tulip festival!

For those of you who read my sister Janna's blog as well, I apologize in advance. The pictures shown here are all taken with her camera and I just stole them, so our blogs just might be an exact copy cat of one anothers. But with the 130+ pics we took, we shouldn't have too many duplicates... we shall see ;)

ANYWAY...
On Saturday, my sister Sandie and her husband took my girls to the zoo. Sandie's done this a few times since we've moved here and Abby & Brenna LOVE it! Especially since their mom isn't the biggest fan of stinky animals (hence the reason we're a pet free family!)
My mom and I decided to go to the Tulip Festival @ our favorite place... Thanksgiving Point. We invited Janna, Jason & Claire to come along, and then Uncle Dennis & Aunt Ruth Ann joined us for a bit as well!
Despite the cold wind, we had a FUN morning enjoying the amazing gardens!

Oh, this place is breathtaking!

Look at these tropical beauties:

and they came in orange too:

I love me some yellow tulips!
Yellow roses are my fav, but these work too!

I have to laugh at little Claire not knowing what to do when Aunt De-De's in self portrait mode!

We're going back this Saturday, May 2nd (the last day)... come join us!
Anyone who comes with us gets in for 1/2 price- thanks to Grandma Diane who bought annual passes!

how it should be

Abby
+
blue sky
+
perfect 70ish temperature
+
stack-o-books
=
a perfect Sunday afternoon!


Did I mention that we're LOVING spring?!

Bridal Veil Falls fun!

Last Saturday, Janna and I were talking and wanted to do something to get out of our houses. It was a nice day outside, and when she suggested we take dinner up Provo Canyon to Bridal Veil Falls, we were all over it! I tend to forget about that place and even though it was still a little drab looking and there wasn't much greenage happening up there yet, it was a fun outing!

Hi, my pretty Abby!

The girls also had fun climbing around a bit on the rocks:
We're loving the spring-time weather and being outside!

Easter

We had a fun and eventful Easter weekend... I've just been busy and haven't cleared off the camera.

A sweet lady in our neighborhood has an amazing backyard, that has several other houses that back up into it. They decided to host a neighborhood Easter egg hunt on Saturday, which was a huge hit despite the rainy forecast.

Easter Sunday was fun too, we went to church and then had dinner with
Sandie & Matthew and Janna, Jason & Claire.

Before we ate our tasty dinner, we had a quick Easter egg hunt for the little chicas and they of course, loved it!

The Easter Bunny brought all three girls new spring time pajamas,
so they were in them as soon as dinner was over!

Twitterpaited?

I've done the myspace thing... over it.
Currently into the facebook thing... like it.
But all I hear about is
So, I conformed. Like, 4 minutes ago.
We'll see how it goes.

Since every possible user name I've ever used in my life is taken,
I'm now debbieruthie.
So, find me and help me.

yup...

I'm in trouble.



and she's barely SIX!

movie night!

Tonight, my girls' school hosted a movie night where all families were invited to bring pillows, blankets and goodies and enjoy watching an old school Disney classic:
Escape to Witch Mountain.

Some people were smarter than me (SURPRISE, SURPRISE!) and brought sleeping bags or even air mattresses. I forgot that it's hard wood floors in the school gym, and my bum was numb (kinda like what happens at Stake Conf!) But we survived with our blankets, pillows and treats and had a lot of fun!

Here's Brenna and her BFF Ashley. Ashley is more girly than Brenna (if you can imagine that!) and told me that she "just got out of the spa" before she came. She's SO cute, and these two are highly entertaining when they're together!


Abby invited her cute friend Hannah to sit with us too!
Hannah was smart and came in her PJ's.


Part of the Gage family was there and here's Jordan showing me his new line-dance moves with his cute mama Laura. This kid is hilarious (and his eyebrows prove it!)


Laura snapped a picture of me and my girlies after the movie ended.

It was definitely a fun night out with my girls!

school play & claire's birthday- all in one day!

April 8th was a jam-packed day for us.

Abby had a darling school play that all the first graders put on.
It was 'The Little Engine That Could", and her teachers did an amazing job putting it all together.

Here's my Abby in her first official school play:
She was part of the "shiny new train" with her good friend Sabrina.
and here is her cute teacher:
Good job Abby Jane- I was SO proud of you!!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After school, the countdown was on for Claire's birthday gathering-
that little girl is TWO already and we were so glad we got to spend her birthday with her! She got a super fun slide from her Grandma Patti and it was the highlight of it all!

Check out this cake my talented sister/mother of the b-day girl made:
Happy Birthday Claire Bear- we love you TONS!

namaste

One day last week, cute cousin Claire was over at our house and it's always amusing when she copies everything my girls do.
I sometimes think my girls do silly things knowing Claire will copy them!

Here's a little yoga/meditation

Pass it on...

Here is the deal:
The first five people to comment on this post will get something made by me.
My choice. For you.

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

I make no guarantees that you will like what I make.
What I make will be just for you.
It'll be done this year.
You have no clue what it's going to be. It may be a story. No guarantees, I may sew or stitch or bake something. Who knows? Not you, that's for sure!
I reserve the right to do whatever I want!

The catch? Oh, the catch is that you must re-post this on your own blog and offer the same deal to 5 of your own lucky blog readers.

So, the first 5 people to leave a comment telling me they are in, win a homemade gift by me!

Be sure to post a picture of what you win when you get it.

P.S.
At first I thought I don't have time to make something, or even an idea in mind for what to make, but after thinking about it- there are plenty of options I can do, so leave a comment while I figure out exactly what it is I will make for you! This will be fun!

GOTCHA!

Today, I was dubbed the "best mom ever" and I'm gonna bask in it for a few more minutes because it will undoubtedly be revoked tomorrow morning.

The title was earned when our day started out like this:
I have a rule in place in our house:
weekdays = healthy cereal
weekends = sugared cereal

Abby was watching as I poured Brenna's bowl of Cap'n Crunch from the Cheerios box. Her eyes grew SO big and she kept repeating
"UM, MOM... MOM... WHAT IS HAPPENING?!"
Then Brenna saw it and said "WHOA MOM, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

Happy April Fools Day girls!!!

Then dinner was served and I was asked
"Mom, we get sweets for dinner?! YES!"

This is what they ate:
Meatloaf cupcakes frosted with pink mashed potatoes!
a little sushi, my style.

I initially found these ideas for our Young Womens activity, so here's one of our cute girls showing her jell-o drink that wasn't so drinkable...
We finished off the night playing some Wii fit and I school them in the Hula Hoop!

It was such a fun day... now I need those talented bloggers I stole these ideas from to think of some new ones for next year!