Why I wear bright colors in the spring

I pulled this dress out of the back of the closet on Sunday, and (with the help of my sports bra and 2 people helping with the zipper) squeezed into it for our first real springy Sunday.  Why?  

1. I really can't wear black and brown when the weather is so lovely.

2. I get reactions like this out of Henry:

"Mommy, I like your colorful dress!

Because it makes me think about Jesus.

It makes me feel so good inside my heart.

Because it makes me feel the Spirit."

With a response like that, what kind of parent wouldn't dress to match the season?  Happy spring, everyone! 

"I'm a Good Artist!"

Henry got to paint last week because he saw Mommy doing it and begged for his turn.  I wish I let him paint more often.  It's just so much effort, you know.  And we don't have any washable paint --  I should probably get some.  Needless to say, it's stressful for me -- hovering over him the whole time, making sure he doesn't paint the table, chairs, or his clothes.  But Henry had such a great time, it was probably worth it!  He said, "I'm a good artist" at least 50 times while he was painting, and I agreed with him every time.  You can see from the photo that Henry "performs all different kinds of pictures."  These ones are mostly snakes, birdies, and dinosaurs.  I'm just proud of him for being so excited about it and so confident.  Hopefully his enthusiasm will continue, and you'll see more of his work!

I can't help but add my own little bit of artistic fun from the week.  New projects have been reeling in my heart since our visit to that Cape Cod art gallery, and I couldn't help but let something out.  This one was for our dear friends' 50th wedding anniversary.  Made with wood-burner, paint, and paper.  Hopefully there will be more where this came from as well!

Cape Cod Weekend

The Griffin family fun continued with a lovely weekend at Cape Cod.  A few highlights:

 
The Easter Bunny managed to find our hotel, and he hid the baskets for the morning of "Easter Saturday."  Henry acted excited and surprised about the basket and its contents.  I made up some story about the Easter Bunny leaving the aforementioned Target bag at our house on accident a week earlier because he didn't get the memo about what hotel we would be staying at.  I think I got away with it . . .

Of course, Henry remembered exactly which items he had seen in the Target bag.  He wasn't accusing at all, but he pointed them all out: "Those are the bath toys I saw in the Target bag!"  Luckily we picked up just a few extra treasures that he HADN'T seen to throw him off a little.  Maybe next year I'll be good at this.

The Heritage Museum had a showroom with 37 classic cars, some of which had been owned by celebrities.  Henry was in heaven, practically running from one car to the next.  I was surprised at how everyone in the group actually loved this museum!

Here's Henry taking us all for a spin (he's driving us to the "Please Touch" Museum, as opposed to the "Please Don't Touch" Museum).

Tanner eating a sandwich and playing Slamwich in Sandwich (that's the name of the town).  We failed to talk my parents into taking us to Ice Cream Sandwich, also in Sandwich.  

Strolling along Main Street in Chatham (the elbow of the Cape).  This was Eliza's recommendation and we loved it!  I loved all of the shops, especially the cute little book stores and the candy shop.  My favorite by far was a little art gallery called The Artful Hand.  If this had been the only thing we had seen the whole weekend, I would have been satisfied.  The gallery had work from several of my favorite artists, including Brian Andreas, Curly Girl, and Sticks.  

Sticks is the artist that first inspired my use of woodburning as a medium!  It was amazing to see some current work and get ideas, ideas, ideas!  I've been thinking about new projects pretty much every minute since we left this place; I feel so inspired to spend ALL of my bounteous free time creating!  

Awwwww . . . the children.

Now for some beach pictures.  It was a gorgeous day, for April.  You can't beat the sand, the ocean, and being with people you love.  Thanks Mom, Dad, and Tanner!

We love you!

Family Week

One of the hardest things about living far away from family is watching how quickly my little boys grow, knowing that my parents are missing it all!  I called my mom a few months ago and told her she'd better get here QUICK before Ellis grew up behind her back.  She responded fairly quickly . . . we had Mom, Dad, and Tanner here for the week of Easter!

It was Dad's and Tanner's first time visiting us here.  We spent a lot of time just chillin' -- playing inside and playing outside, making sure everyone got their fill of my sweet boys.  Henry and Ellis had the time of their lives.  I suspect Grandpa Dave did too.  He played the role of Henry's official full-time playmate, which means he got his fair share of playing with . . . you guessed it: CARS!

The cars went to Boston and arranged themselves by color.  This is just one of many intensely fun car outings.
Henry also did his traffic jam puzzle with Grandma and Grandpa and then cleverly matched up one of his toy cars with each of the cars in the puzzle.  If you look closely, you can see his cars placed on top of the puzzle.

After appeasing Henry's obsession by day, we worked on Tanner's latest passion by night: strategy board games.  Tanner currently spends most of his waking hours either playing games, reading about new games on boardgamegeek.com, or designing his own games.  He even chose to play board games over sleeping several times during the trip!  And for a 17-year old boy, that's saying something.  The night before they left Utah, Tanner emailed me with a list of 9 games (and links to their synopses, instructions, etc. on boardgamegeek), wondering which ones he should bring.  He brought 6 of them.   The favorites?  Power Grid, Puerto Rico, and Dominion.  

Other noteworthy nightlife includes my parents super-gluing Tanner's feet.  They claim that super glue immediately "fixes" cracked skin by creating a barrier from the air, dirt, water, etc. that would otherwise get past the skin and make it hurt.  My favorite was Tanner's reaction 20 minutes after this picture when he realized his sock was super-glued to his foot!  They had to cut off the sock!  Good times.  More to come in the next post.

Spring Break Roadtrip

Although we live far away from our parents, we feel very lucky to have so many other loved ones within driving distance of our home!  We decided to take advantage of this with a road trip down the East Coast for Ben's Spring Break.  Here's the skinny:

1st stop: New Jersey. Back to good old Jersey to catch up with old friends that feel like family! Hung out with church friends, playdate friends, neighbor friends, and many others.  Ate Ralph's pizza and made the mandatory stop at Shop-Rite.  Went to church at the old Paterson Branch. Introduced Ellis to everyone who hadn't met him yet.  Cried about how much we miss all of these people.  

2nd Stop: Pennsylvania.  Had dinner with Emily and Dave of Centennial fame.  Stayed with Christina and Mike of London Study Abroad fame.  Got to know Ava and Ezra.  Trip to the Please Touch Museum.  Covered the Philadelphia basics: the Liberty Bell, Constitution Hall, and Philly Cheese Steaks -- yum!

3rd Stop: Virginia.  Played with cousins, cousins, cousins!  Had late night conversations about family planning and the dream neighborhood.  Went to the Spy Museum in D.C.  Had an indoor picnic and movie night.

BIG LONG DRIVE: between Virginia and Connecticut.  The boys were stellar passengers.  Henry enjoyed the scenery, the DVD player, the Dairy Queen stop, and the time to just think.  Ellis caught up on some much-needed sleep.  Ben and Jenn loved the conversation time.  Nobody really loved the icky traffic in Delaware.

4th Stop: Connecticut.  Played with Amy and Dave.  Played with JoDee & Brandon.  JoDee took amazing pictures of Ellis.

5th Stop: Home!  And now I'm tired of making this post try to look good, and I'm going to bed.  But thanks to everyone for letting us crash at your places and making it a fabulous trip!

Worst Mom Ever #367

Henry gets more and more clever every day.  Knowing this, I was pretty aware that the Easter Bunny would need to be a little more cautious this year than he has been in previous years!  We planned a special time yesterday when Ben could stay home with the boys, and I could run to Target for the Easter basket shopping.  I was careful to separate the Easter items from the other things I bought and leave the secret stuff in a bag in the car.  Then, when Ben returned from the Priesthood Session of General Conference last night, he snuck the bag safely into the house.  He set the bag on the kitchen table and, like the two sly little parents we are, Jenn and Ben went to bed.  

Lo and behold, Sunday morning.  Henry wakes up at 6:30 as usual.  Jenn opens one eye to greet Henry when he comes into the bedroom.  Jenn says, "Shhh.  Don't wake Ellis.  Go downstairs and play."  Ben sleeps on (Yes, this is pretty typical).  At some point, Ben hears Henry ask if he can eat some Cat Cookies for his "breakfast treat."  "Only 3," he responds groggily.  He fails to stop Henry from stuffing all three cookies into his mouth at the same time.

7:30 happens.  Jenn and Ben stretch and revel in the gift Ellis has given them of "sleeping in" this late.  Mmmmmm hmmmmmm.  Jenn turns to look at the clock.  Suddenly the kitchen table and secret bag flash before her eyes.  She realizes that Henry must have been in the kitchen already because he asked for Cat Cookies.  There's no possible way he could have gone into the kitchen without spotting the Lightning McQueen Easter basket poking out of the Target bag.  Aah!  "Ben, did you hide the stuff?"

Ben rushes downstairs to find the contents of the secret bag strewn across the table, and Henry handling some of the secret treasures.  If Ben had been thinking fast, he would have pretended it was Easter today and that the Easter Bunny just didn't have time to make the baskets look pretty (I think that really would have worked).  Instead, he mumbles something about "You're not supposed to open that," and then Jenn walks in and rambles something like "Did you see what I bought for you?  I mean what the Easter Bunny bought for you?  From Target?  Uhhhhhhhh . . . "

Perhaps the damage is already done.  Any ideas for explanations we can give to the ever-shrewd Henry?