1st Grade Field Trip

This week is the Milk Maker's Fest at the Northwest Washington Fairgrounds for all of the 1st grade classes in Whatcom County. Today, Alyssa's class had the opportunity to participate in this event. As you can see from the picture below, she was pretty excited to be there.
Our class started out on a wagon ride and had a list of things to find throughout the fairgrounds. The kids had a lot of fun looking for all of the different items. Those involved with putting on this event do a great job and were very creative with where they "hid" these items.

Here's Alyssa with her very best friend, and cousin, Kylie.

The kids had 6 different stations that they participated in and 3 of these stations were just sitting and listening to people talk. Our class ended up having these three "talking" stations back-to-back. They did amazing! They were all so well-behaved and great listeners.

At the last station, the kids got to "milk" a "cow" after learning about the milking machines and how they work. Of course, this was the highlight of the day! They were having fun trying to race against the person on the other side.

I was so thankful for the amazing weather that we had today. I was also very thankful that my mom was able to have Ethan so that I could attend this event with Alyssa. I love doing field trips with the kids.

Next field trip, Padillo Bay on May 8th with Brenna and all of the 4th grade classes. I'm really looking forward to this! It will be an all day event and some place that I have never been to. We will be praying for another day of good weather.

Spring is here!

This past weekend was just the start of the great weather here in the northwest and we took full advantage of it!

Jason got home from work early on Friday so we loaded Ethan up and headed off to get my grandma's truck and then went and got this great dump trailer from a friend of ours. Our final destination...Smit's Compost. We picked up two yards of compost and dumped it in the driveway and started getting it spread over all of the flower beds. We got the majority of it completed before Jason had to leave for a ministry council retreat.

Shortly after Jason left, the kids and I went for a walk, the girls rode bikes, with my sister and her girls. We walked down to the park and the kids got to play for awhile. It was such a beautiful evening. The kids had a blast and we started to head back to our house just as it started to cool off.

Saturday morning, Jason had to leave early again for the retreat and I headed outside to finish getting the pile of compost spread. Of course, we ran out and will need to get another small load to finish off the back fenceline but the flower beds look great. The new compost down has really made everything POP! I am so excited about getting the yard whipped into shape again this spring. Oh yeah, I also got all of my planters filled. Here is one from the patio. I will have to add a picture of the "flowering fountain" pots that I have by the front porch. I'm just trying to keep everything simple this year.

Today, we went in on an all day rental of a thatcher. We were last on the list so that it would arrive to our home just as Jason was getting home from work. The timing was perfect. My brother arrived about 5 minutes before Jason. I cannot believe how much thatch we pulled out of the yard. I actually got a picture of my wonderful husband hard at work. I think the worst job was all the raking we had to do later. We filled two yard waste cans and 21 garbage bags.

The next step is to re-seed and watch the lawn become beautiful again. I can't wait for the lilac bush to start blooming. I love the smell...I'm seeing lots of "buds"! More pictures to come later of how the yard is shaping up.

I LOVE SPRING!

Happy Easter

We hope that you are all having an amazing Easter Sunday...even with the rain. We had a wonderful Easter service this morning and then brunch. There was so much food...our church secretary is amazing at planning these types of events and makes sure that nobody goes unfed.
When we got home from church, we gave the kids their Easter baskets. It was fun to watch their expressions!
We are now off to the Silves Family lunch. I think the egg hunt will be indoors this year. The kids will be checking everyone's pockets and shoes.

He has RISEN!!

Easter is here and it is time to celebrate our Savior! He died for you and for me!

Last night, we began our Easter weekend by attending Good Friday service at church. We sang some great worship songs, Pastor Ken had a wonderful message to share with us, and we closed our service with communion. It was a great reminder of what the night before his crucifixion may have been like. If you have never seen the movie "Passion of the Christ", I would highly recommend it! It is a very descriptive movie of what Easter weekend is all about and what our Lord and Savior did for us. He died on that cross for my sins and for yours!

Today, we have enjoyed a day of family time just hanging around the house and this evening we colored eggs and the kids are now watching the Donut Man Resurrection Celebration movie. It is a great movie for young kids, so Ethan is enjoying it a whole lot more than the girls. The movie tells the story of what Jesus did for us on the cross and how he rose from the dead and is now ALIVE!

Tomorrow, we will attend church service in the morning. I love the worship songs that we sing on Easter Sunday and Pastor Craig will have an amazing message to share with us. And then after service, we will have brunch with our church family. We will have lunch with the Silves family tomorrow and the kids will get to join in on an Easter Egg Hunt...they are very excited about this because my aunts fill the eggs very full of candy.

I hope as you all go through your day tomorrow that you too will remember what our Lord and Savior did for us on the cross and that he rose and is ALIVE!!

Here are a few pictures of our family coloring eggs tonight. Enjoy!

Birthday Fun

We had a great day celebrating Brenna's 10th birthday. We headed into Bellingham and let the kids have some fun at Build-A-Bear. They each picked out a new outfit for their bears...the girls had certificates to spend there and we wanted Ethan to be able to get something for his bear as well. From there we headed over to "Justice" to browse around...this is Brenna's favorite place to shop and the store we got part of her gift from. We made a quick stop at Costco to grab a few things to get us through the week and then headed over to Billy McHales. We had called ahead to let them know that we would be there and requested to have Brenna's name up on the Birthday Train. As we walked in, she made the comment, "It would be fun if we could put my name on the train." Didn't she have a surprise when she saw the train. The hostess was so great and stopped the train so we could get a picture of Brenna below her name tag on the train.

It has been forever since we have been together as a family in a restaurant. Ethan is finally to a point where he can sit still long enough to wait for his meal. We had a lot of fun being together and spending time together.

Brenna ordered Corn Dogs for lunch.

Our server was great and made sure that she had a group ready to sing to Brenna and had an amazing sundae in hand for her to enjoy. She even brought enough spoons for the rest of us to get in on the ice cream action. (Our server is the gal on your right.)

Here's Brenna with her amazing sundae...there was a giraffe on top of the sundae next to the cherry.

I made this cake that I found on familyfun.com. It was a fun cake to make and Brenna was thrilled with it...that's always a good thing, please the birthday girl.

Brenna got some great gifts. Thank you all who were there to help us celebrate. You helped make her day GREAT!

MAKE A WISH!!!...HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!

Our baby is 10!

As of 5:02 this morning our firstborn turned 10 years old. It is so hard to believe that she is 10 already. We have a big day planned for her. We went to church last night so that we could make today all about her birthday. We all woke her up at 7:30 singing Happy Birthday and videoing. We started that at her 1st birthday and haven't missed a year. We've had donuts for breakfast, a request from the birthday girl, and we are now just hanging out for a little while before we get everyone ready and head to Bellingham for a little bit of fun and lunch. We are having our families over at 3:30 for a party...chocolate fountain, cake and ice cream, gifts and singing. Brenna was so excited that the sun was out this morning when we woke her up...that's one birthday wish granted!

Here's a picture to share of her just after we woke her up singing this morning.

Finally...the scrappin' slumber party

It was a great weekend! A room full of food and women and some amazing fellowship. A room full of wives and moms getting memories of their families into photo albums. A time to reflect back on how good God has been to all of our families.
Here are my friends Molly and Sally VanKooten. They were working on a wonderful gift for a family member. Sally's niece had triplets in October and they have been to visit a few times and are now working on putting together a book of their visits and will continue to add to it with each visit. This is a gift that they will be giving Heidi when she and triplets are here for Easter. What a great gift! Oh yeah, my dear sister-in-law is also in this picture looking at some of the pages that Molly and Sally had completed.

Tanya and I took a break from our projects to visit and see what some of the other ladies were working on. Here, Carmielle is cranking out the cards! She completed 9 sets and there were 15-20 cards in a set. This lady is amazing. She does most of the prep work at home...cutting down the cardstock, etc....and then comes and assembles. Carmielle gets the prize again for actually "working" the most hours. She goes non-stop and takes about a 60-90 "nap" in the middle of the night. Tammy was working hard on an album for her husband. It was fun to see the pictures of his trip.

Saturday morning, we had some "new" faces join us and replaced those who could only be with us Friday evening. It was fun to sit and visit with Kari, Beth and Angela on Saturday. We worked until 5:00 on Saturday evening. It was a great 25 hours of scrappin', eatting, a little bit of sleepin', and fellowshiping.

It was great to get home to see Jason and the kids to show off the pages that I completed in Brenna's album...13 pages to be exact.