Finally......

Kayann turned 5 (ok back at the end of April)! Before we talk about her sweet "garden party" lets talk about Kayann. She is a great helper. She loves mothering Ashlynn. She wants everyone to be happy. She cant wait to start school, in JULY!!! She is starting to make the same expressions as her brother. She is so sweet and caring.

We waited to have her party until old Grandma got back from Ohio. Kayann wanted to have a butterfly and flower party.

To start we decorated pots to plant in

Than, by Kayann's request, we had hotdogs, that one fruit salad (frog's eye) and potato salad, with strawberry lemonade

The kids wanted to sit outside. However Raymond and Connor are to big to sit with the little kids

Kayann's auntie Rayna made her a sweet pinta.

Sal was willing to hold the rope. I think he was more willing to toy with the kids. It was so funny.

The pinta was pretty tough to break which gave all the kids a fair shot at it.

Of course we had to turn it into sweet hats to wear

Time for cake! Again by request we had a vanilla cake with strawberry filling, chocolate frosting with "dirt" and gumdrop flowers. What a little planner Kayann is

Kayann got so many wonderful presents for her birthday. She really does love them all.

A big thanks to everyone that celebrated this sweet girl getting bigger!

And he did it!

Derek has worked very hard on getting to this point. Sure he has had some set backs, but he was worked through them

I am very proud of him for sticking to it and finally graduating with his Associates Degree. His next step is the University to get his Bachelors Degree in middle school education so he can teach science.

Derek choose to participate in his graduation ceremony. My mom and Kobe came. So did his dad and Debra. Kobe got a little board so we played

After graduation

Happy Easter

HAPPY EASTER!

I know my kids dont take good morning pictures. I will say Ashlynn and Raymond look very similar here

Easter was great. The kids were so excited. Raymond told me a few days earlier "mom I dont think the Easter bunny is real. Im pretty sure that you and dad buy stuff and hide it." Awesome. Derek decided to have a little fun with this and hide his basket in the garage. Raymond almost thought he was left out. It was so fun to see the excitement on his face when he finally found it

I find it much harder to teach my kids the meaning behind Easter than I do the meaning behind Christmas. Believe me I try but its a hard concept to grasp. Birth is easy. Resurrection........not so easy. Hopefully they will understand one day

Easter Brunch

I ALWAYS have to work on Easter. It is a big thing. So instead of trying to cram brunch in before I went to work on Sunday we decided to have brunch and an egg hunt on Saturday.

Everyone brought something. I loved to cinnamon rolls Andria brought. Lisa brought an egg dish that our family has been making for brunch for what seems like ever. There was so much to eat, the kids were in heaven.

After we ate Derek and Sal headed to the park to hide eggs. WE HAD A MILLION EGGS! We dyed some and filled some. We could only use half the park because another family was heading eggs. We finished just in time to let a different family use our half. What a busy park! The kids loved looking for eggs and showing off what they found.

Since my mom just had surgery Christian wheeled her to the park.

Uncle Joe decided to let Raymond drive back to the house................

A little eggie?

First let me start this by saying, I know I am super far behind. There just isnt enough time. But now I will catch you up!

My sister recently moved back to SLC with her family, by recently I mean a couple of months ago. This is great! I love having her boys around. I love doing things together. This year for Easter we decided to bring all the grandkids to my mom's to dye eggs (my mom had knee surgery a few days before)

The boys were not very interested in dying eggs. It took all the had to stay long enough for a picture. When did they get old enough to want to do their own thing?

JoEllen and Nicky

Ashlynn wanted to dye all the eggs pink. It is her new favorite color. Kaylee was nice enough to share with her

Kayann and Sal are the best of friends. They are convinced that they are married. It is pretty dang cute!

We all pitched in for supper. My sister made bacon wrapped meatloaf that was amazing. Joe and Cari came when Joe finished school. It was so much fun to have the family together. I love the loud craziness!