Tappana Times: Spring has Sprung

Time to catch up on a few things that's happened this spring season.

First, Ammon has been enjoying his legos as his sister ditches us for school.

Thank goodness for legos for little boys!

Then when Lydia gets home from school, we like to do a little extra math learning together.

It's hard work, all those numbers!

Brigham's been all manly mowing our lawn now that the grass is growing out of control.

Our backyard is HUGE, so it takes quite some time to get it all done.

While he's mowing, I've been cutting through my own sleeping beauty wall of thorns.

My arms were so sore from chopping with cutters, I could barely lift them for the next two days.

We've been cute...

...and crazy at costco.

And when it's been pouring outside, I've had my own tulips to keep me cheery inside.

We've had cubscout field trips to the firestation.

And it felt just like Chicago Fire...if you happen to watch that show...

Spring break came and started with the most wonderful day to the Tulip Gardens and Deception Pass in Skagit County.

Tulips are my favorite flower, and I loved every second of this place. It was SO beautiful!

The kids tired of tulips shortly, but I could have stayed much longer.

After the tulips, we went to a nearby state park that we enjoy - Deception Pass.

You can walk out on this huge bridge over the pass and the view is incredible.

There are tons of hikes that you can do that lead you all over the area, and we hiked down to play at the beach.

One of my favorite days, and a perfect way to start spring break.

For the rest of spring break we did yard work, and went to the park,

and to a bounce house I found on Groupon.

I was sad when school had to start again. I loved having my kids home with me all week doing whatever we wanted, it reminded me of simpler times.

With school picking back up, Lydia also started dance.

She has two friends from our ward that joined the class with us and so that's been extra fun.

Ammon finally had an activity of his own starting soccer.

This last Saturday Ammon manged to go the whole practice without touching the ball with his hands, now we just have to get him to run faster with the ball and actually kick it like it counts into the goal.

Lydia and I have fun being Ammon's cheerleader section.

Sometimes Ammon needs a cheerleader because he gets in a funk. Like this Sunday when he was pouting on the couch because he was ready to go and no one else was. Thinking he looked hilarious, I got out the camera, but Ammon was not amused and wanted no part of his picture being taken.

I got the hand. I think we all have those days.

Easter Extravaganza

We had a fun Easter this year, started off with a glow-in-the-dark Easter egg hunt put on by the Primary in our ward.

I know my kids look a little scary, but it's hard to get a decent picture in a dark room with a blinding flash going off. The idea of the glow-in-the-dark was fun - and looked super cool - but the kids and I weren't really thrilled with running around the gym and picking up eggs and glowsticks. Especially when the older kids took more than they were supposed to so Lydia didn't get very much. Luckily, some corrections were made and it all worked out, it just was a bit less fun than finding hidden eggs.

Friday night before Easter, I got in the crazy Easter-treat spirit and the kids and I created a bunch of different desserts. We made marshmallow-bark easter eggs, egg nests, and easter-shaped rice krispie treats. We only had blue and green frosting left over from previous desserts, but we made do with what we had and the kids truly loved decorating the treats.

Saturday, we carried our treats over to my parents house and had an afternoon of Easter fun.

We dyed a TON of eggs. Sadly, my skills were just missing this year. Usually I'm ok with my work, but this year I was just disgusted with myself. Honestly, Ammon made some of the most beautiful eggs this year. He loved rolling them around in the dye, and they had the most vibrant colors. He's turning out to be more artistic, which is very interesting to me. Lydia's more about rules and learning while Ammon had more coordination and arts.

I coerced my husband and brother to help with another activity I had planned for the kids. They filled 100 eggs with pieces of a puzzle and hid them around the back yard. The kids had to find all the eggs and then put the puzzle together.

I figured it would be a good activity to keep them busy, and it did.  Unfortunately, they couldn't find the last egg so the puzzle was missing one piece at the end. We later found it in an egg that had been found, just not opened.

The next day was Easter Sunday and we had a wonderful morning.

The Easter bunny filled the kids' baskets and left Easter eggs hidden around the living room. Lydia was diving under the piano find eggs, and Ammon was in all the tv cupboards. They were thrilled.

After searching for eggs, I made chocolate chip Easter bunny pancakes.

And then Brigham read the kids' new books from the Easter bunny to them.

Because it was General Conference, we didn't have to hurry to get ready for church so we were able to have a nice relaxing morning. I really enjoyed not rushing and feeling more laid back, though it was weird not to get all dressed up in Easter outfits and instead stay in sweats all day.

Between sessions, we had a break of sunshine, so I took the kids out back to try out their new tetherball.

The smart Easter bunny knew we had a tetherball pole in our backyard, with no ball to play with, and was nice enough to get one for us. After showing the kids how to play, (and getting extremely frustrated with their ineptness) I left them to learn to be brave, more their feet, and actually make contact with the ball together.

The sun became too much for their Washingtonian eyes, and they had to get sunglasses, but they had a good time. They will need much practice in the future, but playground tetherball champions are in the making :)

Later we had dinner at my parents and enjoyed family while missing our other family far away.

Besides the normal Easter activities, General Conference was wonderful. Hearing from the prophets and leaders of our church always bring such a peace to my life. I love learning what my Heavenly Father wants me to do. It was especially fitting on Easter to hear about my Savior. I felt especially grateful for His resurrection and I know I can overcome all because He lives and overcame the world and death for me. I hope you felt this peace and had a wonderful time this past Easter as well!

April Fools!

April Fools pranks began early for us this year. March 31st, around 8:30 pm, we received a knock on our door with our neighbor informing us that some boys in a silver sedan just toilet papered our house. I knew exactly who it was, considering the tricks I played on my brothers last year.

We cleaned up the toilet paper and the oreos stuck to Brigham's car, and found a bunch of half used rolls of toilet paper they had dumped behind our fence. We figured since we had the supplies sitting in our lap, we would retaliate.

And boy did I.

After running to the store, I toilet papered my parent's house and then let loose on my brother's car.

First of all, Kenny left his car unlocked with all the evidence of their misdeeds in the backseat of the car - oreo wrappers and such. I felt justified in my retaliation.

I filled the vents in the front of the car with glitter and then turned the air to maximum so it would shoot full blast when the car turned on. Oh how I wished I could be there to see the explosion of glitter in the face. Instead I satisfied myself with the gleeful thoughts of it, as I saran-wrapped the car doors shut and stuck cotton balls all over the windows.

My brothers are still a bit amateur in the pranking department: toilet papering at 8:30 at night, leaving extra supplies around for us to retaliate with, and leaving cars unlocked with evidence clearly visible. I figured this would help them learn from their mistakes :) Unfortunately, someone April Fooled my April Fool prank.

You see, the next day when Kenny and Ryan headed out to the car for early morning seminary, no toilet paper, saran-wrap, or cotton balls remained. Someone had cleaned it all up. Despite still denying it, I'm sure it was my dad. He was the first one out the door that day and would have seen the toilet paper first, and then the car. Heaven knows, we're sure the neighbors didn't clean it all up. Kenny and Ryan didn't know about the outside of the car until the pictures of proof showed up on Facebook later that day. It was SO disappointing! (Blast it all Dad! I know it had to be you that cleaned it all up, and I will get you!)

One good thing that came from no outside evidence of foul play, was that Kenny was completely unaware, as he turned on his car, that anything could be wrong. And then the shower of glitter. Hahahaha, oh it was genius! Kenny and Ryan said they both were completely covered and it took forever to get it all out of the vents and off themselves. The church parking lot was covered in sparkles. Little did I know, Kenny had just vacuumed out his car and so he was pretty ticked about the mess. Well, you mess with the bull you're gonna get the horns is all I have to say.

Later my brothers attempted another prank and pulling a ziptie on a can of air freshener to keep it spraying and throwing it in my house, but it didn't work out either. But props to them for effort. I'm almost a little afraid of what next year might bring.

As for my husband...well he's afraid every year.

First for his lunch, of course I had fun.

I carefully hollowed out oranges and then filled them with fruit snacks, tapping the bottoms back up so that it that at first glance it looked like they were normal. In the empty fruit snack packages, I slid carrots in and then resealed.

Next I replaced the yogurt with sour cream before resealing that. Don't worry, besides that first surprising bite -that I seriously wish I was there to see - I sent pretzels along so that he could actually enjoy the sour cream and so that the food wouldn't go to waste (Brigham loves dipping pretzels in sour cream). Unfortunately, although he realized it was sour cream, he wasn't quite smart enough to realize he could indulge in one of his favorite treats and just threw the sour cream away. How wasteful!

Now this sandwich may look moldy, but that's just blue and green marker smudged on the outside of the sandwich sack. Pretty convincing? Well it was convincing enough for Brigham that he also threw his sandwich away, although it was COMPLETELY fine. It took a phone call home of him complaining of hunger for me to tell him to go get it, and eat it because it just looked gross.

Brigham also had a surprise that followed him all the way to work.

Too bad people didn't really participate -party poopers- and he said he only really heard like one honk. Maybe he was just to oblivious though...we can't be sure. Unfortunately, some coworker also blew the horn about the sign and so Brigham removed it before driving home. Danget, people! Play along! Keep it cool!

Now as for the kids, they woke up to get dressed and all their clothes were in different drawers! What?!

And as I told them, the milk was so cold it turned blue!

What?!

The kids loved every second of it and really get into the day. Lydia played tricks on her teacher at school, making her teacher afraid to call on her, and tried to switch the soaps around at home, but I caught her in the act.

Ammon decided he wanted to get in on the action and toilet paper someone as well. He said, "I want to toilet paper Grandma Becky's car so she can't get in!" Well, why not?

I let Ammon toilet paper her car as he wished, and he basically just hung pieces on the handles, mirrors, and windshield wipers. He was thrilled with himself, "She won't be able to drive! She'll have to walk home!" As she came out of institute, he said April Fools and we all laughed and marveled at the cuteness of it all...as I picked up the toilet paper so she could drive home. :)

That pretty much ends our list of April Fools pranks, but I say we had a day full. It filled me with glee! Nothing like a something to change up the routine and add a laugh to your day. Now to hunt down the person who cleaned up that car! Dad!