Spring Break

It would be easiest to admit we did nothing over spring break. 

Easiest…and the most truthful.

But I guess after looking at picture on my phone, maybe we did just a little.

There were some Dixon Kid Dog Piles.

Steve worked the entire week, but had one afternoon with a small break.  The kids had cleaned all morning like troopers for me so we treated them to frozen yogurt.

(We then realized why we stopped taking our kids out for frozen yogurt.  It was $24!  Yikes.  Looks like its cheap ice cream for us from now on!  Steve and I will have to go out just us.  Wink wink!)

Things got a little hairy after they were full of sugar so we had to leave the store.

Grady mastered the rocking horse and Grandma Walker's.  Its a right of passage you know.

This horse has been around since my oldest brother Jared was the "Bare Butt Rider" on this thing 40 or so years ago.  Grady kept his pants on the entire time…this ride.

My odometer read this magic number one morning.

It's tragic how many miles we have put on this car in just under three years.

Steve and I went on a lot of "dates" where we put the youngest two to bed, left the older three watching a movie and went out just us for a drive that usually led to ice cream…in large quantities.

I love our mini-dates and the fact we both love Butterfingers Blizzards.

Forts were built this week too.

Saylor wanted to sleep in the downstairs fort with the boys, but they were watching a loud movie when she was ready for bed.  Andrew made her a small fort upstairs under one of the end tables.

She was sweetly sleeping we Steve and I got home from our ice cream binge.

My favorite part of spring break was my girls day out with Saylor.

 I'd promised her I'd take her to see Cinderella and Saturday afternoon was the day.

She was pretty excited.

We stared out by eating (yet again) a sweet treat for lunch no less and then headed to the movie theatre...

where I, like a crazy person, shelled out the cash for a kids pack.  Bring on the sugar!!

Saylor and I loved the movie and I adored sitting next to her and watching her reactions.  Half way through the movie she crawled into my lap and stayed there the rest of the time.  She often spoke her mind (not so quietly) during the show about how "Mom, you need to buy me a dress just like that!" and "Oh Mom, can I please have shoes like Cinderella's?  Just for play?"

On the way home from the theatre I made all Saylor's dreams come true by buying her new pj's from Costco.  

I think Saylor and I should go on more dates.

Sunday night we rounded out our spring break by having Spencer, Eden, their boys, and Anavey over for dinner and one more birthday hurrah for Grady.  I secretly just wanted to see him blow out candles again…and try a new gluten free cake mix.  

The candle blowing was adorable…the cake mix was subpar.

Not pictured:

Hours and hours of brain rotting screen time.

Hours and hours of cleaning for one 15 minute house showing (lame) and one no-show. (super duper lame)

Sleeping in until 8 am every single day.

Staying up until midnight watching Netflix with Steve while eating ice cream and nachos.

Weight gain. (be oh so grateful this one is not pictured.)

Grady is TWO

This little man turned two on Monday.

It's killing me that he's so big…and cute…and feisty.

(No really, last week came along and I'm sure he could just smell his two year oldness coming around the corner and he became a pill!)

My sister JaNae was in town for spring break so we celebrated at my mom's house with JaNae and her kids.  

Grady's favorite part was practicing blowing out his candles.

(He blew out Grandma Dixon's candles at her party a few weeks ago.  This boy is good!)

Grady other talent??

Holding up (almost) two fingers.  He's two!

What do you get for a little boy with four older siblings with way too many toys already??

We got him a little scooter that has a removable seat for when he gets bigger.  I'm hoping the weather warms up again today (yesterday was cold, windy and rainy) so we can take him outside to try his scooter.

Other things Grady did on his birthday?

He kissed a few monsters.

Blew out his candles…about 10 times.  We sang over and over again so he could.  

He was loved and adored by his parents.

And he got the BEST gift from my mom.  She makes all the grandkids pillowcases with their names on them.  Grady is old enough for his now.  I love it!

Ski Weekend

Steve, Andrew and Carter left Wednesday night and headed north towards Wyoming.  They stayed in Rexburg Idaho and then headed to Grand Targee Thursday morning for a day of amazing skiing.

The skied both Thursday and Friday in beautiful sunny conditions and came home tired and sunburned Friday night.

They were all three smiles.  These three have found a common passion and are already talking about extending their trip to four days next year and including Colby.   It does my mom heart good to see these three play hard and have fun together.  

Steve works crazy hard and doesn't take many vacations that doesn't  include scouts or other church responsibilities.  It's refreshing to see him take two days off work to do nothing but play and play hard.

These three ya-hoo's also purchased a Go-pro camera just for the halibut and spent time mounting the camera to their helmets and filming themselves ski.  They really do crack me up.  

They brought home a few fun pictures for me to post.

Oh man I miss skiing at Targee…maybe I'll join them next year too!

Spectacular views from the top of the hill.

Andrew and Carter both came home with beard tans.

Their sunblock only worked partway against the beautiful reflected sunlight…and they have hilarious tan lines right where their future beards might grow.  It's so so funny to see!

The Teton mountains in the distance.  

(Yes, Steve taught both boys what "Teton" means in French.  Man oh Man!)

Science Fair, Parent Teacher Conferences, Crying Toddlers and by looking at this post- you'd figure I only had three children.

Yeah.  Science Fair. 

I have a love/hate relationship with it.  I love what it stands for and I love the actual day of the science fair, but I dread all the work that leads up to it.  It weighs on my being.  

But…as of tonight at 7:30 pm-ish it will be over for another year, so I think I might survive and live to put another one together next year!  (kill me now!)

Sunday afternoon we put together Colby's and Carter's boards.  Colby was a trooper and helped the most of the time.  Carter was a pre-teen and was moody for most of the process.

And speaking of moody…

Grady is showing some two year old colors as of late.  He no longer is my happy companion wherever I go.  He's a pill.

At the grocery store, the school, parking lots…and we won't even mention his behavior at church.  Ok, maybe I will.  He's awful and refuses to go to nursery.  He cries the entire time and has been known to grab the nursery leaders face and yell "DADDY!"  

He gets his point across verbally or with body language these days.

And the binki being taken away because his bite is open?  That lasted all of four hours at the most.

I tried.  He threw a fit.  I gave in.

Score another one for Grady this time.  Fifth children get away with a lot.  (Ask my younger sister.  Ha ha!  Love ya Jo!)

We had parent teacher conferences this week.   Carter's was Monday night.  This picture was on the outside of Carter's classroom.  We have a small joke between Carter and I about how he can't look at the camera.  Those eyes always shift to the side.  This picture was no different.

So we purposely recreated the shot.

I love how Carter is willing to not take himself too seriously. 

He's a good sport.

Carter's conference went really well.  Obviously science is this kids forte.

He's stellar in reading and language, but struggles with careless mistakes in math.  You can't win them all Carter!  He's going to work on his math grade and keep everything else up great like he already is.  I appreciate his grasp on the importance of good grades.

Science Fair was yesterday and this is the only picture I took the entire day.  I snuck a picture of Carter during judging.

I left the school at three from the fair and then picked up kids from my moms house, picked up Colby from violin and then headed back to the school for Colby's parent teacher conference.

This was his display close to his classroom.

(His teacher is not Mrs. Turpin, but Mrs. Sailors.)

I thought his art was worth taking a picture of.

(It's supposed to be one person, but actually looks like two people kissing.  Steve and I have laughed about that one…figuring Colby is our lover-not fighter child.  Maybe this is a foreshadowing of high school?)

Grady sizing out the desks.

Colby too rocked his parent teacher conference.  He is reading at a 5th grade level (at least that what the one test said.  I'm not sure if that's true, but he has improved a ton so happiness all around.) and getting A's in all his classes except Reading where he has  "high" B.  He made sure to tell me it was HIGH.  Mrs. Sailors told me they have changed curriculum for reading and it is much harder than before.  A HIGH B (so so funny) is apparently really good.

Colby has always been a good student but this year he is soaring.  He doesn't always (ok..never) brings papers home that I am supposed to sign or see, but he is keeping up with his classes amazingly.   I'm really proud of him.

This was Colby's board this year.

He was one of two third grade students who completed a project.  He knew this project backwards and forwards.  I won't tell you what place he received, but it was either first or second!  (wink wink)

Behold Carter's project.

(Maybe if we purposely have Carter look away from the camera all his pictures will be this amazing?!)

He was crazy grumpy finishing up this project board Sunday afternoon and I think both of us are relieved this was his last year…halle-freak show-lujah. 

Oh the pre-teen is coming out!

The Many Faces of an egg Stealer

Yesterday morning I actually cooked myself breakfast as opposed to eating nasty cold cereal.

Grady saw my eggs and immediately crawled into my lap and demanded my fork.  He ate 3/4 of my breakfast.  The cute pictures I took were worth the sacrifice.  

Behold, the many faces of an egg stealer...

When I would stop taking pictures, he would yell, "MORE MORE!"  Hence, why I have so many of these cute eggy shots.

We've been pounding out science projects this week.

I'm happy to say that both Carter and Colby's boards are done and ready to be judged.

Colby's project was really easy and involved adding things to homemade bubble solution and testing how long the bubbles lasted.  It was a piece of cake.

The afternoon we did the project was beautiful with practically no wind.

He did a great job and stuck with me during the entire project from the beginning all the way to putting the board together.

Carter's project was a little different.

We tested household items to see how they worked as solvents.  He had 49 bandaids on his body the first go around.

We ripped them off…with lots of pain involved.

Sadly…oh so sadly, I realized we did the project wrong and had different times for each set of solvents and therefore didn't have at least three trial for each of the same times.  Carter wasn't too happy…but I couldn't blame him.

These pictures are from the first go around, but the second go around had less bandaids and just enough trials.  We simplified.  It wasn't the best project we've ever done, but it totally fulfilled the requirement.

He might not win anything this year…and we are both totally fine with it.

In other news, Steve and I cleaned out the yard this last week.  This included me trimming our fruit trees.  I might have gone a little crazy and I'm praying our trees survive. The only consolation in my butcher job is that our trees were over our property line and needed to be cut way back.  They also had huge fruit years last year and would most likely not produce this year.  Lastly, its been remarkably warm this winter and all my trees are budding and blossoming.  The chances of fruit this year are nil.  It will most definitely freeze again taking any blossoms. 

Andrew was put into the teachers quorum presidency today in church as the secretary.  I appreciate the chances my children have to serve in our ward…hopefully they will learn leadership skills.  

This week included:

Science fair stuff Monday through Wednesday. (I'm always so happy when it is over!)

Parent teacher conferences.

Steve leaves with Carter and Andrew for Targee Ski Trip.

Spring Break starts on Thursday.