Dance competition

This year Emma has been involved with the competition group, 'Dance Trax.' They've been working on a jazz routine to Michael Jackson's 'Shake Your Body' (which is why that song is on my playlist right now...all of the kids dance songs are on there so they can practice whenever they want. It'll be nice to take some of them off after the recital.). We spent this past weekend in Albuquerque for the competition. Since we don't get to watch Emma at dance practice, it was nice to see the result of all her hard work (and all of our money :P). On Friday we went out to eat and went swimming at the hotel--which is their favorite part of any trip.

The next day was filled with excitement as Emma got her hair and makeup done. Once her costume was on she was ready to dance. Her team did really well and scored Gold. After the scores were given that afternoon we celebrated by taking the kids to Chuck E. Cheese's. What a great way to end a fun weekend! The 'Dance Trax' team was all smiles after finishing their dance.
The girls with their teacher, Ms. Jeffie.
The dancers and their siblings who were along for the ride.
Girls just want to have fun!

The big 3-0!

Earlier this month Josh turned 30. He now feels ancient and his joints hurt more everyday. :) The kids had planned his whole birthday out...what kind of cake, how they were going to surprise him, what paper to wrap the presents in. Then...the plans changed. I came home from playgroup to find Josh mixing the cake batter. Apparently, an exercise had started on base and Josh had to go back to work in two hours and stay until late that night.

So while I finished baking the cake, Josh checked the kids out of school for an impromtu birthday party. As soon as Emma and Aaron got home they started hanging streamers (after all, can you really have a birthday without streamers ?!?) To make up for not being able to make the cake like they wanted, I let them put a sickening amount of sprinkles and chocolate chips on the cake. Though it was a whirlwind party, everyone had tons of fun!

After school we invited all their friends over to finish the cake.

The calm before the storm

Last week, Emma started setting her alarm for 6 a.m. so she could watch a tv show before school. Inevitably, everyone else wakes up. Thankfully....they don't wake me up until it's time for breakfast. One morning I got up before they woke me up and this is what I found. They were sitting so quietly watching a cartoon. By that afternoon I was telling them to stop running in the house and to play their instruments outside. These quiet, still moments are very rare to find.

Easter fun!

Every year we save our Easter festivities for Family Home Evening the day after Easter. That serves two purposes. 1. It helps to keep the focus of Easter on the Savior. and 2. All the Easter candy and treats are on clearance. (It's my small effort to fight commercialized holidays.) So last Monday we dyed eggs, stuffed plastic eggs, and had and egg hunt. It was an egg-cellent day!

Emma showing off some of her loot. She was so excited to find quarters in some of them.

Aaron was a very good huntsman...he found all the tricky hiding spots.

For Abby, it was more about quality not quantity. She had a lot of fun but wasn't too worried about how much she got. I'll enjoy that while it lasts.

Jacob found two eggs and then sat down to eat.

An extra cook in the kitchen

Every Friday we make homemade pizza and breadsticks for dinner. This past time I left the kitchen for a few minutes and when I came back...Jacob had pulled a stool into the room, climbed up on it, eaten some pepperoni, and played in the flour. He loves to help me cook, especially the hands-on stuff. His favorite thing to do is roll out a breadstick. Future chef?...maybe.
At first he was nervous about being caught.

Then he got excited about all that he had 'accomplished.' :)

Potty training...

is never easy. But I always forget exactly how time demanding and frustrating it can be. I've started with all of my kids at 18 months which means Jacob has been potty training for three months now. He has really good days, like yesterday, where he doesn't make a mistake. And then there are days like today which just start out....yucky! I won't elaborate.

He does great and I'm so impressed with his many successes. I just can't wait until three months from now when all of this will be a funny memory. Cause right now I'm not laughing about it that much. :)This is how Jacob spends most of his time at home...in underwear and plastics. Quite the fashion statement, isn't it?