lundi 2 avril 2012

A Grrrrrreat Spring Break

I have to say I love living in the Family Housing. I seriously think it's the best place we've lived in since we're married. I'm not talking about the apartments, which are a little, well, old and outdated but only incidental compared to the quality of life we have here.
Every year for Spring break, the Family Housing organizes a week of fun outings to visit museums and attractions around Boulder. The weather was amazingly warm and sunny all week and for the first time this year both boys were old enough to actually enjoy the various outings.

So here comes the plethora of pictures.

Monday morning was the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. We were planning on going together as a family but William threw up the night before so we were afraid he'd be sick on the bus ride or in the museum, so he stayed home with Russell. Josh and I had a lot of fun together and with our friends from the Family Housing.

The infrared camera that showed how cold the tip of my nose was (Lol), and how cloths are surprisingly good insulators.

Giant dinosaur bones:

The discovery zone, where Josh played association games, made polymer, learned about vacuums, learned the polarity of magnets, matched dinosaurs with their skeletons, dug for dinosaur bones...
...discovered deforming mirrors (a big hit!)
 and best of all, he got to ride in the bus with his best friend Sammy (and imitate each others random finger sucking)


Tuesday afternoon we went to Jumpstreet, a place with trampolines everywhere and bounce houses for little ones. William and Josh had the time of their life, especially William our half kangaroo, half human 20-month old.
Permission to get wild with their friends = heaven for my boys

 wrestling with the Jacksons and the Fergusons, our twin-families (they have only boys like us and they're very close in age)






Wednesday was play-in the sun day. We also went to the mall where the boys love to play (there's a dinosaur play area).

Josh got a new bike last week-end to replace the balance bike that was getting a little small and that we wanted to let William use. It took them a day or two of readjusting which made for some of the most relaxing times I've had following them on bikes. Now that they're used to their new bikes I'm back to my forced work-out running after them.





We decorated the side walks with chalk, and water.



 Josh drew a dinosaur skeleton


and we watched Josh's friend Sammy while his parents went on a date to the Boulder Dinner Theater (another great outing organized by FH).


Sammy was extremely focused on the Berenstein Bear show we watched before bed time.

Thursday morning we went to the zoo. It was a hot and crowded day but we still had a great time.







On Friday Russell surprised me by taking me to the Hill to get my ears pierced! I had never had my ears pierced. It was exciting! It took pretty much the entire day to do it (after 3 failed attempts - closed shop/open but no ID/with ID but no earrings I like) but at the end of the day my ears were pierced! Now we'll have to see if I can stand them, or if I have an allergic reaction like my Mom and some of my sisters have.


Later that evening we had ice cream with our neighbors at the Resident Council Ice cream Social. Lots of good friends to hang out with for us and for the boys.

Saturday was general conference. It's a little hard to focus and hear anything with the boys running in circle around the computer but I was so proud when Joshua prayed for lunch and said "Thanks for Thomas Monson". I guess despite the chaos that caused me to miss out on half of the talks Joshua still managed to learn about the prophet and to recognize him.

On Sunday night, our friends the Conkeys invited us to an "after conference" dinner at their apartment. Emily made some Japanese wontons and fried veggies and a few other friends brought delicious sides and dessert. We are so glad to have such great friends but sad to see so many leaving this year.
Josh and his preschool friends (Sammy, Elsie and Adam)  and their siblings had a lot of fun playing ball, chasing each other, and painting each others faces with mud.


What a great week we had! Today and tomorrow we're expecting snow. This is so typical of Boulder, but I love it!

mardi 13 mars 2012

At last we can play outside!

I know these pictures will only interest me and maybe a few members of my immediate family but these are some of the things I want to remember. 

Spring is on its way and it's like we're breathing again. Playing outside is the boys' absolute favorite activity.

Here's William walking in his Grampa Parks' steps:
Or more accurately:

 (Throwing things over his head is William's idea of Fun)

Joshua is pretty much a pro this year:

As William gets older, he and Joshua interact more and more. I was looking forward to this day because I heard that's when my life was going to start being easier... Well we're not there yet, they do interact with each other a lot but it mostly involves tackling each other, climbing on each other's back, taking away each other's toy, destroying the puzzle/tower/lego set  the other was building, competing for pretty much anything and everything etc... 

So here's what the real baseball session looked like when I wasn't assigning turns:

I think this one deserves a zoom in:

No wonder today when I picked up William from MOPS (which I'll have to post about later cuz it's pretty awesome) the ladies who watched him asked how old he was, implying they'd like to switch him to the older class because he's bullying kids his age... Hem, hem... where does he get that?

And more cute pictures of the boys with their friend (and pretty much next door neighbor) Kent:









vendredi 2 mars 2012

Our winter vacation... is it March already?

Boy I'm behind on this blogging thing. Hundreds of pictures are accumulating on my computer I don't even know where to begin.
One of the coolest things we did over Christmas break was to go visit Russell's family in Arizona. We left around 5pm a few days after my birthday and drove all night. Russell insisted on driving most of the way saying I should sleep so I'd be rested to take care of the kids when we arrived the next morning. Haha! Funny joke. I woke up in panic every time the car hit a bump, took a sharp turn, slowed down or accelerated... not my idea of a night of rest. Anyway, It took us about 14hrs to get there (and that's fast!)
We had so much fun there. Josh and William were entertained the entire time we were there. Not a minute to get bored, they had lots of play time with Gramma and Uncle Cody, new toys, new DVDs, a new house to turn upside down, a garden etc...



Fun times with Gramma


While we were there Russell's Mom took us on a family outing to the zoo. It was a great hit with Joshua.
What fun memories we created that day.


A tank full of sharks, Josh stood there mesmerized for a good 15minutes


Attempting to touch the stingrays, horseshoe crabs and starfish (he's braver than me, he actually touched the stingrays)

 A slow paced but interesting show


The long awaited felines. I don't think we'd ever been so close to a leopard before.

Riding a dinosaur on the carousel.

 A crocodile... ew! I'm really not a big fan of reptiles


 And feeding giraffes (they have REALLY long tongues!)


 William's favorite animals were the penguins. They were so playful. He kept following them on the other side of the window and was so excited to see them dive and twirl in the water.






We were also very lucky to be able to spend some time with Great Gramma Parks who was visiting her niece in the Phoenix area. It was her first visit with Joshua and William and they (especially Josh) fell in love with her. (Who wouldn't, she has to be the prettiest great gramma in the world). We had a great time visiting with her and her niece Christine.


As usual, Russell's Mom had the best birthday present for me. She sent Russell and I to a Swiss restaurant ("Le chalet") for a delicious meal. I had a very authentic raclette with cold cuts for dinner and a sugar and lemon crepe for dessert. Russell had a Salmon flamenkuche and a buckwheat crepe. It was heavenly, really!