Easter Fun In Grandma's Park!

It's becoming tradition that the Lewis clan heads across the street on Easter afternoon for some fun in the park!  It's so much fun now that the kids aren't babies anymore and they can ALL enjoy it!  This Easter was gorgeous and we enjoyed some much-needed sunshine.  

Megan enjoys walking "her" dog, Keeper!  I don't think Keeper enjoyed being outside much that day or maybe it was just all of the commotion with the kids.

Owen rode the "car".  I sat on the one that had two seat per his direction.  I guess he has his own agenda just like his sister!

Megan and Alexa have been on this "plane" many times since birth!  They enjoy each other's company most of the time!

I also snagged a father-daughter picture of Michael and Lily as well as a mother-son picture with Kristin and Ethan.  Love how families dress alike!

And, of course, the soon-to-be-married couple!

Soon-to-be-uncle Chris teaches Megan the basics of Lacrosse!  I think she enjoyed it!

And then, the attempt to capture all five cousins in one great picture....  How do you think we did this year?  We'll keep working on the "perfect" shot...

 

And then there were three.... Owen is totally one of the "big" kids now!

Bubbles... Bubbles!!!

 

Ethan, are you always happy??

Kind of disgusting but letting the girls use bubble solution along with a little imagination kept them busy for close to an hour.  It was their own little recipe of water, bubbles, dirt, sticks and grass and boy did they have fun!!

 

Easter Egg Hunt

The Easter bunny came very early Easter morning.  Both John and I volunteered again to play in the church orchestra for the 8:15 and 10:45 morning services.  We love playing and it wouldn't seem like Easter to us without doing it... however, it meant that the kids needed to be up at church with us that morning before 7:30!  We made it but barely had enough time for the kids to find their baskets and get dressed!  We left for church with breakfast packed so who knows how much they ate during the service...  Beautiful church service as always, combining orchestra, praise band and full choir.  Simply. Awesome.

We quickly got a family picture snapped before it was time for the kids to leave for Grandma and Grandpa Lewis's place since John and I had another service to play for.  Too bad we couldn't convince the kids to stand by themselves - tummies must have been hungry!

I thought both of my guys looked fantastic in this springy blue color!  So handsome they both are!!!

Who's ready to find some eggs?  We sure had some enthusiastic little ones ready to find eggs in Grandma's backyard - and just to simply get outside!  Megan took off and filled her bowl in no time.  Owen was a trooper and didn't give up until all the eggs were found!  He had a blast and caught on right away!!

 

 

 

 

Easter Prep

It's not Easter in our house until we have dyed Easter eggs and made Easter cookies!  (Plus, I would rather do food crafts instead of art projects.  And we did prepare our minds and hearts for Easter by going through our set of Resurrection Eggs - awesome way for the kids to learn events leading up to the real meaning of Easter!)

Easter eggs were actually dyed in two waves - the first being the very beginning of April!  We quickly ate through the first two dozen and luckily I had saved the dye so we could do another couple dozen later on.  Megan was so proud of her creations as you can see.  She even had a strategic place for them in the refrigerator so she could grab a healthy snack whenever she needed!

 

I've been making spiced sugar cookie cut-outs for Easter for a few years now.  They seem to be a big hit with a cinnamon flavor, awesome Easter shapes and then I do neon frosting on each one too!  Megan helped stir the cookies up nicely but rolling them out with the kids was a small challenge.  We had many tears since the dough kept getting too soft for little ones to work with.  Megan had her own ideas of how things should be done - does that surprise anyone at all?  The kids both enjoyed helping me mix up the frosting in neon yellow, pink, purple and blue but Megan did just enough sprinkles for her to earn a cookie treat.... so she sprinkled only about five.

 

 

Puddle Jumpers

I'm doing a little catch up to wrap up April and thought these pictures were appropriate for the weather we're having right now.  A much different feel the last day of March compared to the last day of April.  Still a lot of water around but not from melting... from raining!  And it actually felt a lot nice our that day than now!  Owen had some new mud boots to try out and they definitely kept his feet dry.  Except when they kids jumped too hard and the inside filled up with water, that is!

 

 

As silly as it all looks, I did get plenty of people stop and tell me what a good mom I was for letting my kids play outside.  They had been itching for this all winter.... and long for warm weather to return!!!

A Hike at Baylor

After a couple really busy week/weekends it was time for me to have a little fun kid time.  Baylor Park had a maple syrup event going on last Saturday so I decided to bring the kids out for it.  The weather was absolutely perfect!  Finally, I nice spring day to do some snow melting!

They had a "syrup shack" setup where we could see the boilers they use to cook down the sap into syrup.  It's a long process and just a 40 to 1 ratio of sap to finished syrup.  Then we were told we could go out to the woods where they were tapping the sugar maple trees.  I was told it was a 15 minute walk but with my kids it took closer to an hour!!  The road was muddy and icy and the kids snacked the entire time and stopped numerous times to try and find animal hiding spots.  But I just had to remind myself that the real reason we were out was to have a nature outing and just enjoy being outside.  I think we accomplished that and kudos for my kids for walking the majority of the 1 mile hike just to get to the tapping location!  Plus, I got a few fun pictures out of the deal too!

 

 

 

 

 

Here was a fun photo-op.  Wish I would have taken Owen's little hat off for the picture - there was no way I was getting him to give up his fruit roll-up either!

 

After the last set of photos it wasn't too much farther until we got to the tapped trees!

Then the hike back.....  My goal at that point was to make it back so the kids could have ice cream by noon, when the event ended.  By this time it was really warming up and the kids were tired - oh, and snacking again.  I felt like I was on an episode of The Amazing Race as I tried to hurry the kids along through the now sloppy dirt road.  Once I attempted to carry Owen, who was refusing my assistance, and slipped and fell into a big muddy puddle.  UGH!  But luckily we met up with some of my dad's cousins who helped me out!  She put Megan on piggy-back and I carried Owen and we made it back making good time!

Whew, what a workout!

Rachel's Coffeehouse Bridal Shower

On Saturday, March 22nd, my mom and I got to host a bridal shower for my sister!  So many things that we've been planning for awhile are finally starting to happen!  We decided on a coffeehouse theme since both Rachel and Nate love coffee and they went on lots of coffee dates early on.  We really focused on the coffee theme both decorations and food.  For the decorations we filled vases with coffee beans and hand-made colored coffee filter flowers.  We framed sayings that played up the theme.

 

We made a beautiful banner using more coffee filters which read, "love is brewing".

Then, every coffeehouse has a tip jar for the barista, so why not at our 'coffeehouse'?  Guests shared some favorite household and kitchen tips for the bride-to-be!  I even learned a few things myself :)

We had fun putting together a small coffee bar.  I dipped some sugar cubes in navy almond bark and also made my own french vanilla creamer which sure got the people drinking lots of coffee!  And, what would our coffeehouse shower be without a lovely plate of biscotti!  The lunch menu was just as wonderful but I didn't get pictures of that.  Pesto-chicken croissant sandwiches, Caesar salad and fresh fruit were delicious!  And a pillow mint dessert added for a bit of nostalgia to the party as well.

I snapped a quick picture of Rachel and Grandma while we finished up lunch.

I totally made Rachel cry with my gift - mission accomplished!  Three photo books:  a small guest book to put out at their reception, a 12"x12" book of their engagement pictures that I took for them, and a recipe book filled with family favorites!  The recipe book was definitely a labor of love but totally worth every minute spent on it!

Love you, Rachel!  Thanks to everyone for coming and making the shower a success!  Next stop:  Wedding!!!