "Sweet Tomato" had him at hello.

He also got a tee and glove so he can start prepping for the pros.

Randoms
The boys worked a long time to fill up a sticker chart and their reward was a trip to Chuck E Cheese. We ate a ton of pizza and played our hears out!
World's 3 cutest kids on a car ride

Hanging with Chuck

Brayden the Dragon Trainer

Watch out for these two!

Tavita the jailbird

Proof my children love each other. Brayden has discovered the joy of carrying Kalei so he usually brings her along to join in the fun. Snapped this after hearing giggling and found the three of them spinning.

I need my beauty sleep!

We've been getting WAY too much of this lately, think we've had more snow storms the past month then we did in December. So much for Spring!

Starting our garden. New this year: Watermelon, canteloupe, pumpkin, cascabella peppers, broccoli and green beans