Lego Creations

Andrew has really gotten into making all sorts of things out of Legos. It helped that we had a friend give us her son's old Legos, so now he has quite the collection of the colorful bricks. Here are some pictures of things he has created. His favorite things to create are spaceships and Lego City buildings.

Tulip Fields 2013

Last month we ventured up to the Skagit Valley to see the tulip fields in full bloom. It was a gorgeous day! We ended up having a picnic in the parking lot of one of the fields before we headed out.On our way home we stopped by the Alderwood Mall to go to the Lego Store. And we found the cutest little potty in the mall's family bathroom. :)

Easter 2013

Here are some pictures of us on Easter. Andrew, Caitlynn and Josiah Caitlynn in her outfit from Nana Caroline. When my mom gave me the dress and cardigan for Caitlynn I knew I wanted it to be her Easter dress. And I wanted a family picture of us on Easter, so I had us all match. I ended up finding a shirt for Micah and a skirt for me that matched perfectly to Caitlynn's outfit. And just because she is so adorable, here is another picture of our little beauty. We had a wonderful day celebrating the resurrection of our Savior. The weather was gorgeous! We spent the morning giving the boys their Easter baskets and getting some pictures, then it was off to gather with our church family. After church we headed to my parents' house where we had a wonderful meal with my dad's side of the family.

Craftiness

I love to make things, so here are some of the things I have made recently. Andrew has been loving Legos, but he wasn't too keen on the picking up of the Legos. That's when I remembered a tutorial for a Lego sack I found at Make It Perfect.

Now if he remembers to keep all the Legos in the sack while he is playing clean up is a cinch. I also learned how to knit earlier this year, and my friend Lori was kind enough to give me the pattern for a cute little shawlette. I loved it so much I made one for me and this pink one I made for my mom for Mother's Day.

And last, I made a little backpack for a friend of Andrew's who loves dinosaurs. It was her birthday and instead of using a gift bag I remembered that I had some leftover dinosaur fabric that I could use to make her a bag instead. It was super easy.

And now I am working on all sorts of fun baby projects since I have a handful of friends who are expecting babies. Hopefully I will remember to take pictures of the projects.

Andrew Turns 4

At the end of last month Andrew turned 4. We did many things to celebrate. Andrew got to go out on a Mommy and Daddy date where we took him to Kidd Valley for hamburgers and milkshakes. And then we went and saw a puppet show of three Eric Carle stories. We had lots of fun. On the morning of his birthday Daddy made him special pancakes, one even had a number 4 made out of chocolate chips. Then it was time to open one present (we saved the other little presents for his party). The not so fun part of his day was going to the doctor and getting 4 shots. But after that we had lunch at Red Robin, and enjoyed a nice time as a family.

Then we celebrated with a party by having some friends and family over.

Kerikeri, NZ

Kerikeri was our last stop on our New Zealand trip. We almost didn't go up there because there had been a lot of rain, so much that it was flooding up in the Bay of Islands. (Kerikeri is one of the towns in the Bay of Islands.) But we called up our B&B and they said it should be fine; there was no flooding near them and all the main roads were now open. So we decided to risk it, and we are very glad we did. We took these two pictures on our drive up to Kerikeri.

For dinner we ate at a fabulous little place called Jerusalem cafe. We had a sampler platter, and we really enjoyed everything we had.

The next morning we woke up to clear skies, and we were happy we had booked a boat tour. Micah enjoys a quick cup of coffee in our suite before we depart for our day. We started with a boat tour around the Bay of Islands. It ended up being a gorgeous day, and the best part was that we got to see four separate pods of dolphins while we were out on the water. We even got to see some of them jump out of the water. It was amazing!

At the end of our boat trip we got off at Russell, another cute little town on the Bay. We had a fish and chips lunch while we enjoyed sitting outside looking out on the Bay. Next we took a ferry back to Kerikeri, where we did some souvenir shopping (we still had not found much for the boys). Thankfully we found a few things we thought the boys would like, then it was off again. We drove to some glowworm caves we had spotted on our drive up to Kerikeri.

The glowworm caves were very interesting. I was a little freaked out about being underground in the dark, and I was very thankful we were in one of the small caves. It was amazing to see the glowworms. They looked like a miniature version of the milky way.

One of the best things about our stay in Kerikeri was staying in the Lyness suite. It was a wonderfully peaceful retreat after our crazy days, and we really enjoyed getting to know the owners. The property is beautiful, and our room was private and comfortable.

Rotorua, NZ

Because of our delay in Queenstown, we only had one night in Rotorua instead of two. So we tried to pack what we could in our short time there. We walked around some of the geothermal pools and peeked in at the Bath House and Museum before we headed out to our Maori village cultural experience.

We really enjoyed going on the Tamaki Village show. They bussed us to the location of the village, and they entertained us on the bus ride by having us pick a tribe leader. When we got to the village the tribe leaders stood out in front while the Maori warriors came and danced in front of them to see if we were friendly or not. Once we were welcomed into the village we were able to go to different huts to see demonstrations of dances, games, and explanations of the native practices. Then we got to see our dinner cooking in the earth pit. While we waited for our dinner to be ready we went into the meeting house to watch some native dances, and a video on the Maori people. Then it was time to enjoy our wonderful dinner.