April Misc

Adley's Playtime

Now that our little girl is two, here are a few things she likes to do...

Push her own cart at the grocery store,

play at our neighborhood playground,

make faces while playing Roll and Play,

(pictured: surprised, happy, sad)

play with coins and stuff them into her pockets,

put her shorts on her head after going potty and announce, "Take a picture, Mommy!"

feed Baby Grace using her new doll high chair (a kind hand-me-down gift from a friend!),

play dress-up,

and sing songs!

This little girl certainly is an energetic bundle of joy, and we love her dearly!

Celebrating Great-Grandma

In early April, Jason's grandma was taken home to heaven, so Jason traveled to Minnesota for her funeral. All of her seven grandsons served as pall bearers. While we mourn her departure from our world, we rejoice that Grandma is no longer dealing with any more physical or mental ailments. We rejoice in Jesus's victory over death and are thankful that Grandma is in a place of no more mourning or tears! 

Little Entrepreneurs

Twice a year, our neighborhood holds a subdivision garage sale. This spring, our family decided to participate in the sale. Jaden and Cody were eager to earn some money of their own by selling lemonade and brownies. So, the day before the sale, the boys mixed up a couple batches of brownies...

...and stirred up some lemonade.

They even designed a posterboard sign to advertise their goodies. On the day of the sale, Jaden and Cody got pretty warm sitting outside in the hot sun and spent at least some of the time cooling off inside. But, each time someone wanted to buy a treat, we'd call the boys back outside to make the sale. They were pretty excited with the money they earned that morning. The brownies were especially a big hit!

Family Photo Shoot

This month we asked my sister in law Sarah to take some family photos for us. We wanted to get some 2-year-old pics of Adley and some early 7th birthday pics of the boys. As always, Sarah did a fabulous job! We loved her location and the precious expressions she captured of our kids. We were so pleased with how the photos turned out.

Field Day

At the end of their 1st grade year, Cody and Jaden had the exciting opportunity to participate in their first ever Field Day. Our school's K-4 grades competed against seven other nearby Lutheran schools, including cousin Ian and Ryan's school! The boys thoroughly enjoyed their morning-- who wouldn't like a day off school to run around outside?!

A few 1st grade moms gifted all of the 1st grade boys with tall green socks and green hair spray. The girls received festive school-colored hairbows and green socks as well. These moms went all out! Cody and Jaden both wore the socks, but only Cody was excited about the hair spray. It was pretty cute to see so many of their classmates matching.

Jaden and Cody were each in 3 events. Jaden's first event was the long jump. It was quite the popular event for the 1st grade boys-- look at all of his classmates in line with him!

Jaden had two opportunities to jump. He had practiced the proper form for long jump in PE and made two pretty decent jumps! 

After Jaden's two jumps, the event facilitators recorded his farthest jump on a ribbon. Jaden best jump was 7' 8". Way to go, buddy!

Next, both Jaden and Cody ran in the 100 yd dash.

I chose to stand way at the other end of the field so that I could see the boys cross the finish line. Because of this, I couldn't even tell who was racing until the boys got closer. I had my camera ready to go on each heat! Finally, I saw Jaden racing towards me and took a few pictures. I didn't even realize that Cody was running right next to him until the race was done! I had assumed that only one runner from their school would go at a time and felt so silly for only cheering on Jaden. Thankfully,  they were running close enough that I captured pictures of both of them. :)

As soon as they crossed the finish line (Cody just barely ahead of his brother), Jaden came to me in tears. I assumed that he was disappointed that Cody had beat him. As it turned out, however, Jaden hadn't tied his shoes very tightly that morning, so both shoes flew right off his feet early on in the race! Even though he was terribly embarrassed by this, Jaden kept on running and still came in third place. After a while, Jaden eventually saw the humor in the story and laughed as he told others what happened. What a funny moment! 

I was so proud of Cody, too, for taking 2nd place in this run. He pushed himself so hard! Here are a few more pics of the race that a friend captured for me. I love the boys' determined expressions in these (and of course, seeing Jaden's stocking-feet too!).

Cody next participated in the sack race. This event looked pretty difficult! We saw some other participants topple over! Cody put his all into the race and barely eked out a 3rd place ribbon. :)

Hooray for our little green-haired sack racer!

The boys' last event was a shuttle relay. Each boy was on a different 4-man team with other boys from their class. Both Jaden and Cody were the starting runners for their team. Jaden's team was up first.

Jaden's team came in first place! Their celebratory picture was taken with the girls' team from their class, who also won a first place ribbon. What a fast group of kids!

Cody's team of boys didn't look quite as athletic, in my opinion, so I wasn't sure how they would do. These boys, however, got a commanding lead and easily took a 1st place ribbon for their heat as well! It was such a fun race to watch.

Hooray for Cody and his speedy team! :)

In between events, Jaden and Cody enjoyed finding their cousins and playing games with them. This was probably the best part of their day! All in all it was a fun morning and a good first experience with field day.