that's my boy

Following his dad around the yard with something in his hand,
"Daddy, what's this?"
"That would be rabbit poop."

After returning from playing four square with the bus stop boys this morning, calling out to them to say good bye,
"Bye guys! Thanks for letting me play! Bye Chicken Butts!"
"Sawyer, what did you just say?"
"I didn't say butt Mom, I said nuts."
"I think I heard you call your friends a Chicken butt. You know I don't like that."
"I didn't... I said nuts. I only called them Chicken Nuts!"
"Um, yeah. That's not any better."

He does this cartoony thing where whether he's going to run or just quick going to get or do something, he bends his leg up sideways in front of himself like he's winding up to take off. I don't know if that description makes any sense at all, maybe I should try and get it on video. Regardless, I think maybe he's been watching too much Tom and Jerry.

"Phew" is the most common phrase out of Sawyer's mouth lately. He says it all the time in a comically dramatic way. Whether he's "phewing" about not having to take a bath that night or the fact that daddy's on his way home from work or that he found a toy he was looking for or just that he only has to have three more bites of dinner. It's pretty funny. It's like the tiniest little thing takes such a load off his mind! :)

Sawyer never says "Savannah" these days unless he's talking directly to her. If he's talking about her it's always "my sister". Which I think is kind of sweet whether he means it that way or not; "Where's my sister?""It wasn't me, my sister did it.""No thanks, I'm going to sit by my sister.""Is my sister in trouble?""My sister needs some too.""I miss my sister." Cracks me up.

Thanks for living up to your name, Sawyer Isaac :)






Oh, and he also learned the "see food" joke. I don't even think he knows what Seafood is... but big sister thinks it's funny so it must be, right?!

putting it all out there... as encouragement

I heard through the grapevine (or just a husband talking to a husband) that a certain friend has foregone reading some of the mommy blogs that she once loved, not only because she's crazy-busy, but because she's (and these are my own words/interpretation here) tired of feeling like she's not measuring up... feeling like everyone has it way more together than she does and are doing a seemingly better job at juggling life and this mommy gig than she is at the moment.

I think it's safe to say the stuff you'll find on my rambling pages probably won't fall into that category. And even if any one person thinks that any of the time, I'm pretty sure this friend knows me well enough to know that I do not have it together and I most definitely do not do any amount of a better job of juggling than she does. She is one of the best moms I know. Honestly.

But regardless, I decided this was as good a time and place as any to use my sad sorry self as an example to prove that mama wrong.

May I present photo evidence of the fantastic job I do juggling. Har har.
Here are a few glimpses of my house right now:

Kitchen at 1:30pmYou'll find dishes (and a bag of croutons) from dinner with friends last night, package and wrappers from a pack of muffins, cereal on the counter, cough medicine, random bags of things on the floor, table covered with beads trying to organize for a charity vendor fair Friday, oh and also kids' dishes from (a decidedly unhealthy) breakfast. My floor has not been swept in at least a week and I haven't cleaned my oven ever in the almost two years we've lived here. And we had McDonald's for lunch after swimming lessons.

This is actually a good day for my sink.

The Playroom:











I haven't even been in here in at least five days.








And the playroom is spilling into the dining room.
Where you'll also find one kid with bed head.















Ew, my stairs are gross. I seriously need to clean these carpets.

Savannah's bedroom:Which is a never ending battle... clothes all over, knick knacks all over, a bulletin board unhung, etc, etc, etc.

The kids' bathroom:Lucky it's not a close up so you can't see the grime. Of course, you might not have been able to see it anyway with the counters covered with junk that should be in the drawers.
Good timing on the picture, as a cabinet door left wide open is a nice emphasis, don't you think?

My bedroom:This one needed breakng down: #1 unmade bed. I rarely make my bed. #2 the comforter that belongs on our bed is crumpled at the foot of the bed (with a pile of towels on it I might add) because we like our spare room cover better. #3 pile of outgrown clothes to go downstairs. #4 clean laundry from last Wednesday. #5 bag from trip a week and a half ago. #6 pile of shoes that made it up from the shoe pile in the entryway, but obviously it was too much work to put them all the way away in the bedroom closet. #7 pile of bedding from when sicko Sawyer camped out in our bedroom last week. #8 frame still yet unhung from Mother's Day last year. #9 shorts I wore last night.
I'll spare you a picture, but you can't see the floor of my walk-in closet.

My bathroom:
I won't disgust you with a photo. I really don't ever clean clean this bathroom. Others rarely see it and I just kind of "forget" about it. It's rather gross.

And yet I'm neglecting all of that and dinking around here on the internet after tucking my kids in their rooms for rest time.

But let's not dwell on my lack of housekeeping.

confession #9:
I also have not printed pictures, let alone getting them in any kind of albums for three and a half years. Sawyer looks through albums of Savannah's and then sadly looks through all five pages of pictures of him in his book and asks "what happened to baby Sawyer??"
confession #10:
granted I have had three separate appointment/lesson/errands to run already today and its only 1pm, but today is my laundry day and I haven't started a single load yet. I still haven't put away all of last week's.
confession #11:
Speaking of laundry day, I only wash and dry laundry once a week. You'd think I could get my act together and not have laundry piles laying around all week long. Yet as you can see from the above picture, that is not the case. The picture is, more often than not, the norm.
confession #12:
my three and a half year old does not know how to sing the ABC's.
confession #13:
my kids watch probably two hours of tv most every single day.
confession #14:
Savannah has a weekly homework assignment to do every Wednesday evening. Most Thursday mornings I remember about 10 minutes before the bus.
confession #15:
I have penpal letters to friends sitting in my drawer from Savannah that I was supposed to mail out probably months ago by now.
confession #16:
We've lived here for 22 months and I still haven't had my address changed on my license. Um, let me rephrase that. The address on there is from five years ago, with four moves since then. And it's an Oregon driver's license. The state which I left three years ago!
confession #17:
I haven't had a haircut since December and I've needed one since January. My roots and grays are getting ridiculously out of hand, and I do that (or don't do that it seems) myself at home!

I probably have at least 300 more confessions, but I'll spare you.

Do I keep up my house well? No.
Do I try to pretend I do when we're having guests over? Often.
Do I send cards or make phone calls to the friends I think about and want to do that for on a regular basis? Not hardly.
Do I often feel like I'm drowning in a sea of chaos that I'm contributing to on a regular basis? You betcha.
Do I prepare healthy homemade meals for my family? Not nearly as often as I could.
Do I fail at time management? Absolutely.
Do I have "it" together? Negative.

I'm absentminded, I'm chaotically busy, I'm a procrastinator and above all I'm lazy.
I go in spurts just like I'm sure 99% of us do.

The only thing I even try to pretend I might be on my way to having my act together on (and the stuff I like to highlight here on the blog because it's so much more fun!!) is when it comes to holiday and birthday stuff, because that stuff is important to me. It's important to me to make a big deal for my kids and to make things special and memorable, or perhaps teach them to want to make others feel special and memorable too. It's important to me to put extra effort into celebrating those things, because otherwise? Normal everyday life around here is boring, chaotic, messy, unorganized and not always very fun or pretty.
Also, it partially boils down to; I'm not the best every-day mom, so I tend to want to make up for it in other ways.

And I have to point this out too. Admittedly, I think I have it pretty easy right now. I only have two kids right now; one in school part time and the other being past the high maintenance toddler stage. I don't, for instance, have three kids 3 and under... I don't have homeschooling to throw in the mix... I don't have any health concerns or issues in our family to deal with... I don't work for an outside income... basically, I'm at a pretty easy going spot in this mommy thing right now, theoretically speaking. And still- it's hard!! Sometimes I think if anyone should have their act together, it should be me right now. But I don't. And I wonder- does anyone, really?
We keep our days relatively full and our home relatively happy, and that takes effort, no matter where you are in life. Is it always "together" and running smoothly? Not by a long shot. That's life, isn't it??

Anyway. All that to say, to my dear dear friend, give yourself a break.
We all have days, weeks, months, where we're looking around wondering why no one ever told us being a grown up was so hard. Why no one ever told us being a mom -or being a mom of two or three or four or eight- was so hard. Why it's such a different kind of hard on so many different occasions.
And we all have times when others look at us and wonder how we do it all. Yes, we ourselves- we who feel that same way about the next mom over.

And, my friend, all you have to do is look at your child's beautiful face; when he smiles at you, when he shows you with pride the puzzle he's finished, when he just wants one more hug, when he's sleeping soundly in his comfy bed at night... just look at those faces and know that God only gave you this "job" because He knew only you could do it just the right way to grow your kids, to grow yourself, to grow your marriage and grow your family as He intends.
Your children are blessed to have you as their mother. Your husband is blessed to have you as his wife. Your family is blessed by you, as are your friends, as am I.
I'd say you're right on track.

top ten picks for road trips

I spent 16+ hours in the car with my husband the weekend before last. While we had great fun (and peace and quiet -who remembers road trips without kids in the car?!!), we did eventually run low on things to talk about, which seemed magnified by the fact that we forgot to ransack the house for good trip music before we left. So conversation turned to brainstorming ideas for future Tuesday Top Ten Lists. We came up with a few goodies. And number one on that list of brainstorms?...

My Top Ten Favorite Road Trip albums:
Note: This is my list. though we had some meshing, our top tens differed and I don't remember lots of his must haves, so here are mine. Also, be forewarned these may also be biased in the fact that they probably aren't in reality the best road trip albums, per say, but rather albums that remind me of that period in my life of taking tons of road trips at any chance. Whether I actually listened to them on actual trips or not, may be up for debate.
I'll shut up now and get to the list:

1. Tom Petty's Greatest Hits
obviously

2. Michael Jackson's Number Ones
the oldies are obviously the goodies here

3. U2's Joshua Tree
Almost all my memories of listening to this album are in a car. Listening to it on a tape deck in a boyfriend's car actually. How's that for aging myself?? Regardless, love this one!

4. Sheryl Crow The Very Best of
Sheryl just reminds me of summertime. Summertime= Roadtrip!!

5. Counting Crows August and Everything After
I think this album is good for just about anything... lounging around the house on a rainy day, a road trip, a good mood, a down mood, whatever. This is probably one of the all time favorite and most played albums I own. And being that I rarely listen to old music in the house anymore, it most often gets pulled out for long drives.

6. Live Throwing Copper
This is one that is probably just connected to road trips in my head because of the time frame. Live was the soundtrack to lots of time spent in the car with lots of friends.

7. Bryan Adams So Far So Good
Ditto #6. Many trips to the beach with the windows down and this one playing nice and loud. But also time skipping class and trips to the mall and random late night gallivanting around. Did I just say gallivanting??

8. Sublime
Never a huge fan of Sublime, or even this album, but something about it says fun and carefree and hearing it just whispers in my head, "Let's hit the road!!"

9. probably at least one Dave Matthews Band album. Pick one. There are a few out there to choose from.

10. and last but not least, what is a road trip without a mix tape cd playlist of all time favorites?? Good old summertime faves! One hit wonders! All the oldies that bring back past trip memories!

Hmmm... Nothing too recent on that list I see.
I guess that would be because most of our road trips in the past few years have consisted of Silly Songs and Trout Fishing and certain Giants. They're good, but not exactly going to make my personal top ten choices.

So. What would be on your (adult) list??
(and check out other Top Tens this Tuesday over here!)

the builder

I can't remember if I mentioned this line of conversation with Sawyer before or not; I can't seem to find it off hand, so maybe not.
For awhile he was on this kick of asking (several times on several different occasions) "Who builded us?"
As in who made us. So we'd have discussions about God creating us and "building" our bodies and so forth. He quizzed me often on it; "Who builded us again?" "God did." "Oh, yeah. I remember. He's a good builder."
That turned into specific parts of our bodies and how we grow and questions about "Why did God build it that way?" "Why did He make it work that way" and so on.
It's a topic it seems Sawyer never gets tired of.

Today we had an appointment with his pediatrician to make sure his fever and cough (going on five days) were nothing needing treatment. After the appointment, on the way home in the car, he starts asking questions again. Only this time it takes a slightly different turn:

Sawyer: "So God builded our bodies, right?"
Me: "Right"
"And if we get owies or if we get sick He can fix it because He can just build it again."
"Well, God does often heal our bodies, and you know sometimes he has doctors help Him fix when we're sick or have owies too."
"Like my cough. My doctor said no medicine but God can fix my things in my throat because he builded my throat and he knows how it goes."
"Yes, God can fix your sore throat and your cough, but we also have to make sure we're taking care of our bodies... make sure that we're getting rest and good food and sometimes taking medicine and taking care of ourselves especially if we're sick. We have to help God take care of this body He built, right?"
"Yeah, and Mom, if I crack my head open, God can fix that too. So don't worry about cracking my head open Mom- it'll get broken but God can fix it because He can just build it again."

Um, yeah. Let's not test out that theory buddy.

here

Well, it's been awhile.
Only two blog posts in the past two weeks! One may be inclined to ask what in the world is wrong with me?!

A friend asked me the other day if I had let blogging here regularly go by the wayside, like so many other bloggers lately, because of the preoccupation with Facebook and Twitter.
That would be a big fat NO.
I have never Twittered in my life, and I rarely post or communicate on Facebook. Like I said before, Facebook is simply a connecting point for me to get back in touch with people I've lost track of over the years. Sure I peek in from time to time to see updates on others (since it seems that's where everyone spends so much time these days), but mostly for me it's just led to blogs and emails and more personal communication with friends and family I otherwise would not know how to contact.

Yes, it seems a lot of those who were regular bloggers before have lightened either their content or their frequency or blog reading in leu of spending more time with those other online social avenues. That would not be me. I frankly do not need more online things to take up my time. I refuse to get sucked in. ;)
I love my good old blog. This will be here forever. My conversations or statuses (stati??) over there will not be. This is my log, my journal, my day to day life. This is something I can look back on, use for more tangible documenting like scrapbooks or photo albums (someday), and that my kids can look back on. The fun things we do, the bad days we have, the advice I look for, the seemingly boring details of me. I was looking through the past almost three years I've been blogging and I can't believe sometimes how reading a simple story of my toddlers' antics can bring back so many memories, smiles and details of that day. I love that. That's all I need.

I read a great reflection the other day referring to a lot of this kind of thinking... how much is too much... the "noise" of our lives these days and the contribution of all that's online. And remembering the real reasons (for me) for blogging. It all really resonated with me. As she said, "re-evaluating what my place should (and shouldn't) be in this curious on-line world."
Here are a few snippets from her post that stood out to me:
After somewhat of a blogging haitus- "balancing one's need to offer an explanation without presuming that anybody really requires one. Not to mention, one of the most convicting realizations I've come to is that blogging may just fuel in us (and by "us", of course, I mean "me") a need to articulate everything. I wonder sometimes if our culture is veering away from the very fine art of simply keeping some things to ourselves. Sometimes the best words are the ones we don't say."
Other parts of why we blog- "the part that craves to "measure" ourselves, the part that is naturally drawn to a false sense of urgency, the part that needs to be heard even when there's not really anything to say."

I feel like that's me. When I've been on Facebook and almost typed out a status or commented on someone else's... that's the line I keep coming back to. Why do I need to be heard even when there's not really anything to say? And isn't it the same for blogging? Yes, the reasons I blog are partly for a personal journal of our life. But why blog? Why put it out there? I can argue that it's simpler to put it out there as an all-in-one updates for our long distance friends and family... there's no way I could find time to journal and document like I want to, and also keep in touch with everyone that I want to individually. But the truth is, as a stay-at-home-mom who's moved across the country a few times in the past few years, for me it's more than that; It's another community. I've met some great girls and made some fun friendships I would have otherwise missed out on. There are plenty of good things about that.
But sometimes, for lots of people, that fine line between fun and recreation and making a few connections gets fuzzily blurred into being plugged in all the time and, as Shannon stated, "But I also think that I've probably let myself go a little off-course, when I reflect back to why I started doing this in the first place. I look back and wonder if I've contributed to the "noise level" that seems to be wearing out me and so many of the women I know."
"I'm coming more and more to the conclusion that we (I) seem to be operating in a fog of sensory overload. We blog and Twitter and Facebook. We have cell phones and multiple e-mail addresses. We're so plugged in we're almost motorized, and it's exhausting."

It's crazy, because even though I don't Twitter and I'm hardly on Facebook, I so feel that. I feel like almost the longer I have resisted that "everybody's doing it" pull of those engaging online communities, the more I can step back and see how casually plugged in all the time it would make me. And how exhausting that would be. Even if it doesn't "feel" exhausting. I don't want to be spread thin(ner). I've determined that I want to keep my energy and my limited online time focused on my memories here. Well, here and on my other four blogs. :)
I'll stick to reading and commenting on the other blogs and friends I've grown to love. If I'm going to be spending time online, I don't need to be spending it in -or listening in on- five dozen conversations in "real time". I'd rather have some "real" conversations here. Even when they're only with myself.

And please hear me when I say that I'm not trying to knock Twitter or Facebook. Really, I'm not. I think they can be great fun and also be a great way to form many new relationships. I just personally don't have the time management abilities to be involved. And the more I've realized that, the more I'm thankful for that. My kids and my husband are thankful for that.

Whew! What a tangent I went off on today! All I really wanted to say was that I'm here, I'm back, I've been busy, but I'm not giving up on the good old blog. I'm refocusing on what I want here, what this space is for me, the writing I want to be doing.

And some of that writing involves some definite catching up around here.
Odds and Ends of the past two (three?) weeks (and probably upcoming blog posts):

• my parents being here with us for two weeks and lots of fun keeping busy in all of that
• the gorgeous SUMMER weather we've had (90 degrees the past four days!)
• soccer, soccer and more soccer
• our weekend away
• my boy and our trip to the ER, which was a nice kick-off for his knock him flat fever the past four days
• new landscaping
• sunburn
• more bead parties
• Ryan's work migration to a shorter commute
  
• pickle smells

For now, it's a nice cool drizzly morning, we're headed to the pediatrician in a few minutes, and I'm spending the day scratching the itch to get my house in order and back to a normal routine after houseguests for so long. I'm hoping soccer is cancelled tonight. This is one of those Mondays where I need a weekend after the weekend.

i'm late, i'm late, for a very important date

Our baby girl
turned six years old.














I asked her if I could snap a few shots of the big (belated) birthday girl this morning...
and as usual the "few" turned into dozens.
I tried to condense here and get them up pretty quickly (read: slapped up here on the new laptop with no editing) since I'm behind in blogging, but most everyone knows that me and condense don't always work well together.






















































I love this six year old.














I'm not so good with words on occasions like this.
I'm not so good at voicing my love and my joy and my pride and putting into words what makes my little girl who she is and why she is so very cherished by us. I'm jealous of the eloquent writers who can paint such an amazing picture, their ability to capture so much of what it means to be a parent watching their child grow up... the bittersweet, the swell of joy, the amazing piece of their heart that walks around outside of them.





I wish I had those words to describe Savannah.







I can at least say that I cannot begin to fathom what I would be missing out on if we had not been given the blessing of her life joining ours six years ago.













She is the smartest, craziest, silliest, and sunniest girl I know. She'll laugh at anything; a loud belly laugh with her head flung back and her eyes crinkled up to little sliver moons.




She loves to snuggle up and read any thing at any time with any one, including her little brother which melts my heart. She would probably spend the rest of her life at a table drawing and writing if we let her, filling notebook after notebook, making up stories and poems and songs and always cards and pictures to share with her loved ones. She loves her friends. She loves to dance. She loves to run and go barefoot. She loves dressing up. She loves being fancy and pretty. She loves games. She loves making up jokes. She loves to be the boss (what big sister doesnt'?). She loves school. She loves playing in the rain and she's obsessed with rainbows right now.




















Speaking of rainbows...
she has had a random preoccupation with them as of late. She picks rainbow anything and has been on the lookout constantly for rainbow colored accessories, decorations, etc. For her birthday cake this year I decided to surprised her with something along those lines. I wouldn't tell her what kind of cake I made and presented her with a plain old white birthday cake.














Or so she thought....




















until we cut it open...














and she loved what she found!!






















I have to admit, the cake was yummy yummy!









































I found it here a few weeks ago and knew instantly when I saw it that I had to make it for Savannah's birthday this year.
It was so bright and fun and each layer tasted so good!
Ryan asked for a repeat for his birthday!!
The red layer was made with raspberries, the orange with orange juice and zest, the yellow with lemon juice and zest and the green with the same from a lime of course. The blue was done with blueberries and the purple with some big delicious blackberries. I did a regular buttercream frosting instead of the white chocolate one originally done with the cake in the recipe. YUM.
Yes it was a process, but it was simple (all it takes is two cake mixes and fruit and food coloring) and well worth the effort I think. Best of all, Savannah loved it!

Happy Birthday again Savannah Joy! Here's to your best year ever!!

pajama party

Trying to squeeze in Savannah's birthday party pics from this past weekend before her actually birthday gets here.
And be forewarned, there are a ton of pictures! We had so much fun planning and preparing for this party... the best yet I think! Savannah's been talking about this idea since before Christmas and we did our best to make it a great party. I didn't want to leave any of the fun details out, so here it all is! Hope your scroll button is working well!!
(and f.y.i. if you're reading this in a reader, the words and pictures might not not be matched up right... try clicking over to the blog page itself if that irritates you like it does me)

Savannah invited six of her friends (for her sixth birthday!) and they were all instructed to wear pj's and bring sleeping bags and pillows. It wasn't a sleepover, but simply a late night (6-9) pajama party. Savannah was set:































So first up, the cake.



Sorry to disappoint, Katie, but no fondant this time around. Instead, I made a batch of plate sized pancakes (and found out this pancake recipe is awesome!!) and stacked six of these big suckers like a birthday cake, smearing strawberry fruit preserves in between each one. Then I topped the whole stack off with more strawberry preserves, some whipped cream, drizzled just a tad of chocolate sauce on it and sprinkled with pretty sprinkles.





















In the end, Savannah was super excited about the Pancake Cake. I'm glad we went with that choice; it was fun and easy and it turned out (I think) so cute!!














Table's set: besides the Pancake Cake, we had tons of strawberries -both plain and chocolate covered, those little mini-breakfast sausages, these yummy donut muffins, and a choice of chocolate milk or fruit punch.














Here are the mini-pillowcases (they fit small travel sized pillows) I made for the girls' goodie bags...
Savannah and I stamp-painted the fronts with each of the girls' names and fun shapes and then Savannah used fabric markers on the backsides to write a personal note to say thanks for being a part of her birthday party.














I made another one for Savannah to keep and all the girls at the party signed and drew on the backside for her to remember the party.

And these were the goodies inside their "goodie bags"... all pajama party-ish things for sure; sparkly slippers, a diary, a toothbrush (all scored at the dollar store) and of course the pink-polka dot sleep masks Savannah was so excited about. All tied up with a cute ribbon to go home.
















I printed off these paper dolls (hairdo personalized for each girl and complete with a wardrobe of pajamas of course)!














The girls sat around the table working on decorating their paper dolls while they took turns decorating and autographing Savannah's pillowcase

























And then it was time to dig in!





















































After "cake" and Brinner (breakfast+dinner), we played a few games including musical chairs pillows and good old fashioned Telephone














And then of course some present time...












































And pink popcorn for movie time!















and the girls got cozy in front of a showing of Sleeping Beauty













Little Brother crashed the party for a bit











































All the girls' claimed they were going to have their own pajama party at their next birthday too! I think everyone had a great time!! I know at least Savannah did :)

easter pics

Just for the record, here are the few measly snapshots from Easter.
I felt very half a$$ed about Easter this year (that feels like a very wrong adjective for Easter preparations, but really that's the most accurate description that comes to mind). Not in the 'real meaning of Easter' kind of way, I just never did get out any decorations, we skipped dying eggs, we had no egg hunt here whatsoever, and it felt like just basically -in terms of preparation and celebration- a wham bam thank you ma'am kind of day. I dug out the kids' Easter baskets just in time to fill them and it was nothing special.
Not that any of that took away from the day... it was still a wonderful Easter Sunday; church was great, my parents arrived and we had a fabulous dinner (if I do say so myself), and of course, it was still -and always- the same day of cherishing the perfect grace of God and the sacrifice of His Son.

We just had so much on tap in the couple of weeks leading up to Easter Sunday, I didn't take the time to prepare for it the way I usually like to do.
Anyway, here is the little bit of documenting I did do...

The traditional jellybean trail















This is what Savannah hands down looks forward to the most about Easter every year. I don't know what it is about it, but she cannot wait to get to Easter morning and find the little pile of jellybeans followed by a trail all through the house to her Easter basket. She and Sawyer find their own little trail from their bedroom door, down the stairs and winding through the house to their baskets sitting in the middle of the living room.









































Their baskets had way more candy than we normally do...
I'm telling you I was so last minute and non-creative this year that that's what I was left with.
These kids weren't complaining though!




















My pictures of the morning are pretty sad and scarce (and Sawyer in his Christmas pajamas adds a nice touch, don't you think?) because it was too early and as I mentioned before, we were on time restritions with our schedule...















This is after grandma and grandpa arrived and we filled our bellies with a big Easter dinner....















and a quick copycat pic from last years' family picture (complete with Ryan in the same outfit):