Tulip Festival

We met Tysen and her kids at the Tulip Festival the one day this week that was nice enough to be outside.  (I am really sick of cold weather.)  The children were wild, running off and away from me.  In fact, Blythe got so far ahead, Brandt begun asking people we passed if they had seen his sister.  They rolled down hills, they fed the fish, and Brandt tromped through a stream.

Blythe is pouting, but I don't know why.

 

 

More Easter Celebrating

On Sunday, we went to Grandma Sue and Grandpa De's house for dinner and an egg hunt.  Grandpa De is still in the hospital and we missed him.  Dinner was delicious and the egg hunt a lot of fun.  Before dinner, as we were preparing, the children went into the backyard.  Grandma Sue called out to all of them, "Don't look for eggs yet.  It isn't time."  I am certain none of the children had any idea there were eggs to look for until she said something, and then they certainly couldn't resist.

 All the DeMartini cousins.  

Ava is crying about something or other.

Frantic hunting.

Mikayla, Guy, and Lyla

Easter Bunnies, Yard Cleanup, and an Egg Hunt

On Saturday morning we gathered with the Brinkerhoffs at Grandma and Grandpa Barrus' house for some yard cleanup and an egg hunt.  Before we left, I pulled out the candy and plastic eggs to fill for an early afternoon egg hunt.  To my surprise, I found that Brandt and Blythe were both very keen to help fill eggs.  Look how keen!

Here they are, next to me on the counter.

 Rather than struggle against two determined children, we set up an assembly line at the kitchen table and I had the children help me fill eggs.  I told them they were being Easter bunnies.  Most of the candy went into the eggs and only a little bit into the bunnies mouths.

 

We took our eggs to Grandma and Grandpa's house, and did quite a bit of cleaning in the yard.  We cut back dead vines, turned over soil, raked, mowed, edged, sawed, and even chopped out grape plants that were no longer producing.  Everyone worked, everyone played, and after a delicious lunch, some of everyone looked for eggs.  Charlie played the Easter Bunny and hid while Brandt, Blythe, Lydia, Jace, and Tess hunted.  We had a marvelous time.

Grandma and Tess preparing lunch inside while others worked outside.

Our most excellent tree trimmer.

 

Jace and Brandt are up in the Red Pearl (pirate ship extraordinaire).  They are dodging balls thrown by

Lydia in the Rainbow Boat.

Charlie mowed and trimmed.

Doesn't he look cool. 

 

My rather darling egg hunters.

Carl Bloch at BYU

There has been a wonderful exhibit of pictures of Christ at the BYU Museum of Art since November.  I took the children in January when our Relief Society went, but Kent and I went back on Friday for a private tour with my mom, Aunt Georgianne and Uncle Lauren.  Mom knows a man who works for LDS Foundation and was responsible for raising the money necessary to pay for the exhibit.  

Although the children were good when I took them, it was much easier to look and contemplate and reflect on both the images and the life of Christ.  As Easter has been approaching, I have been talking to the children about Christ's life and death and resurrection, wanting them to understand that Easter isn't really about bunnies, eggs, and candies.  I was grateful for such a wonderful visual reminder to what I was trying to share with them.  The paintings are so beautiful and I was deeply touched.  I am pilfering all the following images from the BYU website.  Check it out here.

The Doubting Thomas 1881

Christ and the Young Child  1873

Christ Healing the Sick at Bethesda  1883

Christ in Gethsemane  1879

Christus Consolator  1884

More Pictures of Our Big Biker Girl

Blythe loves, loves, loves, loves her bike.

She sneaks out of the house any chance she gets and rides up and down the street really, really fast.

Helpful Children

The other day the children were helping clean up.  

Brandt was doing the dishes (sink filled with very sudsy water)

and Blythe was scrubbing the floor with dish soap (unopened; she was just pretending).

Isn't that wonderful?  

You just can't buy good help like that.

However, as I take this picture, I am standing next to this:

This is a pile of laundry just outside the kitchen.

It is a melange of clean and dirty with shoes from the front entry shoe basket thrown in.

Less helpful.

My Little Biker Chick

Blythe began biking today.  We got Brandt a bigger bike several months ago, and today Blythe began using his older, smaller one.  She did really well.  She bikes.  In fact, she rode past a couple of neighbors and called out, "I'm a bike rider!"  She even had her first crash--coming around a corner too fast and going over.  She had a cry but then got right back on and kept riding.  We have a biker chick.

Brandt is checking Blythe's head for cracks after her crash.  

He didn't find any.

Our smaller bike rider and her brother who is offering lots of tips.

As we sat outside watching the children go up and down the street (what I have been doing all week long), Heidi, Simon, and Jack Tanner came walking by.  It was too quiet on their street.  Brandt pulled out a sledge hammer and he and Simon and Jack whacked away at one of my decorative rocks.  Is there a boy anywhere who can resist a sledge hammer and destruction?  

Simon smashing.

Jack and Brandt smashing by throwing. 

Pictures of Jack (above) and Simon (below) taken by Blythe. 

I Googled "biker chick" hoping to find a picture of a chick (baby chicken) on a bike.  Instead I found a whole lot of pictures of scantily clad, heavily tattooed women on motorcycles.  Not quite the thing to put at the top of a post about our sweet daughter learning to ride a bicycle.  If, however, one Googles "chicken on bicycle," there is a whole different sort of picture that comes up.  It's all in the way you ask the question.

hen on a bicycle

"biker chick"