Easter

Easter morning goodies. My lilies are huge this year! They are still going strong and smell heavenly.

Can't you see how much they love each other? And they truly do!

I love these three kids! What great faces!

The many faces of Jacob. And his new trick of sticking his fingers in his ears.

Pondering.

Dinner was rack of lamb, roasted baby potatoes, and steamed vegetables. Very simple and delicious.

Jacob's Birthday

Whewph! Three March birthdays! At least I only have to plan two of them.

Our little Jacob turned one on the 30th. This year has just flown by. Jacob is such a happy baby and is an absolute delight to have in our family. We love his laugh and his sweetness.

Esther and Nathan chose a race car party for Jacob.

He was very excited by the cupcakes! But Esther and Nathan were freaking out that he was going to touch the candle. They are very protective.

He wasn't crying, just whining. He didn't like getting his fingers dirty. Plus he was getting tired. After a quick bath and some warm pjs, he was ready to go opening presents. Unfortunately, we didn't take many pictures of that. But we did get some cute videos which I'm not going to upload tonight. Needless to say, he was a bit overwhelmed and Esther and Nathan played with his toys more than he did.

Dyeing Easter Eggs

I ordered a little kit on Etsy this year to try a new way of dyeing eggs. You use silk fabric to make colorful eggs. Two of them ended up not working so I think they may have been chiffon and not 100% silk. I'm going to be collecting pieces of silk this year so we have lots for next year!

Step 1: Wet the fabric in water.

Step 2: Wrap the silk around the egg.

Step 3: Wrap a piece of white fabric around the wet silk and tie it with a twisty tie.

Step 4: Put the eggs into an enamel or glass pot and fill with water and 1/4 C white vinegar.

Step 5: Bring eggs to a boil, then allow to simmer for 20 minutes. Drain eggs, then let cool.

Step 6: Unwrap eggs and see what happened!

Certainly the brighter the fabrics, the better they turned out! The duller colors were not nearly as interesting.



Esther's Birthday

Esther was disappointed that her birthday was a schoolday this year, but she found that it was fun to tell everyone that it was her special day! We had the dining room decorated for her when she came home from school (and I forgot to take a picture of it!) and she was so pleased. She had requested an ocean birthday party. So we put up blue and purple balloons, and sea green, purple, and blue paper lanterns. The cake had dolphins on it and there were seashells on the sea green tablecloth.

I made it myself this year. It was a pretty good chocolate cake recipe and a yummy whipped cream cheese frosting.

What a face!

Esther is so funny to watch opening presents. You always feel well thanked as she is so dramatic in her "I love it!" "Just what I wanted!" and "Thank you soooo much!"

Her first ever CD. She was pretty thrilled to have Lindsey Stirling to listen to. I can't believe my baby girl is now seven!

Heather's Birthday

 

My birthday was very relaxing. I went to a Relief Society activity in the morning, ran some errands, and came home to cute decorations that the kids had picked out. Esther even got me a pink hat and a scepter because I was the queen for the day. Daron let the kids buy me whatever they wanted to. Nathan picked out Merida from the movie Brave and Esther bought me flower seed packets. Jacob picked out chocolates. Daron got me a gift certificate for a massage!

After presents and a yummy dinner, we went out for dessert. The destination was a friend's house where she had gathered several of my dear friends. Surprise! We had dessert and hung out and talked while the kids ran around outside. The weather was beautiful and it was such a pleasant way to end my birthday!



Purim dinner

Our annual Feast of Esther dinner!

Lamb, cherries, sweet potato, and red pepper tagine. All mixed with loads of amazing Moroccan spices!

Leprechauns!

Esther and Nathan built leprechaun traps on Sunday evening with their Lincoln Logs. We put chocolate gold coins inside in the hopes that the leprechauns would eat them and get too fat to get out of the trap. We even left a window open a crack so they could smell the "gold" and come in.

The kids kept telling me what they were going to wish once they caught them. Esther figured a magical creature could produce a real unicorn Pegasus for her. Nathan wanted a rocket ship.

Imagine their disappointment the next morning (Esther's birthday...more on that later) to find the chocolates eaten, wrappers strewn, and traps burst. The leprechauns left a note to say better luck next year and left each of them a gold colored dollar coin. They even shut the window behind them!

While pretty upset about not getting three wishes, they were excited about the coins. And they are already planning next year's traps!!!