Finally some Sun.

Today, we finally got some much needed and longed-for sunshine. We weren't sure most of the morning if it would actually come, but we headed out to at least enjoy the drier conditions.

First we took a trip to the zoo.

Stretch Rachel! You can do it.

Then we came home to play, play, play and express ourselves on the sidewalk. It was loads of fun.

We certainly used up some energy today... finally, the kids will all sleep well, and hopefully their parents will too. Tomorrow the moms run, and the dads have the tougher job was taking care of all the kids until after the race. We'll see who has a harder time. ;-)

More Cousins- Awesome!

Last week Gavin told his friend Lexi that he had different cousins coming to visit him. Lexi said, "Wow Gavin. How many cousins do you have?" and his reply was, "I don't know, Sooo many of them. Like 110, I think." Since 110 seems to be the biggest number in their world right now, Lexi was pretty impressed. 

While we don't have quite that many cousins, we did have 4 more of them come and visit this week, and we have been having lots of crazy fun.

Everyone is even smiling... that must be because it hadn't started raining yet. 

(yes, I know Henry is sitting in the flower bed and that it is against the rules, but what can I do. He is both looking and the camera and smiling, so I hope we can be forgiven for it.)

Sara, Joshua, Hannah, Gavin, Rachel, Henry

These visitors even have parents to join them. My wonderful sister, Heidi, looking beautiful. Mark was pushing the stroller in the background of this one. He has been a good sport to chase the kids a lot, and even watched them all for us to go shopping while Caleb was still at work. What a guy!

Hopefully these warmer signs of spring will join us again at the end of the week, especially in time for the race on Saturday. Though Heidi was a real trooper when we went running in the rain this morning.

Happy Easter

We had a happy Easter and mostly great Sunday. We had no traditional food, a stop from the Easter Bunny, for way too much candy, and plenty of hunting eggs. 

We took a few pictures after church, since I had quite the morning with the boys trying to get ready. By the time we even made it to church Henry had both dirt and blood on his clothes, so you can guess how awesome the morning went. Somehow we survived it though, and you can't even see his battle scars in the photos.

This was Gavin trying to be helpful and get Henry to hug him for a photo... You can see Henry holding onto the tree to try and keep from standing for a picture. It was really fun.

Happy Easter to you all!

Lots of Family

Before our next round of visitors comes in to town, I had to get a few more posts from the last round of family travelers. We were able to have both of our parents in town for a few days, and though we did grow up about 10 miles from each other, it has been a very long time since we had a dinner with both of our parents. Nathan and Stacy were nice enough to host just the thing, on Brennan's birthday just over a week ago. 

Just a few of our many moments of fun.

Our happy hosts... they are just like newlyweds- Right?

Grandma and Papa... Most of the time we see them they are laughing something like this, so I think I like this picture much more than an posed shot I could ever get of them.

Eating some Easter Egg Hunt treats.

The Birthday boy... snoozing... We were trying to get a picture of Denice giving him a kiss on the head, but he seemed to sense that something was amiss and opened his eyes just a moment too soon. Oh well, we have plenty of time to play tricks on him later.

Who are these two older gentlemen? Hehe... they always know how to enjoy themselves, and they have taught us well.

The Worstest in the Whole World

This afternoon Gavin asked me if we could get a car DVD player for our road trips this summer. When I told him we probably could for the very long drives he said to me, "First, I'll choose a movie and then Henry, and maybe dad can choose one, but you can't mom. You always choose the worstest movie." When I denied it and asked which movie I have ever chosen that he didn't like he said, "Enchanted... You always choose that and it is the worstest movie in the whole wide world."

Glad to see there is a lot of confidence in my tastes around here.

Training Wheel Express and a few days of fun

We have had some pretty tricky weather this week with our visitors from Oregon and New Mexico, but we have still been able to manage to have some fun. Kaylee brought her bike with her, so she and Gavin were able to take a few bike rides, though they had to wear gloves since they get going so fast of their little training wheel bikes.

We spent a little time at the playground...

...And threw some snowballs.

We even went to see the Budweiser Clydesdales in the Smith's parking lot.

Since it was date night this week, we also had a chance to drop off the kids at the neighbor's house and head to eat dinner and do some bowling. None of us had been bowling in a long time, so we had a lot of laughs and a pretty good time.

You can tell from our awesome scores on the second game just how good we were.

Caleb seemed to be the winner, though you can't see his initial... you might notice that Natalie did beat both Duane and me. :-)

Temple Square

In honor of my soon-to-be-sister-in-law's first visit to Utah, we went to tour Temple Square this morning. It was a little chilly, but the weather held out for us.

Only a few tulips up so far, but we always love the flowers.

The cousins were having a great time together. Gavin and Kaylee were already acting like they see each other every day, and Henry was just running a long hoping to keep up.

For some reason this picture just cracks me up... what super cool kids.

The Lovebirds in front of the Temple.

This just had to be included because just a few seconds before this moment both Henry and Vatti realized that Henry had a dirty diaper and needed a change.

Yuck.

After some decent weather on Saturday, this is what I got up to go running in on Monday morning.

Normally, this would have me on the treadmill at the gym, but since my Dad was in town and eager to run outside with me. We did a nice 4 mile run in this nasty, wet, slushiness. My shoes are still wet.

Probably no wonder that I ended up with a migraine yesterday and am now a few pounds lighter as the result. Oh well- I plan to get my miles in on the slopes tomorrow for the first time since before I had kids. Yeehaw!

12 mile Run

This was a long one... luckily, we start working our way down in mileage from here to the race. Only a few weeks to go.

We ran mostly around town with no incidents, though a few large hills. The weather wasn't horrible or super great. Really a lot of this, except the distance, were pretty average about this run.

The Annual Stats are In

Gavin- Age: 4 yrs- Height: 42.5 inches- Weight: 44 lbs

Henry- 25 months- Height:35 inches- Weight 33 lbs

Did I mention that 11 miles is a long way?

Well- It seriously is, and after a long week of early morning runs that just get longer and longer... it felt like a really long way. On the very bright side, it was warm and we ran in short sleeves pretty much the entire way. Caryn said that I could be a super cool runner if I ran in just my sports bra, but since I didn't want my blinding white skin causing any traffic accidents, I opted out on that one.

If you can't tell by these photos- It was really dark for a long time- we left here at 5:45 and starting running by 6, with the goal to make it home by 8am to get ready for everything that we all had to do today.

What cute sisters... notice how happy they are to be running 11 miles in the morning. 

Finally with less that 4 miles to go, we got a very nice sunrise.

Hopefully the soreness will wear off and I will be able to walk tomorrow without the use of large amounts of pain meds.

Something Can Grow In Utah

Look what came up in front of my  house, and with basically no effort on my part.

After 2 years of struggling to plant and keep flowers alive I have finally figured out atleast one thing that will grow here... bulbs. I am so excited to put more in and wait for the results.

So Grown Up

Since I obviously can't get past all of the things lately that remind me how big my boys are getting... having them wear their new sandals with shorts didn't help me at all. I found these little toddler and kid tevas on Amazon for half off and couldn't resist getting them, since my kids have really gotten particular about their shoes being comfortable. I am so glad I got them too, are these not the cutest thing you have ever seen... especially with Henry's still chubby toes..

Henry's are still a bit long since the back strap isn't adjustable I can't just force his toes all the way to the front with the straps, but he still got super excited to wear them, and hopefully he won't trip too much, right? Gavin sustained some decent sidewalk burns in several places on his legs while playing tag in flip flops yesterday, so he was pretty excited to wear his sandals that feel more like tennis shoes.