30 days

Right before we left for spring break we put our town home up for sale (March 27th).  2 days after we got home from Spring break we had an offer! (April 08th) We countered their offer and they accepted so we have been under contract since April 10th.   We were so shocked when it sold so fast. The buyers originally wanted to close on May 06th which was just too soon for us.  We are now closing on May 23rd which is Mark's last day of school with students. He has to go back on Tuesday after Memorial day to check out so we will be homeless that weekend but we can find somewhere to stay for that weekend. There are always hotels right?  The appraisal and inspection have been done so we are just waiting and hoping the buyer doesn't change their mind. I don't think they will but really I don't know them at all so we are hoping for the best. I am super happy I don't have to be ready at 2 hours notice to leave my house for showings.  I am so glad we were out of town and didn't have to worry about it.  We had quite a few showings those 10 days and got really positive reviews so that was fun. The few times I did have to leave for a showing were tricky so I am so glad we are done.
Now we have to figure out our summer travel plans because the ones we had won't work.  We have about a month between our closing and meeting my family in Disneyland.  Do we go North first (instead of after Disneyland) than down the Coast to Disneyland than Colorado or hopefully Virginia? Do we stay in Utah until Disneyland then go visit everyone? Decisions Decisions. Right now I think we will go to Utah and stay for at least 2 weeks so if Mark is still interviewing he will have a set place. Ideally he will get a job offer before we close on the house but we can't control these things so we will just wait to see. If he doesn't get a job we are planning on moving into the apartments we lived in when we first came to Colorado Springs 5 years ago and he will still work the school he has been at. I can't really believe we have been here that long. It went by so quickly.  It's been a nice place for us but we so hope we can move back East!  It is a relief to know that our town home is sold though. We really didn't want to live here anymore. With the newer nicer town homes being built across the street and our Association Fee costing us 133 dollars a month and going up each year we just want to get out of here.  We can't wait to find out where we will be heading!  It's so strange to not know where we will be 6 week from now! So unlike me.

McDonald's

Last week Jared filled up his charm jar again. When we asked him what he wanted his reward to be he decided he wanted to go to McDonald's.  First just Jared and I were going to go then all of us were going and then he decide he would go with Lydia and I. I think it had something to do with having to wait till Saturday if Mark came along.  We were planning on having hamburgers for dinner the next night so we went out for breakfast instead which I have decided I totally prefer.  When we got out of the car Jared sat down on the window ledge and asked me to take his picture.  He totally read my mind.  Nice pose!

We enjoyed our breakfast and then played in the play area for awhile. We went Friday morning and there was a good sized group of elderly people there with matching McDonald's coffee mugs. I wondered if they meet every week or something similar. That would be fun to do when I am older. I have seen similar things at Einstein's Bagels. They were a fun group and had fun talking to Jared and Lydia.

Sadly Jared has had many charms taken out today. He has been so naughty with his Easter Eggs! He asked me today if he could have one of his candy eggs after breakfast and I said No, we would eat them after church (we have 9:00 church). A few minutes later I hear him go into our downstairs bathroom and shut the door. I went to check on him shortly after and asked him what he was doing. He replied "nothing". I left him alone thinking that was odd and went back a few minutes later.  I again asked him what he was doing then saw the egg and that his cheeks looked like a little chipmunk because he had so many jelly beans in them.  I was so mad!! He got a time out, charms taken out of his jar and a toy from his Easter basket got put in time out. Its one thing to eat some candy but to hide in the bathroom and then lie is a whole different thing.  We talked some and then I just sent him to his room I was so upset. Mark went in and talked to him and then he came and apologized.  It was just so annoying especially since I said he could have some right after church. It wasn't like I said he couldn't have any ever he just had to wait.  And he has had plenty this week.  I really hope he thinks twice or like 5 times before doing something like this again. Part of me is tempted to just throw away all the candy and be done with it! So irritated and he is only 4.

Each night before Jared goes to bed I lay down with him and sing him some songs and we talk about the good and bad things of our day.  It's a nice time to sort of check in with him.  We talked a little about him being sneaky and lying and I hope he got why it was such a big deal to me. I am sure it will come up again but I hope he understands how not okay it is.  Hopefully tomorrow we will be putting more charms in than taking them out.

Happy Easter!

 This is how they thought we should take their Easter picture.  

I curled Lydia's hair for church, finishing about 15 minutes before church, sprayed it with hairspray and by the time we got to church it was hard to see a single curl.  I need to try curlers just to see if it lasts longer. 

We started Easter morning off with some delicious bunny buns. I love how they are orange flavored. We did most of our celebrating yesterday and today Jared told me "Bunny buns were the perfect way to celebrate Easter."

Yesterday we had all kinds of fun dyeing Easter eggs and hunting them and enjoying our Easter baskets.  After we dyed our eggs we went over to a library and went on an Easter egg hunt which was super fun. After the hunt we decorated our egg cartons and listened to an Easter story time.  I needed to go to Barnes and Noble to exchange a book we put in Lydia's basket and we got there just in time for story time there too.  After our stories we played at the store for awhile then headed home. Mark had stayed home to meet with the guy who is going to fix his car that has been unusable for the past month.  We are pretty excited to get it fixed.

I had the hardest time with Lydia's basket.  Jared is still completely in love with CARS so his was easy. Jared first became aware of CARS  right around when the second CARS movie came out so I had the hardest time finding him toys from the first movie then because everything was CARS 2.  Now I have a harder time finding CARS 2 items.  Talk about bad timing. In any case his was still way easier than Lydia's.  Lydia like many others loves Frozen. I wanted to get her some little things from the movie and couldn't find anything anywhere (this link talks about it). I would walk into a store such as Target, Wal Mart, and Toys R Us go to the Frozen section and they would have like one item. It was ridiculous.  I looked on Amazon and EBay and couldn't believe the prices and the lack of variety.  It was so weird.  But at Barnes and Noble they had Frozen books and stickers so it worked out in the end. Lydia was super excited. It was just bizarre.  It's hard to believe that a company like Disney would be so unprepared for the demand that would come from this movie. So a summary: after much looking and driving to different stores by me,  Jared and Lydia were so happy about their baskets. When I brought Lydia downstairs she said, "sited" for excited.  I was glad they loved their baskets.

We had 2 kits this year to dye our eggs. One was a CARS kit I bought Jared last year and then left in Colorado when we went to Utah and then I had a princess kit for Lydia. I got the brilliant idea to double up the color tablets so we could have super bright dyes for our egg and accidentally mixed a few colors.  I mixed up the blue and purple tablets so we had no purple dye but a really bright blue so in a way it did work just not how I thought it would. I am not sure what happened to our pink but it was not pretty. Jared and Lydia had fun dyeing the eggs which was the whole point so I say it ended well.

Hunting the eggs at the Library was a hit.  We did it when Jared was around 18 months but hadn't since then. It's fun to see the eggs on the shelves with the books.  Our backyard hunt was also fun.  We told Jared to look for his CARS eggs and Lydia to find her Princess eggs and it worked great. They both enjoyed the hunts.

 I can't believe how old Lydia looks here! 

We also had some more fun with eggs. Jared and Lydia took a fun bath with Easter eggs and had a special Easter Egg snack.

I had Jared play memory with his snack which he enjoyed.  He had to find the matching snack before he could eat it. I tried to do it with Lydia but she was too excited about turning over the eggs. It was fun and one of my favorite Easter activities I saw online that we did.

We had a lot of fun celebrating Easter and are so grateful for this special holiday.  Last night I attended the Easter cantata that Sally Deford puts on each year.  It was a wonderful way to feel the spirit through music.  Last week Jared sang with the Primary kids during Sacrament meeting.  He was just a little distracted. He was right next to the podium and half way through the songs grabbed a tissue from the box up there.  That wasn't so bad but when he took it and placed it on his head that was over the line.  I couldn't really see him because the chorister was right in my line of vision so I heard all this second hand.  I saw him reach for the tissue but I knew he was up to no good when a friend of mine who sits right up from kept looking back at me and laughing. I am glad she was entertained.  She told me all about it when I visit taught her. Oh well.  He will grow out of it one day.

Easter Fun

We jumped into Easter mode right when we got home from Spring Break. It has been so fun, I just really love planning out these activities. We have been playing and learning with Jelly Beans, Mini Cadbury Eggs and Bunny marshmallows.  To quote the cashier at our local grocery store: "Easter has the best candy" We've hunted eggs, chicks, and bunnies and made cute Easter art projects.

 Counting and sorting

 Graphing

 Patterns

 Addition and subtraction

 Color identifying

Finding the bunnies

Jared and I made this cute little rabbit puppet and fed him Shape carrots.  Lydia and Jared both love it! I have been wondering how many shapes Lydia knew so this activity was a perfect way to find out.  She knows them all except the hexagon I through in there.

 Grandma Sue sent Jared and Lydia a cute Easter package and it had these Easter glow stick wands in them. Jared and Lydia love them and took them into the bath with them and slept with them last night.

This morning Jared was playing with his and the bunny came undone.  He was so sad and tried so hard to not cry about it. We talk A LOT about how it's good and fine to feel sad or mad but we don't have to yell and throw a fit about things we don't like. I don't want him or Lydia to think they can't be sad but I also don't want the waling and gnashing of teeth that comes with it at times.  He went to find Mark and show him what happened and Mark asked how it happened and Jared said he played too rough with it. I am writing this because I was really proud of how he handled it. He was very upset but he recognized that he was the one who broke it and only had a few tears. I could see him just biting his lip and working so hard on not sobbing. Luckily for him the bunny could be taped back together since it didn't crack just came undone.  So we had a happy ending.

Jared also got to go on an Easter Egg Hunt at preschool yesterday.  Each kid took 12 eggs then went out to find them. Jared brought home 4 of our eggs which I thought was funny.  Guess he liked what we put in there.  After his nap yesterday he came over to me and said he had a great idea. He said " How about I eat one piece of candy each day?" I would like the candy gone much sooner than that so I suggested he eat one egg a day.  He really liked that idea and went to his basket in the kitchen to get an egg.  I was at the computer finishing a blog post and I kept hearing him open eggs and wrappers. After about 5 minutes I finished up and went to go check on Jared and he had eaten like 5 eggs! He looked at me and told me he "was being so sneaky." In reality I knew he was eating more than one egg but decided that I would rather have the candy gone before we do another egg hunt and if he wasn't asking me if he could have more where I would have said no then I was glad it was gone.  We did talk about how we shouldn't be sneaky so it ended well.

And we have of course been remembering the true meaning of Easter as well. There are quite a few really good Easter videos on Mormon.org that we have watched and each night we do 2 of our Resurrection Eggs.  There are 14 of them so typically we do an egg each night the 2 weeks before Easter but I forgot to start on the right day and decided since we have 2 kids we should just do them the week before Easter and then they can each do 1 egg a night.  We have also been doing a new activity I found online that uses pictures from the last week of Christ's life.  We hold up a few pictures each night and tell what is happening in it.  We have really enjoyed it.  Each night I tape up the ones we did that night and then we can see them all day and talk about them. Its been great.  Such smart people out there on the Internet.

We have a few more activities planned and some egg hunts to attend so it should be a great weekend.

Smile!!

It's strange to me how sometimes Jared and Lydia love having their picture taken and other times they want nothing to do with it. Since we have been home they have been on more of a love kick and have even asked me to take their picture. I have always tried to explain to them how the pictures I take are the ones we will look at later on the computer so they should look at me and Smile but it doesn't always sink in. Lately when I take Lydia's picture she says "Smile!" She is cute.  As these pictures show.

First time I curled her hair.

While in Utah Sue curled Lydia's hair a few times and Lydia seemed to like it so yesterday I bought a small curling iron so I could curl it. She was so patient while I worked on it. I already knew I lacked the skills to curl my own hair but thought I would be a little better at doing her hair but I wasn't.  It was still cute because she is so cute. I will have to practice a lot more if she will let me.
Lydia also learned a new "trick" from her Aunt Molly while in Utah.  Molly always keeps her cell phone in her bra pocket so Lydia saw her do this a good amount. A few days after we go home I was sitting on the couch with Lydia and she does this:

Mark and I looked at each other and both said "Who could she have learned that from?"  So funny.  She also really likes her "pockets" and loves trying to put things in them.  Sadly for her some of her clothes don't have pockets so she will often try really hard to put things in her pants.  We have found some goofy things but mostly just tissues.

Lydia has also decided she occasionally prefers to go "commando" at nap time and sometime at bedtime. While we were in Virginia Sue would go to get her up and she would be free as a bird! Jared maybe did this once when he was younger but Lydia does it at least once a week.  She is so silly. When I went to get her from her nap today this is what I saw:

 Her underwear and pants. 

Jared thinks it is pretty hilarious. We do not and are so glad she stays dry as well as she does. 

The other day I went to go wake Jared up from his nap.  When I got to his room he was laying in bed waiting for me like this:  Such a sweetie.

Lydia also lately developed an interest in the princess crown we put on her birthday cake. It has been sitting on her dresser since January and she has never taken it down or asked for it. This all changed last week and both of them enjoy wearing it now.

We are still loving our Blender. We are only 7 smoothies ways from our 100th one since February. Yeah it has a counter. Mark makes us a green smoothie most mornings and I love starting our day with them knowing we are getting in some servings of vegetables and fruit. It is the best way for us to get Jared and Lydia and me to eat them.  Sometimes we make one to go with our dinner too and Jared and Lydia get really excited when the smoothie is not green.  They do like them but a non-green smoothie is like a special treat. Our blender is not really that loud. I mean it is but not as loud as they act like it is.

We had the missionaries over for dinner last week so I decided to try out a new dessert. I love chocolate and peanut butter so I found THIS peanut butter brownie cake and made it.  Sadly one of the Elders couldn't have peanut butter (but enjoyed the brownie part) but other than that it was a huge hit. The cake was huge so I had Mark take it to school the next day. Have I mentioned how much I appreciate having a place to send leftover desserts so I don't eat them all? I really do. Jared was not pleased when Mark took it to school. The teachers really enjoyed it which makes me happy.  It was super rich so I felt a little bad that they did not have any milk to go with it. But they still loved it.

Before I frosted it, it called for so much butter!!!

We have been having lots of Easter fun and are excited for the big day!