Trip of a Lifetime Part 1

We have been dying to take Liam to Disneyland for years, but knew he'd appreciate more when he was a little older.  Well, we had decided to take him for his fifth birthday, but then decided against that since it's in the middle of the summer at the height of the heat and the crowds, so we just made a family vacation of it.  It's been our first real, big vacation that we've taken as a family.  We were lucky enough to have Nana join us to help out and to have fun!  We started out on Friday morning (after watching the Royal Wedding!-Amazing!) and went to Yerington pick up Nana.  After we got Nana, Nana brought out the map and Liam had so much fun finding all the cities we were in and where we were going.  It was quite the surprising entertainment!

The kids were amazing throughout the trip.  We hadn't told Liam we were going to Disneyland and we had decided we weren't going to go there until Sunday because of crowds. So we did all of these distraction techniques and such to keep him from knowing we were going there, since our hotel was down the street from Disney.  I think he just thought there was a lot of Mickey Mouse stuff around. haha.  We got settled and hung out with Uncle Beannie Friday night. We had a great suite with a kitchen and our hotel had fabulous breakfast and dinners included. Liam was just thrilled to get to stay at a hotel. 

We decided to go down to San Diego on Saturday with Uncle Ben.  Per my request, as seeing the San Diego temple is on my bucket list. Let me just say, it was totally worth the 1 1/2 hour drive.  The flowers were gorgeous and the temple was just stunning and did not disappoint!  We didn't do a session or anything, just enjoying the grounds and the beautiful flowers and snapped lots of pictures. 



















Liam was too excited to run on the beautiful grass and about going to the beach afterward to pose by any of the beautiful flowers.  To be continued with beach photos...

Easter!

We had a very nice, low-key Easter Sunday.  Izzy was the one who remembered that the Easter Bunny had visited the night before and that she had to look for her Easter basket. Once she reminded Liam, they were on the prowl! Izzy found hers first under the kitchen table. Liam had a hard time finding his because "that Easter Bunny is verrrry tricky" (he kept repeating this while searching) and started hiding his Easter basket harder because he's older now. He finally found it under the office desk after playing the 'hot and cold' game.  Both Izzy and Liam got swim suits and fun treats in their baskets. They had to model for us and Izzy was really into modeling Liam's new sunglasses!  All the kiddos piled into Addy's pack-n-play to check out her loot!  Her favorite was her baby mum mums.  :D












 
We all went to church together and took some family Easter photos afterward.  I am not sure why, but we seemed to have a hard time getting a decent smile out of Liam that entire weekend.  Oh well, such is his four-year-old self.  He's still pretty handsome anyway.  I had a hard time finding cute boys' Easter clothes this year, so I made him a bow tie and he thought that was super cool. I thought he looked pretty handsome myself.





Addy was really into her Easter grass, the flowers, or the wind and I couldn't get a smile out of her either! That is, until daddy played with her.  I think this turned out pretty cute: (helps to have such an adorable subject!)

Nana and Papa and the kiddos!

We tried to get a photo of all the cousins together-- pretty much a hilarious disaster which is what you get with 4 kids 4 and under. By the time we were done trying to get a photo, we were all cracking up.



It's even more of a feat trying to get a photo with Nana and Papa and the kids. Nana and Papa are also very hard to get a photo of smiling for the camera, so add in four kids and some wind and this is what you get: 

Still pretty cute though. :)

We then bundled up for the traditional Y-town Egg hunt. I made this cute little onesie dress for Addy.  The wind was pretty fierce so we did have to change out of our Easter best.

We got to the hunt a little early to visit the Easter bunny. Liam was excited for this, except when we got there he said, "Look at that man dressed as the Easter bunny. I think it's just a costume." To which we had to explain that he was a helper for the Easter bunny and not to tell the other kids.

Liam did an awesome job at the hunt and Addy did too, despite the windy conditions. They had a lot of fun, too. Although, between my sister and I, we've been going to this hunt for approximately 30 years and neither one of us have EVER found THE golden egg. One of us found a second placer once, but never the golden egg. We're starting to doubt its existence.



I love this picture of my sweet girl. She thought the Easter grass was about the coolest part of Easter.



Hunting her first eggs!

We're so thankful for our Savior, Jesus Christ, and his atoning sacrifice.  What a blessing it is to have the knowledge that we can be with our families forever and live with Heavenly Father again. That is definitely something to celebrate.

Easter Weekend Festivities

We had a wonderful Easter weekend.  We headed out to Yerington after I got off of work Saturday morning.  Saturday was filled with fun Easter crafts, Nana and Papa's new annual Easter Egg Hunt, Rain, and Egg Dying.  I took approximately a million photos, so here are a few.  We made Easter Egg rice crispies and fun yarn Easter egg decorations.  Nana and Papa hid each grandchild a color of eggs for the egg hunt (Izzy had pink, Liam green, Peyton blue, Addy purple) and then at the end each found a big treat! (Izzy and Addy got LaLaLoopy dolls and the boys got bubble toys).  Peyton had the most fun with coloring eggs I think, he even ate them! oops!  After the egg dying fun, a community bath was definitely needed!  The the kiddos tucked into their Uncle Wes/Daddy made tent to wait for the Easter bunny! What a fun day!

The kids had lots of fun getting drenching under the gutters. haha

















Addy's first Easter egg!



Easter Baskets all ready from the Easter Bunny!