Easter Sunday

We celebrated our Risen Lord today with family time, newness, seeking and planting.

Egg Huntin'

One of the churches in our town has the sweetest little egg hunt. The kids look forward to it every year. The eggs are the initial excitement, but that is quickly followed by all of the facepainting, seed planting, bunny ear making, and egg coloring whirlwind. We have an absolute blast for two hours.

Getting older.

A few days ago it was my birthday. On that day we drove home from our vacation for six hours, all of us suffering from end of vacation blues. On the car ride, Evie threw up a few times while we drove in traffic, unable to stop and then when we got home Parker was beside himself from exhaustion and both kids were so badly behaved that they went to bed early sans books and snuggles. At 11pm after we finished unpacking, Jeremy turned to me and said "Want a birthday redo tomorrow?". Yes please.

So the next day I came home from work to hushed whispers and excited giggling. The kids popped out from behind the furniture yelling "SURPRISE! HAPPY RE-BIRTHDAY!" and handed me a mimo (good kids), put a home-made mom crown on my head and grabbed my hands for the treasure hunt. They put clues inside of balloons leading me around the house, which translated to an ecstatic Evie popping each one with a pin and Parker racing ahead to tell me where the next clue was hidden. The last clue led me to a heartfelt Starbucks card ("What does mom want?" "Starbucks!!"). They decorated the house, hung up the streamers, made a happy birthday sign, hid eggs for an egg hunt around the house, and cooked a delicious dinner. A perfect Birthday redo, indeed.

On Feathery Snow.

Our time here has been magical. And we are making the most of every day.

 

Things got a crazy at the top of the mountain. We learned it from our elders...

 

We stopped for a late afternoon treat break and then the kids decided that rather than walk the 100 feet uphill to the condo, it would be easier to ski all the way down to the bottom of the mountain, catch the last chair, ride up to the top of the mountain and ski back down to home. Which forced me to enjoy the rest of my hot latte on the slopes in order for us to make it down to the bottom before the mountain closed.

Don't let this undisturbed photo Jer snapped fool you. Moments before this I was skiing along, caught an edge and totally wiped out on the run. Being that I have my priorities, I managed to spill just a couple drops of coffee while completely bruising my hip. I'm that good.

 We took the kids innertubing one afternoon after skiing. Flying down the hill, 90 miles an hour and landing in a pile of hay at the bottom was total glee-filled-bliss for these adrenaline junkies. This tubing run was no joke. They eventually closed two of the tracks due to excessive speed, to the disappointment of our kids.

And speaking of adrenaline junkies. Parker has been patiently waiting a year to drive the mini-snowmobiles as the minimum age is six. He got about 30 seconds of instruction (brake, gas, kill switch) and could take off. And take off, he did. He gunned that thing and drove around the windy, hilly track in and out of the woods like he has done this a million times. Except he hasn't. And it causes me to fear for when he's sixteen. And in-between.

Silverstar

We are enjoying a week of skiing with the kids and grandparents in Silverstar. Sometimes I think it seems like too much, how much we ski as a family. Jeremy worked (REALLY) hard to get several weekends off in January and a couple in March (which means the kids and I survived many a long weekend without seeing dad from Friday until Monday). But somehow, all the sacrifices and things we do to make our version of winter happen are worth it. Sometimes people ask us why we ski so much and it's  hard for me to put into words, but I've been thinking about it on this trip.

This is why we ski:

We ski because we get the opportunity to spend quality time together, free of distractions.

We ski because we are building confidence in our kids through sport and athleticism.

We ski because we get to breathe in fresh, clean, cold mountain air for 10 hours a day.

We ski because while our kids don't get along all of the time, their bond is great on the mountain.

We ski because our kids are proud of themselves when they attempt
something daring, whether they succeed or not. 

We ski because we delight in our pride of our children.

We ski because we are building a sense of accomplishment, effort and sportsmanship with our kids.

We ski because we get to stand at the top of a gigantic mountain and look a 360 degree view
of splendor that God made for us.

We ski because our kids love it.

We ski because we get to have some very deep and real conversations in the safety of a ten minute chair-ride.

We ski because we get to explore places and spaces and woods and wide-open hillsides with each other.

We ski because it is exhausting and fun and exhilarating for everyone. Every time.

We ski because of the determined faces of our kids trying something new each day they ski.

We ski because it is something we can do as a family, all together, for a day or days or a week.

four.

My Sweet Everly,

You are FOUR today! And what a big four it is. You have been planning, plotting and reminding of this birthday for at least six months now. You are a girl who is all about the party and the experience. You want a big event to share with everyone who crosses your path, be it strangers, friends or family. Your list is a mile-long of what this day should involve (streamers, cakes, cake pops, cupcakes, candy, balloons, table wraps {tablecloths}, presents, skiing, swimming, hot tubs, skating, games, painting, sunshine, and family). We've done our best. We figured a day of surprises would delight you, and so we decorated for you in the middle of the night, set out gummy worms for breakfast, took you skiing all day and hot-tub'd the evening away, we snuggled during a movie and spread out the presents to last all day. And your sweet four-year old smile shined on, all day.

My darling Foreverly. You are an amazing little girl. You are confident and outgoing. You smile and chat with everyone you meet and hand out compliments to everyone. You make EVERYONE smile back at you. You magically entice an entire lodge of strangers to suddenly spring into song, singing Happy Birthday to you, while your bright eyes sparkle. You hand out hugs when you think someone's having a bad day, and you pat my hand in the middle of the night as I help you drift back to sleep. You love to draw (quite accurately, this proud mama says!) and you easily get lost for hours in a land of make believe with your stuffed animals and toys. You are cheerful, endearing and tenacious as much as you are strong minded and determined. You are my Forever Everly. I love you SO much.

Love,
Mama

Easter Program

Everly had an Easter program at her church preschool and as usual, it's always a show. The highlights for me were during her first song performance when she clearly had to use the restroom and then paused in the middle and yells "Mom! I need to go to the bathroom! NOW!" I took her to the bathroom, rushed her back, she sang three more songs and then at the end of the performance she took her dress and flipped it over her head so she could rub it on her face because "it's soooooo soft". I'm so happy to provide the opportunity for other parents to laugh while I'm breaking into a cold sweat. We followed that with a great all-school potluck and the Great Eggstravaganza! A super fun hour of games, egg-hunting and pictures with the Easter bunny. So cute.

Fieldtrips

Our household has been flooded with a new experience lately - fieldtrips. With Parker's preschool we had been to a lot of farms and parks, but this year with Everly's preschool and Parker's Kindergarten class, we had some new ones. The dentist, the firestation, and Mount Baker Theater to see a real play of The True Story of The Three Little Kids. All of this happened within a week. And caused a great stir in our home. There was some slight disappointment as The Dentist turned out to be our "real" dentist office and a good friend of ours, but Evie still managed to have a good time (and talk the staff out of a lot of prize coins - girl knows the drill). And lo and behold I had to really let some things go as Parker got to ride on a school bus for the first time and go to the theater and sit with his class amongst hundreds of other students ALL BY HIMSELF! I stopped myself just in time from jumping in the car and being the creepy mom with a long lens taking pictures from afar. But I did get fire station pictures (via a friend). Because eleven preschoolers on a firetruck is just about the cutest thing. Ever.

 Adorable sillies.

Character.

My kids have been described as "full of life". I have to agree.

Easy Breezy

I don't think I can utter the words easy-breezy without Parker calling out from somewhere in the house "LEMON SQUEEZY!" which never fails to make me smile.

This weekend we were HOME! And it was easy-breezy. All this gallivanting has been very unusual for us because it took about year of working on trades for Jeremy's schedule to have a weekend off (let alone weekendS). And while I love it and the excitement and being able to spend time together somewhere else, a weekend at home is good for my soul. I'm a homebody and an introvert at heart, masked deep inside an outgoing traveling gypsy. Go figure. Over the weekend we had Jeremy's best friend come stay with us (also known as The Back-Up, The Godfather, Coffee Concierge, and Chris). They organized their own pub crawl and worked very hard to stay out past 8pm to spite me, as I insisted they couldn't last that long in their growing age. They rolled in at 8:11, very proud of themselves. We worked in two other get-togethers with friends, 30 pounds of carrot soup, decorating the house for spring (I'm trying to encourage it), and Jeremy worked a shift. The kids also helped me weed some of our garden and get it ready for planting and pride exuded from me as Parker worked endlessly hard for FOUR HOURS helping me weed and rake. He is particularly inspired right now because he has been saving for a wooden sailboat for a year and he is getting close now. I told him I'd pay him a dollar towards his savings to help me weed, but four hours later after he had FILLED our compost and collected  3 additional buckets of weeds, raked the beds, and trimmed a lot of plants I proudly handed over four dollars to his shocked and delighted face. Such a huge help. I think I got as much done as if it had been Jeremy and I!

 The first batch. Hopefully we still like carrot soup in a year, because that's how long 

it will take to get through all of it. (Fifteen+ pounds of carrots is a lot more than it looks).

 We welcomed spring with the kids helping me decorate (they also 

redecorate, play with the items and artfully arrange little bunny ears that the break off).

 I got to spend some quality time with several friends, and one of the noteworthy 

ones was baby Bea - a dear little lady adding to a sea of 6 brothers.

 Everly insisted we go to the pool which sounded like so.much.work.  She settled 

for bathtubs and bathingsuits! Which I said in a super fun voice to make it seem more appealing. :)

And the gardeners extraordinaire. I'm giddy with excitement that they enjoy and 

can help with a hobby I'm passionate about!